Etheree Day for 2016

Today is set aside to celebrate the Etheree syllabic form.  I have a great fondness for this form: its simplicity, its flexibility, and the way it starts slow and then blossoms into fullness are attributes that offer a poet many opportunities.  A number of my books use the form:

'Poems of Place' contain a series of 'Tea Etheree', most of which begin with the word 'tea'.

'Safe Harbor' contains an Etheree series I call 'Cathedrals'.

'Even in Winter' has Etheree poems scattered through the collection.

The Etheree is a form I have explored extensively and continue to do so.  It seems to have endless possibilities.  Here is one I wrote recently:

From a Hermit's Perspective

Place
Stasis
Quince blossoms
From dusk to dusk
Boulder in a stream
Butterfly migrations
The rise and fall of nations
Enacting my daily routines
The waking world, the world of dreams,
The desert hermits from long ago
Seasons of summer, seasons of snow,
Stability as the stars ebb and flow

Book Launch: Even in Winter

Book Launch: Even in Winter

I have just published my latest collection of poems.  It is called Even in Winter.  In this collection I take a new turn in how I have put the poems together.  Previous collections have been form specific: either the entire book was dedicated to a single form (such as Microcosmos which is dedicated to renga, or White Roses dedicated to haiku), or each section of the book is form specific.  An example is Lanterne Light which contains three collections of poems and all three collections are form specific; the lanterne, the tetractys, and the cinquain.

In Even in Winter I have mixed the forms, so the collection is not form specific.  All the poems are formal, but the forms are interspersed and not grouped into form specific collections.

Five forms are used: Etheree, Fibonacci, Lucas, the Even Sequence, and 100 Friends.  These forms are explained as part of the back matter in a section called ‘Afterthoughts’.  I felt that the different forms worked well with each other because all five of the forms share a similar overall shape.  All of the forms start with very short lines and then expand into longer lines.  What differs among the forms is the pace of the expansion.  Here is a quick look at the syllable counts for the five forms used in the collection:

Etheree:               1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10

Fibonacci:            1-1-2-3-5-8-13-21, etc.

Lucas:                  2-1-3-4-7-11-18-29, etc.

Even Sequence:   2-2-4-6-10-16, etc.

100 Friends:        2-4-2-4-6-4-6-8-6-8-10-8-10-12-10

I think of this collection as a kind of bouquet of forms.  Hopefully they are attractively arranged.  The collection covers a number of themes; nature and seasonality are central.  Spirituality and my commitments as a Quaker are woven into the collection, hopefully in a not too obtrusive way.  I think I would say that the overriding theme is the human relationship to eternity in an ephemeral world.

Even in Winter

ISBN: 9781514224649

118 pages

$12.00

Even in Winter

Cold
Freezing
December
Frost on the ground
A cloudless sunrise
The sound of the furnace
There are tasks I have to do
Projects that I need to finish,
Reluctantly I relinquish
The pause that I place after prayer,
Yet a certain stillness stays with me
As I walk past a familiar oak tree

Naturescape

Naturescape

Clear

Starlight

Before dawn

November cold

The moon has gone down

The sound of my footsteps

There is no wind this morning

The Orion constellation,

Like an adagio for my eyes,

Sends me an invitation to the sky.

Asceticism

Asceticism

Fog

Morning

Thick and cold

November gray

Renunciation

That’s a difficult word,

One that is not often heard;

Lack of things means you’ve not prospered,

That abundance has been deferred.

Perhaps some tragedy has occurred.

There must be some kind of explanation;

An ongoing rationalization

For a psychological repression?

That it’s attractive is beyond conception,

It can’t be voluntary renunciation.

There is beauty in the sight of a leafless tree,

A distant solo flute’s exquisite melody,

In a room a single book that is often read,

A few words overheard that a stranger once said,

A walk along the beach when the ocean is calm,

The transcendental presence that glows in a Psalm

That opens a door that allows us to perceive

Waves of vast spaciousness from a limitless sea.

