Storypath/Cuentocamino: : February 2019

BOOKS ON A SINGLE SHELF

move through the rooms

of my house at night

Yesterday I installed

a hat rack in my study

My wife read instructions

and interpreted diagrams

Something about this paper

isn't friendly to ink

something was about to happen

in this poem when of a sudden

I became very drowsy

Jim Bodeen

27 February 2019

AT THE COME-ON-IN LISTENING HOURS

LISTEN #1704

My brother

brings me

voices from heaven

Soweto Gospel choir,

says he listens

all night long

every night,

Nap a bit,

he says,

when asked

Jim Bodeen

26 February 2017

BLESSING MY SISTER'S KITCHEN

BLESSING MY SISTER’S KITCHEN

What is it that drives us from the fortress

of our self to seek the company and conversation

of other beings who mirror us endlessly

in the strange world in which we live?

--First Digression, Unpacking My Library

Alberto Manguel

Toasted marshmallow Greek yogurt

with raspberries, orange scones, bacon,

set plates for yellow yokes beside

baked egg bread pudding, mixing

Savory Boursin cheese and spinach

in ramekins. My sister’s life in wetlands

with husband Craig. Table blessings

of unguarded talk, books with surprising

titles, and song. Each other's eyes.

Places set for strangers, nobody holding

or petitioning milder and safer ways to enter

Sunday morning. Snow warnings

II.

have been noted. My sister and husband

live in a cabin-made home in wetlands

in Maple Valley, outside of Seattle, surrounded

by trees, pond, animals like bear and cougar--

for one's breath-sake--that's a starter.

Before breakfast we watch

Oregon Juncos, California Quail, sparrows

and a Towhee, red and white breasted

kind of robin-like. So many birds

who cannot hear the city, like my sister,

who has access through dark roads

known only by locals. Their old kitchen,

a galley, has been gutted, made new

supported by sturdy hidden rafters.

My sister and her husband

have crossed the Atlantic Ocean

in a small sailing boat. They are sailors

and have known loss and joy sailors know.

They savvy sailor-talk of storms.

They share long marriage, adult children,

grand children--and young as they are

III.

my wife and I consider them elders.

My wife brought vases for kitchen window

flowers. I brought a book of poems

of love, longing, and loss, with illustrations

made to slow one's day. We find ourselves

before the meal discussing the word Supine

which was heard the night before

on Public Broadcasting Service

where the conservative spokesman

spoke about the Republican Congress,

calling them out, supine, suffering from

a learned helplessness. From dictionaries,

both online, and book form, (a terrific

old library copy discarded and gifted),

we find mental or moral lethargy,

lying on one's back, indolent,

sluggish, mean spirited; indifferent

to one's duty. Facing upward,

I'll add that and be done with it.

Antonyms are not listed online

but they're here, on the page:

Keen, alert, proud, self-respecting.

I recall how Hamlet's mother

called her son keen as his play

unfolded. You are keen, My Lord,

she says. Not so much, as...well,

there's more in the footnotes in your Signet

Shakespeare. I've been called these words,

I say, all but self-respecting--

but we're here to celebrate this kitchen,

the light you bring, and the birds

you feed. This food is getting cold,

and this is table talk.

Love, Jim

Your brother

23-24 February 2019

Photos by Karen Bodeen

NEAR PERFECT BALANCE

My way-walk rebuked

for who I say Jesus is

and poems dismissed

as Emerson recommends

Mountain fresh joy breath

Jim Bodeen

24 February 2019

Storypath/Cuentocamino: : The Shield Maker

Storypath/Cuentocamino: : The Shield Maker: Marty Lovins, Shield Maker Marty Lovins has been making shields for more than three decades. Being that I seldom l...

The Shield Maker

Marty Lovins, Shield Maker

Marty Lovins has been making shields for more than three decades.

Being that I seldom leave the house without one of his shields

protecting me, you might want to take a look.

Jim Bodeen

TALKING ART WITH THE JEWELER

for Marty Lovins, Shield Maker

The artist wants to cause problems

Tell Karen what can’t be put into words

Tell Karen, anything you can get away with

An idea, like Picasso says,

but a vague idea

This photo, taken 1938 Coney Island

An over-crowded beach full of white people

A thing I found

And all these white people on the beach

Cancer on the way

Obsolete wire

Obsolete gloves

Those stars

three black holes

in space

three missing stars

Karen knows all this, she’s a maker

Karen makes things

Things that can’t be put into words

Here it is again.

Eye and tongue at cross purposes.

Shape, texture, memories

This can opener. It’s texture, its feel

In the old days we opened beer cans with it

Drank the beer and threw cans out the window

Jim Bodeen

20 February 2020

If you view them as stars they make up the three

in a line from the constellation Orion, The Hunter.

(His belt.) But that’s real personal because of something

I experienced. You might see it as part of the design

to balance the composition with the red stripes.

Stars would never enter into your viewing. These

dots repeat the circles of the flute and circle at end

of black strip. But that wire-wrapped glove and a packed

beach of people is the main image I was trying to form.

“You have to like the mystery,” From a found poem

by Jim Bodeen

Statement by Marty Lovins
20 February 2019

ALL IMAGES BY
MARTY LOVINS

Earlier today, visiting my jeweler
he showed me goggles that hadn't quite
made it into an assemblage

they were my size
and might work for me
on the mountain

If I had money I would write him the check
that one, the one matching the value
I hold for each piece of work

These shields have protected me
for three decades and when I mentioned
earlier that I seldom leave home

without wearing one, an artist
asked, Really? Really, which made me
think I could show him a few pieces

right here, pretty easy,
made me almost forget about Karen
sitting beside me as we ate

Here a few are then, belt buckle,
medicine bag, fetish, elk tooth,
they're all shields, some pinned

to vests Karen makes for me.
I'm not allowed to tell you
what's in the medicine bag

anyway it changes
depending on dangers
anticipating pleasures and joy

Jim Bodeen
Storypath/Cuentocamino

Ah! What a Task!

