A NEW telluric poem for tomorrow today.

The poetry of a rock wall on side of a mountain 

leaves you speechless:

Hours

           pass

you sit

astride

        this

        fieldstone

wall

words

           come

    slower

  now

each one

tethered

to lifetime

of use

misuse

the poem

more       sculpture

than painting

a process

a taking

away

removal

until all

that remains

is bone

white

          gleaming

cleansed

      by wind

through leaves

exposed

to light

of day.

obeedúid~

30-31/July/12

Telluric Delivery!

...just received shipment of the "Special-Limited-Shortrun-Café-Lena-Edition" of "Telluric Voices" courtesy of "Benevolent Bird" which I will be selling at my reading next week at Café Lena with Ken Hada in Saratoga on August 1st, 2012!!!!

All proceeds from this shortrun will be donated to the effort to rebuild the Czarnecki family home and  their business "Foothills Publishing" after their devastating fire.

Each copy includes the DVD "Telluric Visions" which contains 3 Videos based on poems in the book and a number of Bonus Audio Recordings from my recent reading!

obeedúid~

27/July/12

Almost Telluric...

Here's a little audio recording of a poem that just missed being included in Telluric Voices. It even almost became the "Main Menu Screen" on the "Telluric Visions." DVD, but since it was not in the actually book I chose to use the raw file of "Morning Doves In My Hollow Tree" instead. Who wants to hear a poem read over and over again on a loop you can't mute anyway! ;)

So here is the SoundCloud Link:

Why would there not be:

I still like it so maybe it will be in a future mix... Say: "Telluric Voices/Visions Part Deux..." ???

I mixed the original upload of "Morning Doves In My Hollow Tree." with a recording of me reading the poem into "Voice Plus" on my iPhone with a swirling effect.

Enjoy!

obeedúid~
21/July/12

Transformation: Into the Telluric:

I have often been fascinated by how my poems change and metamorphose. This past week I decided to look back at one poem in particular that appears in this book. It first appeared on my Hiking Blog: "Helder~Hiking Adventures!" back in November of 2010 with pictures and was also accompanied by a poem by Alan Casline. Both poems were a poetic experiment in response to our hike together on Bennett Hill. I actually wrote mine on my then new iPad as I hiked. It was immediate, impressionistic and spontaneous.

Not long afterwards Alan published it as a Broadside. Not much had changed at that point with the exception of some of the line formatting. The differences were subtle.

If you click on this image it will come up larger
in  your browser so you can read it.

Last year as I collected and composed this cycle of poems into a cohesive narrative things changed. I had hiked Bennett Hill several more times by then. Alone, and in different weather conditions at various times of the year. It had become home. Less a place of the world, more a place of contemplation, spiritual communion and reflection. 

Chronologically it is located fairly early in the cycle and as it was one of the first pieces completed soon after moving here that makes sense. This is how it appears in  "A Mythological Map of The Telluric Voices poems: What they symbolize and how they fit along The Path Of The Poet's' Journey."

3.) Nò ŏnŏquaàm: (I have had a beautiful dream.) Departure- "Supernatural Aid." Timeframe: One Autumn day.

The complete "Map" was an invaluable tool as I wrote and gathered the cycle. This much organization and ridged criteria is not normally characteristic of me but in this case it allowed me to focus and stick with the poetic path as it were. It allowed me see where I had been, where I was going and track my spiritual growth as well. (At some point in the future I will post the complete "Map" for the curious.) Here then, as summer swelters and beats on, is the finished poem as it appears in the book:

~

"He now came in view of land, on which he debarked in safety, and could see the lodge of the Shining Manito[*], situated on a hill."  -Henry Rowe Schoolcraft: Algic Researches. 

~

Nò ŏnŏquaàm:
 (I have had a beautiful dream.)

Wachtschù Mennitow [†]

your
arboreous-mane

now
autumn tincture

I stand alone

in white-pine grove
          search
for wetland

blinded
          by sunlight

crash through trees 

walk false trail
                      circle
                summit
 of dreams 

~

Listen

         trains

                 blow distance

         call me home 

to yesterdays

Shaman in tree-mask
speaks
 through wood:

"Lost one

             follow oak

                          don't forget"

~

        Switch-
 back
         down
       your
spine

Into
 shade
 your shalier
side
Birch litters
           your
           cliffs

       Sloping
    down
sharply

to moss
     covered
     lowlands
     of home

~

Here
       trail
less
      clearly

marked
I search again

make way
 to infinite
 futures

drink
 then onwards

find
 sacred spring
  encourage flow

drink
 say prayer

rest.

