Tin Man: Issa's Sunday Service, #178

 America

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An AOR hit of the 70s for the band America, the lyrics to The Tin Man have a smoky befuddlement of earlier times which, though less complicated technologically, were every bit as forbidding emotionally. 

Though the allusion to L. Frank Baum is readily apparent and the song has an easy-breezy arrangement (a specialty of America), the words themselves are a bit puzzling in their arrangement on the page, for which, of course, they were never intended.

Still it's not hard to sigh and tap your foot a time or two to the trippy confluence of color and image and sound and, yes, a touch of nostalgia, not necessarily for those times, but for some unnamed, unreal other time ... that never existed at all. 


America - Tin Man

Sometimes late when things are real
And people share the gift of gab between themselves
Some are quick to take the bait
And catch the perfect prize that waits among the shelves

But Oz never did give nothing to the Tin Man
That he didn't, didn't already have
And Cause never was the reason for the evening
Or the tropic of Sir Galahad.

So please believe in me
When I say I'm spinning round, round, round, round
Smoke glass stain bright color
Image going down, down, down, down
Soapsuds green like bubbles

Oh, Oz never did give nothing to the Tin Man
That he didn't, didn't already have
And Cause never was the reason for the evening
Or the tropic of Sir Galahad

So please believe in me
When I say I'm spinning round, round, round, round
Smoke glass stain bright color
Image going down, down, down, down
Soapsuds green like bubbles

No, Oz never did give nothing to the Tin Man
That he didn't, didn't already have
And Cause never was the reason for the evening
Or the tropic of Sir Galahad

So please believe in me 

~~~~~~~

I recently saw the new Disney release, The Great and Powerful Oz, which was nowhere near as bad as folks made out. It prompted me to go back to Oz, the cinematic classic, and then to another Disney amalgam, the foreboding Return to Oz, a film much closer in its presentation to the Baum novels than the Garland musical version. 

Baum's fetish for detachable heads alone is something to contemplate when walking on the darker side of the street. 
 
                And here is the 1910 silent version:      

--------- 

Cover of the first editon of The Scarecrow of Oz

a katydid
in the scarecrow's gut
singing

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,

Don

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Jeffrey Woodward: Evening in the Plaza - Small Press Friday

Haibun and I have had a rocky relationship over the years. I expect a certain something from the form and, it would seem, I'm very particular about that certain something. 

Let's go right to the heart of the matter: if the haiku doesn't work on its own, I'm out of there. 

Is this fair? Am I upholding my end of the relationship, am I demanding too much of a form that isn't simply haiku but haibun, the alchemical amalgam of prose and verse?

I suppose I'm not being fair but I've set a standard and I'm sticking with it. 

I'm happy to report that so is the poet Jeffrey Woodward, in his fine new collection, Evening in the Plaza: Haibun & Haiku, published by Tournesol Books of Detroit, MI. 

Evening is comprised of 40 titled haibun an 48 haiku, the later divided into 4 separate sections. Some of the haibun are outstanding, most notably "A Small Funeral," "Questions for the Flowers," "Family Album," "The Sweet Wild Grass," "Imago," and "Finis Terrae." There are many more that grabbed me, but these are the ones that had that special mix of great execution and personal (to me) appeal.

I'm sure there are others that will grab other readers.

A Small Funeral

Enough:   a    condolence   that  affords no
comfort, a eulogy too feeble to enliven the
perfect composure of its subject, a sermon
that  promises peace where peace will  not
serve ...

Against fair hopes  and  expectations,  to settle
now, as one must, for the recognized rites and
to commit this being,  so precious, to a lasting
rest, the homily and liturgy an obligation:

a book of wisdom
is set before the world
and autumn deepens

The  23rd  Psalm  recited  as,  also,  the  "Our
Father," the congregation files out and forms
a corridor as  if  to wait  not  upon this  final 
parting  but upon  the  arrival  of  a  dignitary.

a tiny coffin
ventures out like a whisper
into the bright day

 

Not far behind, there on the steps before the
great door of the church:

late autumn-
about the parish priest
the wind is black

The emotion, the power of this piece is almost beyond words. Where there is "a condolence / that affords not comfort" and a promised "peace where peace will not / serve ...," what might be said?

And then the poet says it.

Here, in words that follow the lamentation of neither comfort nor peace, comes just what is missing: a true eulogy, a sermon on loss, on pain and on sorrow. As the poem unfolds, "this being, so precious" begins to realize a final rest; the book of wisdom open, but it is autumn that keens, it is autumn that deepens. 

Now the being, the lost one, is a dignitary in the emotion of the attendees, played out in a ritual service after the formal one. The 23rd Psalm and Our Father echo, but it is the coffin itself that actually speaks, whispering out into the bright day the true message.

All ends with a perfect haiku - the wind, normally invisible, is manifest, and it is, yes, black.

What might be thought of as a companion haibun follows:

 ~~~~~

The Sweet Wild Grass

    That's    where    we   stood,     that's    where
    beforehand we  knew we'd end  up, a  gang of
    boys, on a hot midsummer day, loitering about
    a low retainer wall that marked an entrance to
    a   village   cemetery—someone    scuffling   his
    tennis  shoes in the  gravel, someone   chewing
    on a blade  of sweet  wild grass  plucked  from 
    the  broad  field  across   the  road,   someone
    retelling  an  exaggerated  tale that   an   uncle 
    had told

     Then the funeral party came, everybody in 
    black, everybody wrinkled and dry like pale 
    dust,   everybody  shuffling  along  in  dead
    silence  except  for the muffled sobbing  of 
    somebody somewhere 

    A rote recitation
    of the 23rd Psalm 
    and cicadas 

    Then a man in black suit and tie, a lean man
    with  a shock of white  hair, approached us 
    from that party, approached with a slow but
    deliberate gait, and  he drew  near and drew 
    with him the hush of his black flock 

    But  before he  reached  that  wall, before he
    might come  so close as  to  brush us with his
    breath or tell us whatever it was he would tell, 
    our gang  jumped  up  and   scurried  over  the 
    road,  each  boy   then  looking  back  over  a
    shoulder
 

    going quietly
    into the deep
    grass of summer

 ~~~~~

 
This poem at once seems almost a companion piece to the earlier poem, yet, really, there is no telling the chronology and even if they are related. Still, I had a Rashomon feeling while reading it, as if I was seeing the same event from a different perspective. 

If possible, this piece is even more powerful than the previous. Here there is a lost innocence, not simply of the deceased, if something like this might ever be described as simple, but of the young observers.

Perhaps this was their companion - after the first death, as Dylan Thomas wrote - in any case, the power of the event is palpable. In its specificity, the poem almost crosses over into the domain of short story.

But the same might be said of many a haiku, which is the beauty of condensation. 

Speaking of haiku, there are a number of very fine one's here:

with every blackbird,
the sun, too, settles deeper
into the cold trees

There are many superior qualities to this poem, not the least of which is its literalness: the settling of the sun, in the form of the birds (or reflected on those forms), into the trees as it sets on the horizon.

In addition to literalness, there is the poem's allusiveness - one can't help but think of Basho's famed poem of autumn, tree, and crow: 

 

on a bare branch
a crow has settled
autumn dusk

Woodward's poem is no mere pastiche or homage: it inhabits the same universe, the same world, both again literally and also figuratively. 

a nest -
nothing more,
nothing less

Here is an object for contemplation, akin in some ways to the famed half a glass of water. The reader at first seems to have little to work with, but this is not so.

Not at all. 

the cobblestone
of the city's old quarter
and red leaves

This is a poem of layer upon layer upon layer. It is a poem of civilization, a poem of nature and, for man, above all, a poem of time. 

Ultimately, for me, it is a poem of stunning beauty, stumbled upon in an ancient square, in a forgotten city ... in an exciting new book.

A book I recommend for lovers of haibun, haiku, and poetry itself. 