SEEING INTO SNOW

Four days

on two mountains

new looks

through

historic highways,

12 West and East,

97 North and South,

familiar, mine,

2 in the middle

mined again

transporting images,

dream tracking.

not knowing

what's what

coming or going

Jim Bodeen

19 February 2019

COMFORT FOR EYES AND EARS

SOFT LANDING

Back from winter camp

with grandkids, new mail

waiting from old friends

Jim Bodeen

19 February 2019

Chocolates in the New World

VALENTINE'S DAY APP

Books and chocolates

after the meal with Karen

Outlanders picked from list of movies

asking What's Outlander

Someone from another country outsider
we've been talking

about moat around a man's home

Karen says keeping people away

me suggesting threats come from invitations

I'm having another one Karen says

Claire in catacombs on table

opens her legs give me a bath

as husband goes down on her

Everything out of order

in the living room our daughters

call at different times we turn off movie

Are you going to get the mail I ask

There's nothing coming she says

is it a holiday no I have a new app

on my phone tells me what's coming

Even letters I ask Even letters

You have just taken from me

anticipation of pleasure I say

You have taken the pleasure of anticipation

Jim Bodeen

16 February 2019

from "The Life of Poetry"

LEAVING FOR THE DENTIST

JUST BEFORE 11 AM

...to despise his song.

As I come back in the house,

Karen asks,

What have you forgotten now?

I'm looking for some poems

I have the notebook,

a shield

but not armor--not

for the dentist--

She has soft hands

but my country--I--

Muriel Rukeyser

randomly what must

be listened for--

quotes Emerson,

Poets should rejoice

if he has taught us...

Jim Bodeen

8 February 2019

NARRATIVES FROM THE HEBREW BIBLE

NEW STRATEGIES FOR MAKING LIFE HOLY

--Zev Shanken

We grew out of that one

never out growing it

and that became problem's way

to practice. Oh, Zev,

that you took me

to meet Jay Greenspan

sits with me this morning

before the Falls behind

the fence, calligraphy

emerging from mist,

that word Keats loved.

The first thing I do

opening

If I Try To Be Like Him, Who Will Be Like Me?

is read Al Het, after looking a long time

at the cover, Beautiful Thing, looking at it

for a long time, asking for its permission

to open, asking its blessing as a way

of asking permission to enter

perhaps opening myself

as well, a ticket

to be transported--

Bless my stupefaction

And the second thing--the second thing

is to look for is The Night Hillary Lost

overjoyed that first night you sent it

in an E-Mail--memorizing it and passing

it on to friends in letters--you've re-vised the poem,

no matter--did you soften Leslie's words?

the thing is, you got out of the car and walked home.

I was so happy to find it on paper

and in this beautiful thing of a book

and next-but-not-next, because

it all takes place

in the same breath

is to look for Leonard Cohen, he did it better, but only better,

and by now, I'm giggling like Karen does

so much better than me

and I feel good

I won't be your shield. These are chilly days for Tel Aviv.

River-running poems. Your Ken Koch poem--

so much better than the man you call out at the Station.

Israel, the idea was to become holy.

Your book is an archeological mound.

Jay Greenspan is inside your name, tattooed, on the cover.

from here and forever,

Jim

13 February 2019

Child-Sheltered Gold Mittens

KETARI, THE SHELTERED CHILD

Beautiful thing!

Dr. Williams riffs

breaking through

young-man-no-mind

recall, one,

Immortal

one of them

Beautiful thing!

going over the Falls

by the old reform school

Beautiful, beautiful thing.

Bashert

kernel of gold

slipped into Ketari’s

mitten last night

at the Shelter

under a foot of new snow

Ketari,

a year-and-a-half

warm-wrapped

Easter-bunny jammies

between

Mom and Grandma

seated on folded

bench table

Bashert from Zev

A silver dollar

slipped in

with new mittens

yarn from all colors

of the rainbow

shining

light

into old canvas Army tent

a single string

of lights

illuminating

chile and cornbread

after new snowfall

15 record inches

and cold hard love

Hard gold to love

Dr. Williams wrote

a mother’s milk

Beautiful thing!

Hard gold to love

So beautiful

this finding

this Zev-poem

this bashert

one’s destiny

and soulmate

this man walking

incognito

with a satchel

full of poems

I knew they were there

I did I knew it

I didn’t know

they were there for me

Didn’t know that

until tonight

tucking them

into the child’s

pocket of mittens

at the shelter

new mittens

gold and silver

plated yarn

sparkling

Jim Bodeen

12 February 2019

JYPSY ROZE AND THE RANGER

Jypsy Roze, Get it, she says, I do outreach at the shelter. Can’t tell you where they’re at. We go out just after dark trying to get them to come in. Last few mornings it’s been 6 degrees. It’s cold, but in the three camps, there are survivalists, and they help others survive. I leave a bag of food

hung on the tree for the Ranger. He is a Ranger. He don’t want to be found. I write him notes.

He’s afraid to come in. He don’t want to be found yet. He writes notes. I write back. Last week he asked me my name. Jypsy Roze. Get it?

Jim Bodeen

12 February 2019