~

[*] Manito: 'Spirit' -Henry Rowe Schoolcraft: Algic Researches. Schoolcraft was working with the Ojibwa language. The Mahican equivalent would be 'Mennitow'

[†] Wachtschù: 'Mountain, or hill.' :Schmick's Mahican Dictionary Edited by Carl Masthay. I have created Wachtschù Mennitow for my own purposes and in my own spiritual imaginings. Hence: Wachtschù [Mountian] Mennitow [Spirit].

obeedúid~

20/July/12

Foothills Publishing Suffers Devastating Fire

Foothills after the fire.

Some regular readers of this blog may not be aware that my friend and publisher Michael Czarnecki of Foothills Publishing suffered a devastating fire and the complete loss of their home and business last week. Fortunately everyone is safe and unharmed but they are currently without a home/business and need our help!

Here is a link to their website where you can donate and support them in their efforts:

http://foothillspublishing.com/id20.htm

Here also is an email he shared with regards to what they are in need of at the moment:

On Friday, July 13, 2012, Michael Czarnecki wrote:

"First of all, many thanks and heartfelt gratefulness to all of you who have been responding with offers of help, good thoughts and prayers. We are humbled by the response.

We will be arriving back home (ah, the hill is still home, whether a house is there or not) Sunday, mid- afternoon.

I'll go over briefly a bit of where we are at with needs etc.

Temporary housing - three different people have made available to us a small travel trailer and two campers. We should be getting those to the hill starting Monday. One fortunate thing is that this fire happened in summer. That certainly makes temporary living quarters a lot easier to work out.

Long Range Housing - Peter, a neighbor and the bishop of our Amish community neighbors, called and said the community would do a house raising for us (the house that is no longer was built by them) when we are ready. I told him the only problem with that will be the funds to buy the material. Long range plans here.

Clothing Donations - Again, being summer, clothing is a lot easier to deal with in the short term. Grayson lost most of his clothes, Carolyn, Chapin and I have the clothes we came to Acadia with. Most of our clothes come from Salvation Army stores and we prefer it that way. I think we'll be ok in the short term, so clothing donations aren't a strong necessity at the moment.

Financial Help - Being money poor, this is a big need. Once we return we have so many things we need to purchase to get back up and running. We'll need a new electrical system - generator, deep cycle batteries, inverter, etc. and also purchasing all new equipment to get FootHills back up and running. Also chainsaw, other tools. The list goes on and on. This doesn't even take into account what will be needed for more permanent housing. The campers will only be useful for a few months. The financial needs will be great. I'll be working hard on booking more work out as a poet, and we'll get FootHills going again, but even then, before all this, it was a continual struggle.

Many of you have asked how you can help with this, where to send etc..

mail: Michael Czarnecki, PO Box 68, kanona, NY 14856

or Paypal. Go to Send Money and then put in my email address:

poetguy@foothillspublishing.com

then amount, click on personal tab and then make sure gift is checked.

That's it.

Ok, this is enough for now.

Again, it is beyond words the way we feel about all of the support you have expressed for our situation. When we get through to the other side, we'll have an unprecedented gathering on Wheeler Hill of all you wonderful people,

Michael"

obeedúid~

15/July/12

The DVD Mastered and Complete!

Yesterday I mastered and assembled the "Telluric Voices DVD Extras" which will be inserted into the back cover of a limited number of my forthcoming book.

The play list includes:

1.) "Telluric Daydream." [Video]

2.) "Anachẽmu nàn tah:
(My heart is at peace.)" [Video]

3.) "The sound of moonlight
in your head." [Video]

4.) "Nè ŭdèttan máowe náwàhn.
(He looked at it all.)" [Audio]

5.) "2 Poems Live @ Cloudburst
Council." [Audio]

Still pluggin' away!

obeedúid~
14/July/12

Tilluric Visions

"Moonset over the Helderbergs"

Putting the finishing touches on the DVD that will accompany a limited number of copies of Telluric Voices!