~~~~~ 

Photo by Denis Collette

onlookers
at a funeral...
the autumn wind

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,

Don

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Gary LeBel & Pravat Kumar Padhy: Wednesday Haiku, #134

Photo by Carine06

evening hush . . .
the long brown lash
of a filly

Gary LeBel

Photo by Gracey 


twilight hour
the starlit sky
in my garden

Pravat Kumar Padhy

  Photo by Florian Dre

the pony also
sets off on a journey...
autumn dusk

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,

Don

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Walking on Hell's Roof: Issa's Sunday Service, #177

The Waco Brothers

   

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I never imagined that one of the rock song's featured on Issa's Sunday Service would be, well, based on an Issa poem, but here you go. The Waco Brothers have co-opted the title from a poem by the venerated Master Issa, though the spirit may not be quite the same. The lyrics provided tell the tale.

Still, hail the Waco Brothers! Something is decidedly better than nothing, particularly in a world where we are, indeed, walking on hell's roof gazing at flowers.

 

Walking on Hell's Roof

History is written by the winner
This is a loser’s song
I took this job in the summer
Never saw the winter rollin’ on
Never thought it would end in a second
A burned out smoking wreck
Expectations & ambitions
Were just a rope around my neck
Broke my back to earn a crust
Saw my dreams die in the dust
Now I’m walking on hell’s roof looking at the flowers

All in bloom, red yellow & blue
So sweet & true, nothing better to do
I’m not hiding come and find me
What am I doing, there’s no need to remind me
I’m walking on hell’s roof looking at the flowers
In the A to B & the miles per hour
Keeping out of reach of that higher power
Where the bees are buzzing in the April showers

The spoils belong to the victor
This is a consolation song
Your life is science fiction
A flash of light & you’ll be gone
No more trials & no more trouble
Bad luck & bursting bubbles
Walking on hell’s roof looking at the flowers x2

We’re not hiding come & find us
What are we doing there’s no need to remind us
Walking on hell’s roof…. (repeat) 

---------------

Photo by Marco Vianna

      In this world
we walk on the roof of hell,
      gazing at flowers. 

Issa
translated by Robert Hass 

best,

Don

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R. H. Blyth & Chora: Late Summer, Early Fall

Art by Egon Schiele

       The change of clothes;
The crow is black,
      The heron white. 

Chora,                                        trans. by R. H. Blyth

While slowly perusing (by slowly, I mean over the last year or so) the third volume of R. H. Blyth's Haiku (Summer-Autumn), I ran across this poem by Chora, under the chapter title "Human Affairs."  Blyth, of course, always gives one pause in his astute, penetrating, and, sometimes, decidedly off-kilter observations. Here is what he said about this poem:

"Human beings are a feeble tribe, always changing. The crow remains as it is, the heron also. This haiku is somewhat epigrammatic; it is of intellectual content, but its meaning is expressed with such directness, simplicity, and concreteness that we welcome it as a lower but interesting use of the haiku form."

In some ways, most obviously tone, this seems a casual observation but it is hardly that. It is Blyth's style, coupled with his mastery of the subject, which makes the tone seemingly casual. 

And what makes him so eminently readable. 

What is negative in his assessment of Chora's haiku is the "intellectual content," which is directly to the point when discussing traditional haiku. Though he consigns it to a lower circle, in this case it is a lower circle of heaven and not hell. 

Certainly, the pros out weigh the cons.

The poem, from a human standpoint, nicely represents, if intellectually, the transition of seasons and, if I can take a hint from the volume 3 subtitle, the transition which we now in the Northern hemisphere are experiencing: late summer to early fall. I'm not quite sure it should be characterized as epigrammatic, unless strictly limiting it to meaning and not execution. Still, there are so many reasons to love Blyth. 

His selection of this haiku, for instance.

Plus that chapter title: Human affairs.  

And, oh, yes, a feeble tribe, indeed.

---------------

Photo by YST

growing feeble--
breaking off blossoms
with twisted mouth

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

David Lanoue notes of this Issa haiku that it is "A reflection on the aging process. Issa contorts his face with the effort of snapping off a little branch of blossoms." 

