solstice: June 2018 Archives

#11 summer summit 2018

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After being slightly frustrated by putting metal handles on teapots, I took a long break wandering through a wet garden center, a friend's garden, and my own irregular rows. I needed distance on my efforts, so I enjoyed assessing the ways our gardens have taken off, investigating what the deer have been eating, and enjoying the unplanted surprises like the volunteer squash.

11 summer 2018.jpg
Brian Eno in describing his process of making music says:
One is making a kind of music in the way that one might make a garden. One is carefully constructing seeds, or finding seeds, carefully planting them and then letting them have their life. And that life isn't necessarily exactly what you'd envisaged for them. It's characteristic of the kind of work that I do that I'm really not aware of how the final result is going to look or sound. So in fact, I'm deliberately constructing systems that will put me in the same position as any other member of the audience. I want to be surprised by it as well. And indeed, I often am.


#8 summer summit 2018

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Today I looked to see if I have any ripe blueberries, but no. I checked the peas, which I am disappointed by this year. I decided to try some new varieties and I don't like them as much as my old standbys. As I wandered I noticed the first daylilies are blooming. The orange jumped out with the June energy that this month is all about. I picked one flower and walked to the studio meditating on my mother and her habit of picking single flowers for fear of damaging the plant and how she wanted to save more blossoms for the future. I put the flower head in a small cup--like she might have--next to  a recent poem cup which, in turn, is based on a rough draft of a poem that she wrote.

When I work on the poem cups I often use one of my Mom's poems as a jumping off point. The poem becomes my lens of attention. I draw/write the lines, my mind focused on the words, but without any judgment of good or bad because it is printed backwards. Appearing inverted I don't worry about legibility or spelling. The intention is balanced with an attention to the specificity of the verse. This focus allows me to learn something about the interactive mark of the hand, the expression of the material, and the lens of attention.

08 summer 2018.jpgEntering the Kingdom   [by Mary Oliver]

The crows see me.

They stretch their glossy necks

In the tallest branches

Of green trees. I am
Possibly dangerous, I am

Entering the kingdom.

The dream of my life
Is to lie down by a slow river

And stare at the light in the trees-
To learn something by being nothing

A little while but the rich

Lens of attention.

But the crows puff their feathers and cry

Between me and the sun,

And I should go now.

They know me for what I am.

No dreamer,

No eater of leaves.




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This page is an archive of entries in the solstice category from June 2018.

solstice: December 2017 is the previous archive.

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