The movies and a bonus audio clip are finished and I am right now at work on the graphics for the DVD. Then it's on to mastering the disks! Whoo-hoo!



obeedúid~

08/July/12

From Onisketau to Nkensittawãn: (I will listen.)

The original poem: "Onisketau", the poem that it became: "Nkensittawãn: (I will listen.)" and the video that is based on the original poem; was the impetuous for what became this cycle. It was the first poem that I wrote that gave me a feeling that this place was saying something to me; that I was now living somewhere that was changing me and my outlook on my world. It spawned my interest and launched me on this journey. 

It was therefore created early on in the process of my research as well. The original spelling "Onisketau" came from maps and seemed to be the earliest authoritative spelling. This was before I found the transcription of the Slingerlands Patent and when I was relying as most do on "Beauchamp's Aboriginal Place Names Of New York State." in various versions (1893 to 1906) and "The Composition of Indian Geographical Names Illustrated from the Algonkin Languages" by J. Hammond Trumbull (1870). 

When I found the transcription of the Slingerlands Patent and it's indication that it was sold by the Ma-quaes [Mohawks] (after they drove the Mahicans out subsequent to their victory over them at the the end of their war with each other in 1628.) and it included the spelling and pronunciation "Onesquethaw" (O-nits-quat-haa) in the "Bi-centennial History of Albany: History of the County of Albany 1609-1886..., Volume 2 By George Rogers Howell, Jonathan Tenney" (1886) I suspected that Beauchamp's translation and meaning of : "Corn Field Creek" based as it seemed to me solely on the similarity to the word for maze was incorrect. 

The difficulty of analyzing early names is greatly increased by the fact that they come to us in corrupt forms. The same name may be found, in early records, written in a dozen different ways, and some three or four of these may admit of as many different translations. 

Beauchamp used many sources and I have as well. I finally arrived at the conclusion that the Slingerlands Patent spelling and attribution were correct when I found on the Internet that a native speaker of Ma-quae [Mohawk] had translated it as 'Sinking-stream'. 

While the area is and has been surrounded by cornfields, and has been used for centuries for such purposes, the geographical features of the stream rise, fall and at times disappear underground. Thus the name 'Sinking-stream' seems from my point of view to be decisive and as close to the true meaning as it is possible to get. I am more familiar with the topography now than I was when I first came to this place. 

The corrected poem as it stands in this cycle is therefore different in it's usage and translation than in the video. To recreate the video at this point armed with this advanced knowledge however seems pointless. 

The video was experimental in it's nature with regards to my use of cinematic techniques available to me at the time. When I first created it I had only just discovered that I was capable of using green screen on my computer. I remember it's creation as being fun and exhilarating. But as I look at it now I wish that I had done some things differently. 

I present them both here for comparison as an interesting contrast only; a comparison of how things change in creation. They stand therefore as a time capsule and an interesting step in the creative process. Someday, with time and more advanced technology I may attempt to create a more definitive version. 

In the cycle, as it is indicated in the table of contents, the original poem "Onisiketau" is now number 9.) "Nkensittawãn: (I will listen.)" and represents the Initiation- "Meeting/Hearing the Goddess." Timeframe: Winter. 

Here then is the videO'em in it's original form:

~


And the poem as it stands now in it's final form:


Nkensittawãn: (I will listen.)


I hear
your voice
calling to me

From my back porch
through the trees
over the distance

Broken by season
severity of temperature
and lack of snowshoes

Onesquethaw
you sing to me
from the cold dark
depths
of your mountains
shadow

Onesquethaw
you call to me
in the full moon
of night

and I long
ache
dream

of you
in the light

of autumn
spring
summer

But can not
imagine you

burbling

in this bitter
angry
wasted land

winter.

~

The poem itself has not changed much. Only the spelling of Onesquethaw (which is the same modern day spelling) and its meaning have altered. For me this not only strengthens it's allure it tells me the from the beginning I have been on the right path! 

obeedúid~ 

05/June/12

An inspection of something before it comes to light.

I'm a slave to the poetry despot. The muse knows my number and I am it's poor farmer. 

