Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Real Solace

Too much, too much.

How to console, this will be an ongoing question.

 How to change, what to do to help.

At the moment, I am grateful to Ellen Wade Beals, and glad that her anthology, Solace in So Many Words, begun when she wanted to give solace after 9/11, is coming out now.

Here are a few excerpts:

From "Bleeding Heart," by Constance Vogel Adamkeiwicz, the first poem in the book:

Amid the rubble
of demolition,
where nothing else has survived,
a bleeding heart grows,
red blood dripping
from delicate arcs.

In my own flower bed, the tiny first spikes of bleeding heart are coming up amid the tulip spears.

From "And What If I Spoke of Despair" by Ellen Bass:

And what if I spoke of despair--who doesn't
feel it? Who doesn't know the way it seizes,
leaving us limp, deafened by the slosh
of our own blood, rushing
through the narrow, personal
channels of grief. It's beauty
that brings it on, calls it out from the wings
for one more song.

One more song, one more song of beauty, let us keep singing.

7 comments:

Maureen said...

Thank you for these excerpts, Kathleen. I wasn't familiar with this collection. Words of solace are never more needed than now.

Sandy Longhorn said...

A book I need to buy ASAP.

My mom has a huge, thriving bleeding heart beside the back door. Can't wait to see it when I'm up for a visit in two weeks.

THANKS!

Nancy Devine said...

plants coming back...i am envious.

Maureen said...

Kathleen, the link to that documentary should be ok now.

Kathleen said...

Thanks, Maureen. It looks like such a wonderful project and wonderful film.

SarahJane said...

It seems odd that it took 10 years to get that anthology out. Sounds like a good one (although there's a lot of blood in your excerpts!). Beautiful cover.
I think solace is need but more than that we need some practical solutions to what looks like it's going to be the biggest disaster of all time. Sorry. While they're evacuating the people they should also evacuate all the innocent sea creatures in the Pacific Ocean.

Kathleen said...

I agree. The practical must happen, for humans and all creatures. And it must happen here in the USA in terms of change. I'm glad Germany shut down 7 reactors. Here, alas, some politicians took away money & power from regulatory and failsafe agencies.