How right he is and how poignant the image, and the observation.

best,

Don

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Susan Constable & Laszlo Slomovits: Wednesday Haiku, #133

Photo by Angeloangelo

knee-high grass
I make my own path
into autumn

Susan Constable

 

Moth Wing Magnified by Johan J.Ingles-Le Nobel

paparazzi moths
clamor at the window —
the celebrity is light

Laszlo Slomovits

Photo by Jason A. Samfield

to enlightened eyes
Buddha's bones?
dewdrops in the grass

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,

Don

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Old Pajamas: Biting The Buddha - Small Press Friday

Having previously reviewed Drenched Through at Old Age, by old pajamas, I've gone back to the well again to an earlier collection by him, entitled Biting the Buddha. Published by Blue Cottage press in 2000 ...

There is a noticeable difference in approach and style in this older volume; the newer book has no punctuation and an assured use of the monostich (there are none of the later in Biting the Buddha). Still, let's not get our knickers in a twist, eh - it is the message and the talent that should be in the forefront and so it will be in this overview.

From my lips rises the full moon
To stare at her white belly.

The mystery: origin, essence, and epicenter: the lips, the moon, the belly.

Enveloped so
        Inside me
The sudden rain
        Does not cool him.

Again, a mystery, this time one of identity, ego, and presence.

         In the air
A junkie's drawing...starved limbs
         Petals falling.

 
A lyrical little dirge, capturing at once the sadness and beauty of a life 'squandered,' and the rhyming echo.

Autumn gust,
Still leaves
          Scatter again.

This poem turns on the first word of line two: 'Still.'  To me, this feels like two contiguous moments, passing quickly.

How sweet the grass!
How calm a place
To lay skin and bone!

 
This resonates with philosophical beauty, dealing as it does with life and death and more, and a literalness that says it all, says it all ...

Dust rises
Restless in a dried field,
Shifting
             Foot to foot.

Ashes to ashes - there is a biblical quality, a mythic quality, a folklorish quality to what, in essence, is a simple observation, couple with a human echo that has its own chilling quality. A sister poem to "How sweet the grass," certainly.

Crushed by the wheel
The fox looks back.

 
There is more to this little two-line 'short-story' than meets the eye, eh, Mr. Fox?

The tide gone out,
I am left behind.

Oh, maggie and milly and molly and may ... the ocean dwarfs us all with dimension and perpective and loneness. So much cosmic detritus, so little time. 

  Across the marsh
All life flies on the wind
  Of a New Year.

There is a big picture perspective here; strangely enough my first free associative thought is of the first picture of the earth from space. 

Oh, there it is!

Biting the Buddha may be purchased directly from the author for $5, which covers the cost of the mailer, the postage and the book. Contact him at <blue cottage 2000 AT yahoo DOT com>, no spaces, and read AT for @ and DOT for . in order to avoid those pesky harvesting bots.

------

US Postal Service Stamp Commemorating 100 Years of Cherry Blossoms

in cherry blossom shade
there are even those
who hate this world

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,

Don

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Richard K. Ostrander & Ramesh Anand: Wednesday Haiku, #132

Photo by Gaspi *YG

Grandma's supple hands
After cleaning my skinned knee
Wringing a chicken's neck

Richard K. Ostrander

Photo by DCSL

distant hill
the river carrying
the spring

Ramesh Anand

Woodblock by Hiroshige

the distant mountain's
blossoms cast their light...
east window

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,

Don

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End of Summer Sunday Seranade

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Here's a little something to end the week with, or begin the week with (or end a season with, or begin a season with). One of my favorite little hot/sweet bands, Hal Kemp and His Orchestra, with my favorite of their tunes: How I'll Miss You When the Summer is Gone.
The vocal doesn't drop in until around the 2 minute mark and stick around to 2:40 'cause there's a modulation that will get the old rockin' chair rockin', grandpa. 
The regular Sunday Service should be back in two weeks ...  but Wednesday Haiku as usual. Since I'm prepping for a reading next week, the rest is seat of the pants.      

Woodblock by Shibata Zeshin

     

looking at the mountain
looking at the sea...
autumn evening

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,

Don

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