Return

Thoughts
Morning
Dream warnings
And images
Vanish with the sun
The day has just begun
I turn to the day's tasks
It's a housecleaning day
Which I find satisfying
Cleaning all of the dishes
Running the washer and dryer
Hanging up the clothes in order
Outside I trim the garden border
In the late afternoon it's time for tea
A voice from the dream realm returns to me,

"All of these things, ev'rything that you see,
Resembles the sand cast up from the sea,
Shifting, changing, without stability,
Like smoke in the air, leaves falling from a tree,
This is their inevitable destiny,
They will soon be gone even from memory;
But there is one thing which never disappears,
It transcends all our sorrows, transcends all our fears,
Finding this realm means the cessation of all tears;
It is accessed through the door of the infinite heart,
Turning to the formless is how we begin, how we start,
It is the path of beauty from which we must not depart,
It is found in the stillness at the center of the storm,
It is found in the silence before anything was formed,
Before there was light, before there was night, before any thing,
There exists the grace-filled song of silence that eternity sings."

Corrective Lens

Views
Constructs
Perspectives
Commentaries
Interpretations --

We do not see the world.
What we see is our own mind,
We see ev'rything through glasses
That distort all the things that we find,
As if orange was the color of grasses,
Like those who believe that nothing surpasses
Their desires that crumble like broken fences,
As if a solid mountain range contained passes,
As if truth was determined by vote of the masses,
Or those who believe that the only thing we can grasp is
That which can be measured and observed by the five senses,
Unconcerned and unaware that all those things become ashes --

But all becomes clear when we think of this: ev'rything vanishes.

Etheree Taylor Armstrong Day: 2013, and an Announcement

This is the anniversary of the passing of Etheree Taylor Armstrong; February 13, 1918 to March 14, 1994.  It's a good day to write an Etheree.

And I am taking the day to announce my first published poetry collection.  Here at Shapign Words I have reviewed print-on-demand poetry publications because that is the arena where most of the syllabic poetry is being published these days. I have noted how print-on-demand has changed the dynamics of poetry publishing and how many poets have taken advantage of this.

I myself have refrained from this approach; mostly, I think, because I am kind of a techno-peasant.  I am easily intimidated by techno-demands.  But I have managed to overcome this and use the Create Space print-on-demand service to publish this first collection.

It is called Safe Harbor.  It contains three collections:

'Cathedrals' is a collection of my Etheree, which is the reason I have chosen to make the announcement today.

'Scones' is a collection of my Fibonacci.

'Safe Harbor', the last collection, brings together poems written in a form I created called '100 Friends'.

I brought these three forms together because all three of them have a similar way of unfolding.  All three of them start with very short lines and then slowly build to longer lines.  The pace of expansion differs, but the general contours are similar.  And so it felt fitting to bring them together under one volume.

You can purchase Safe Harbor from Amazon; the cost is $12.00.

This is a new phase for me.  Before I have put together small chapbooks; but I found towards the end of last year that I wanted to create larger works than the chapbook format would allow for.  This pushed me into using the print-on-demand technology.  I explored several options, but finally settled on Create Space.

Safe Harbor
By Jim Wilson
ISBN: 9781482551983
$12.00

Renunciation

Time
Slow
Sunlight
Afternoon
February
A clear cloudless sky
The air is cold and dry
I am at peace in my room
In my silent hermitage
I sense the presence of God
The gentle touch of timelessness
Is so much more than I can grasp
I become inarticulate --

A coyote briefly trots by
A satellite is launched into space
Saturn is slowly turning direct
In Andromeda a new star is born
A sparrow appears on the windowsill
A new Buddhist Nun has her long hair shorn
An ocean wave becomes perfectly still

Etheree Day for 2013

Etheree Day – 2013

Today is Etheree Day.  This is the day we set aside to celebrate the Etheree syllabic form.  Since learning about the Etheree I have had a lot of fun with it.  I find the simplicity of the form highly attractive.  The basic form is a 10-line poem.  The first line has 1 syllable, the second line 2 syllables, on up to the tenth line which has 10 syllables.  The overall structure is 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10; for a total count of 55 syllables.

