Things On A Thursday
Tomorrow (today) is my son's 12 birthday. For my 12th birthday I wanted an expensive picture book, The History of Yoga. The librarians had already laughed me out of the library for several years when I wanted to check it out of the adult section. It was a beautiful book written and compiled by someone really knowledeable, about half my size -- the book, that is. It was exercise just to pick it up and hold it. But instead of The History of Yoga I got a used copy of East of Eden with an inscription: "To my daughter on her 12th birthday, so that she will know that all is not brightness and light." It did some kind of trick. My son wants all kinds of expensive electronic gadgets. He's been working on the list since last birthday. Sheesh, they get you through your kids, don't they?
I've got to clean house for a party on saturday. Just a few kids playing the new whatever with no sé cuantos controllers extra. Some kind of kiddie icon piñata they can bash. Ice cream cake. My son's sensitive to gluten, wheat specifically, so I'll probably bake him a spelt cake. Some online shopping. Much running around. Fish tacos, a movie & shopping spree are on the agenda for tomorrow.
Meanwhile, I've been in the thick of classes. And this manuscript of love poems. Deadlines looming. Suddenly I have lots of projects, maybe too many going. And these Maná translations. I'm still working on "Ojala Pudiera Borrarte" in case anyone has any suggestions. I really liked doing it. Dream job would be to do a whole songbook. I can see them sticking to Spanish. Why not? They are such masters of the language and poetic thought. But there doesn't seem to be any English translations out there that are not only singable, but true to the incredible poetic power of the lyrics in Spanish. They are poets of nuance, linguistically, musically and performatively. I think. Right now I'm listening to "En El Muelle de San Blas" and thinking of a translation.
Thinking, too, of another muelle some 13 years ago, the crystal aqua water and the graceful shadows of rays underneath. El sol y mar. The delicate trains of finger notes on a sole guitar. The moon like a painted picture book hanging unimaginably out my window, looming over la "media luna" and the subtle waves of the ebb and crash. en el muelle // sóla con el olvido Before my life changed, forever as I'll know it. And some being came to be. A light in the dawn. Le dí la luz 15 minutes before midnight. A calm and curious soul with flapped over ears like a kitten and a layer of fine fur. Birthed like a cat, my yoga stretches opening the flask to the future. My control and calm, my rational stance. The midwives all in a wonder over my lucidity. My waiting for the worst part to begin -- and it never did. Native herbs and yoga. To not control. To trust the knowledge of the body and the power of the will -- from within or without. I looked to a Huichol mask on my bedroom wall: la mariposa, el alacran, a 2-headed quetzal like a Phoenix, el caracol all within the nine layers of being, from the underworld to the rainbow overhead. That power to traverse. Something like birth. That power to go to death and come back, with something. Some pollen. Some smoke.
Greetings to you, corazón de mi vida, my son. Feliz Vida.
Sóla con su espíritu. . .
I've got to clean house for a party on saturday. Just a few kids playing the new whatever with no sé cuantos controllers extra. Some kind of kiddie icon piñata they can bash. Ice cream cake. My son's sensitive to gluten, wheat specifically, so I'll probably bake him a spelt cake. Some online shopping. Much running around. Fish tacos, a movie & shopping spree are on the agenda for tomorrow.
Meanwhile, I've been in the thick of classes. And this manuscript of love poems. Deadlines looming. Suddenly I have lots of projects, maybe too many going. And these Maná translations. I'm still working on "Ojala Pudiera Borrarte" in case anyone has any suggestions. I really liked doing it. Dream job would be to do a whole songbook. I can see them sticking to Spanish. Why not? They are such masters of the language and poetic thought. But there doesn't seem to be any English translations out there that are not only singable, but true to the incredible poetic power of the lyrics in Spanish. They are poets of nuance, linguistically, musically and performatively. I think. Right now I'm listening to "En El Muelle de San Blas" and thinking of a translation.
Thinking, too, of another muelle some 13 years ago, the crystal aqua water and the graceful shadows of rays underneath. El sol y mar. The delicate trains of finger notes on a sole guitar. The moon like a painted picture book hanging unimaginably out my window, looming over la "media luna" and the subtle waves of the ebb and crash. en el muelle // sóla con el olvido Before my life changed, forever as I'll know it. And some being came to be. A light in the dawn. Le dí la luz 15 minutes before midnight. A calm and curious soul with flapped over ears like a kitten and a layer of fine fur. Birthed like a cat, my yoga stretches opening the flask to the future. My control and calm, my rational stance. The midwives all in a wonder over my lucidity. My waiting for the worst part to begin -- and it never did. Native herbs and yoga. To not control. To trust the knowledge of the body and the power of the will -- from within or without. I looked to a Huichol mask on my bedroom wall: la mariposa, el alacran, a 2-headed quetzal like a Phoenix, el caracol all within the nine layers of being, from the underworld to the rainbow overhead. That power to traverse. Something like birth. That power to go to death and come back, with something. Some pollen. Some smoke.
Greetings to you, corazón de mi vida, my son. Feliz Vida.
Sóla con su espíritu. . .
posted by Lorna Dee Cervantes at 12:45 AM
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