Anyone who creates knows, once you commit to that creative process, it either becomes a way of life or you move on. Poetry is that process for me, continuous and ever evolving. Absorbing, never ending and sometimes obsessive. I would be much more successful at almost everything if it were not for poetry, and I would be unsuccessful at just about everything if not for poetry too. It makes me who I am and it precludes me from getting those necessary things I'm supposed to do done, in a timely fashion, because more times than not the only voice I hear is the muse. I have lots of things around the house that may never get finished, may get finished someday, or will be left for the ages and all for one reason: I'd rather be in the poetic state than anywhere else. This includes Hawaii or Alaska too! 

Just because you've finished something like a collection doesn't mean you're done with it right? Didn't Walt revised "Leaves" how many times? 

So I've sent this collection off to my publisher and I'm still writing things that could/would/should fit into this thing! The year is over, the perimeters were fulfilled but I'm still working on the journey! The original concept was 21 poems. (I kinda cheated and added an epilogue.) Now I've written another 4-5 that I feel belong. What am I supposed to do now? Add 4-5 epilogues? So, I guess I'm working on the next cycle right?

At this rate when I do my reading as a Co-feature at Café Lena on August 1st with Ken Hada and launch this book, I'll have plenty of pieces to read I can bill as previews of a coming attraction! 

That's what this poem here is. A preview: |ˈprēˌvyoō| noun: An inspection of something before it comes to light.


~

My Mothers Hummingbird:

A messenger came
from
otherworld

healerspirit,
luckgiver,
gifter

you firebringer

came to me

when I was in need

but I
unawares
caught you

in grille
of car
on rainy morn



a chance to seek
wisdom
hear council

gone these years

missed in twi-night
opportunity margined

I stumble blindly

bury you again
in backyard
of dreams

under
next
years

flower.





obeedúid~
10/June/12

The following is a Link 

to the Audio Recording 

on SoundCloud 

of me reading this poem:

Pine Hollow 15-June-12 My Mother's Hummingbird

[Note: My Mom planted somewhere around 120 varieties of Lilium. As a result we cultivated Hummingbirds also. If you were in the flight path you often had an angry hummingbird IN YOUR FACE wondering why you were not a flower! Since my Mom died when I see a Hummingbird I think of it as her Animism. She taught me to return to the earth things that are of the earth so that they may become something new and beautiful.]


obeedúid~
02/July/12

A Telluric Cloudburst!

Back in May I attended the "Cloudburst Council" with Alan Casline May 11th, 12, and 13th at the Gell Center in Naples N.Y. The subtext as provided by Alan was "Friendship Among Poets." 

Gell Center at night,Venus rising in the sky.

The gathering grew out of several conferences focused on Charles Olsen and when things got  started it threatened to go headlong in that direction to the dismay of some attendees who were more interested in the friendship aspect. I wouldn't have minded but was afraid we might lose some poets I was eager to hear from and get to know better. 

After some discussion and perseverance we arrived at a place in the clouds more concerned with friendship much to my relief. 

I enjoyed myself and the company of some of my favorite "living poets." I got to meet and was exposed to a number of poets I had heard about but was not necessarily familiar with. I even met some people I had never heard of or would never have had the chance to meet during those three days. I look forward to getting together again with them at the next "Cloudburst."

While we were there we even took a break to do some Hiking at the "Seneca Point Of Emergence."  The place where the Seneca peoples believe their ancestors entered this world. The hike was lead by Poet/environmental educator and consultant Stephen Lewandowski. Stephen also served as the Host, Head Chef and Bottle-washer for the weekend. Very Cool!!!

That's Will Nixon looking up into the waterfall and Andre Spears on the lower right

Here's a little video of the falls in action. 

I believe that is Peter Franklin aka: "Mountain Goat" who climbed into the falls.

When it came my turn to read I read several selections from my then as yet finished manuscript of "Telluric Voices." I recorded the complete reading but I'll spare you its length here. Alan and his "Young-Apprentice" videotaped the entire event and at some point I expect to be able to post that or a link to it here. For now here is a recording of the final two poems I read. The first of which is the epilogue to "Telluric Voices" and the second a Cento made up of other poets recognizable lines from my favorite poems beginning with a line from Charles Olsen.

The following is a Link 

to the Audio Recording 

on SoundCloud 

of me reading this poem:

2PoemsFromCloudburst 12May12 

Enjoy!

obeedúid~

01/July/12

I can be GOOFIE when it comes to my Technology! :)

Here is another Video I just found from the Cloudburst Hike...

I actually whacked the iPhone like it was going to listen to what I was saying! :)