There is something really charming about this form.  I first started writing Etheree in earnest when I set the word ‘tea’ as the first line.  My day job is working at a tea shop and spiritual bookstore (since this blog don’t pay the bills).  I began writing a bunch of Etheree all starting with the word ‘tea’.  And about 25 ‘tea’ Etheree just tumbled out.  Lots of fun.  It has occurred to me that if I were to teach the Etheree form one way to do it would be to have everyone in the class compose an Etheree with a shared first line.  That opening one syllable line.  I could use ‘spring’ or ‘June’ or ‘moon’, etc.  Then everyone take off from there.  I think it would be interesting to see how different people would go in different directions from that first word/line. 

People who compose Etheree have experimented with form variations.  There is, for example, the reverse Etheree: 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1.  And then there are various combinations of the forward and reverse types.

I found that in some of my Etheree I wanted to go beyond the last 10-syllable line; it’s like I was on a role and out came the 11-syllable, 12-syllable, and etc., lines.  I think the longest line I worked up to was 14 syllables.  But these longer Etheree still feel like the same form to me because of the gradual unfolding, syllable by syllable, line by line.  The pace of the unfolding stays the same.

Lately I have written some Etheree is which I hover over a particular line length before going on to the next longer line.  Something like this: 1-2-3-3-4-5-5-5-6-7-8-8-9-10.  This makes for an overall longer poem, but it still has the feeling of an Etheree to me; a kind of slowed-down version of the process of unfolding.

There is another aspect to the Etheree form which I enjoy.  Because the Etheree is a new form, I find there is a great sense of freedom in how to use it.  If I want to rhyme, I’ll rhyme.  Or not.  If I want to focus on subject X, Y, or Z, I’ll go ahead.  There is not a long tradition behind the form, so I don’t get the feeling of looking over my shoulder at what predecessors did.  At times that can be intimidating to a poet.  For example, when writing a sonnet, so many of our greatest poets have written such magnificent sonnets that it can feel kind of impertinent to try to find one’s own way in the sonnet landscape, so to speak.  With the Etheree I don’t get that sense.  And there is no National Society of the True Etheree Way issuing lists of do’s and don’t’s as to correct Etheree procedure.  All of this makes my experience writing Etheree very enjoyable.  And yet the Etheree is formal syllabic verse so there is a sense of discipline and focus in the form, just as in other syllabic forms.  It’s a captivating balance of freedom and focus.

My basic approach to Etheree is to think of the opening, very short lines, particularly the first line, as resembling a seed, a thought seed, out of which the rest of the Etheree emerges.  My tendency is to use the first three or four lines to write a list; and the list is the setting for the poem as a whole.  Words like ‘dawn’, ‘dusk’, ‘night’, ‘cold’, ‘sun’, ‘moon’, words the give a broad sense of place and/or time.  Then with each subsequent lines details are added, until the Etheree becomes a complete picture.  Here is an Etheree I wrote a few months ago:

Gap

Parting

In the sky

Between the clouds

Over a rainbow

A few angels hover

Gathering the pray’rs from earth

Pray’rs that come from green fields of grass

Pray’rs that come from the waves of the sea

Pray’rs on behalf of all humanity

So if you are inclined, compose an Etheree today, share it with some friends.  The structure is so simple anyone can learn it in a few minutes.  And it is always a good thing to share poetry with friends.

The Descent of Grace into the Whole Body

Rain
Winter
December
On the solstice
Gifts are arriving
Gifts are departing
Festivals of lights
One more year has passed by
I send cards to absent friends
Greetings from across the country
It is a time to reconnect
To find out how people are doing
To find out if someone has passed away
To rekindle the light of relationships
To strengthen those bonds which so easily slip
To once again rediscover the holy
That descends upon all from a source above,
To open the heart to waves of lovingkindness
To remove the anger that constantly blinds us
To pray for the welfare of all living beings
To drink once again from the infinite stream of love.

Transcendental

Then
After
At the end
At the threshold
Into the unknown
Beyond dawn, beyond dusk
Beyond questions and answers
The light that began creation
The ceasing of all agitation
A song made of silence that has no end

Current Events

Fights
Clamor
Politics
It's a blood sport
That let's us resort
To gross propaganda
To words that hide and distort
The nature of our intentions --

Is this all there is, is this our fate?
Planting the seeds that will sprout into hate

The Virtue of Small Tasks

Wind
Clear sky
In August
Hot afternoons
Shorts and short-sleeved shirts,
Glare from windshields and chrome
Deflects the impulse to roam;
I think I'll spend the day at home
(The garden needs a spread of new loam),
Attending to my corner of the world.

Why Stoicism Is Attractive

Sand
Pebbles
On the beach
By the river
Flowing to the sea
As far as I can see
(A grove of trees behind me)
Waves and sky steadily recede
Into the haze of the horizon
Where those who are spinning the threads of fate
On the wheel of fortune, on the wheel of time
Determine the trajectory of our brief lives.

Unfinished

Sun
Shadows
Moving clouds
An empty house
('For Sale' for three years)
Long grass obscures the door
A few ghosts sometimes appear
At the large living room window
Their presence on earth isn't quite done
Like building construction that's been delayed
Like words unspoken that I wanted to say
Like waiting for a summer that never will come

Etheree Taylor Armstrong Day

Good Morning:

Today is Etheree Taylor Armstrong Day.  She is the poet who created the Etheree syllabic form.  I have grown to be very fond of this simple form.  I think I now compose poems in this form more often than any other.  I think what appeals to me is the simplicity of the form and how agreeable the form is to individual expression.

I have found it difficult to find out information about Ms. Armstrong other than the birth and death dates: February 13, 1918 to March 14, 1994.  I have noticed on other online sites devoted to poetry that they say the same thing in their sections on the Etheree form.  I think this is because Ms. Armstrong was what I call a ‘local poet’.  That is to say she seems to have been content to write and publish for a local audience.  She seems to have lived her whole life in Arkansas and doesn’t appear to have been interested in contacting or publishing in a national context.

I managed to snag one of her chapbooks when it appeared on amazon.  It is called “The Willow Green Of Spring”, published in 1967.  Most of the poetry is rhymed and there is an emphasis on traditional forms: there is a sonnet and examples of rhymed quatrains.  This particular volume does not contain any Etheree as I believe it predates her presentation of the form.  The poems reveal a life of deep faith; many of the poems are explicitly religious and others use religious imagery.  It also appears that Ms. Armstrong lost her three brothers during their tours of duty in the military and this deeply affected her life and view of the world.  I believe that is part of the reason that there are included in this collection some strongly patriotic poems.

Interestingly, the work contains two Haiku:

SPRING HAIKU

Violets duck their

heads, as daisies count “He loves

me, he loves me not.”

SUMMER HAIKU

Summer hibiscus;

southern belles gowned in red flame

with hummingbird hats.

Personally, I don’t find these as successful as her other, more traditional, efforts in this collection.  But it does show an awareness on Ms. Armstrong’s part of Haiku in the west; remember this was published in 1967 when Haiku societies were still being established.  I don’t know if she was in touch with the new Haiku societies.  If anyone has information about this I would like to hear from you.  I am speculating that Haiku was her door to a syllabic approach to poetry because almost all the other poems in this collection are metrical.  Haiku may have been her way of uncovering the potential for a syllabic approach which eventually lead to the Etheree form.

She was aware of a range of modern poetry.  Here is her poem for T. E. Elliot:

Your kinship

spans eternal bridges;

conformity to things commonplace

is a rocker

for unfinished dreams.

And here is a poem titled ‘KINDRED SPIRIT’ about Robert Frost:

Old clothes and shoes and a summer rain;

A wobbledy calf, and a country lane.

We gathered apples, both soon and late;

We made repairs on the pasture gate.

A crooked trail and a low-flung ridge

Led us down to the low-water bridge –

Where willow trees are old and mossed;

I have walked this day with Robert Frost.

Notice how both poems reflect the styles of the poets that are the topic of the poems. 

I hope to learn more about Etheree Taylor Armstrong.  But for today I’ll close with one of her poems that I enjoyed:

AS IT STANDS

I should cut that vine

away from the tree,

And trim the branches

so we could ‘see’ –

The vine must be

thirty feet long;

But where would the poet

get his song?

Where would the Cardinal

build his nest?

Without the vine

where would he rest?

How can anyone honestly say –

They can improve nature anyway?

Artifact

Roads
Sidewalks
Bare branches
Wet from the rain
Leaning on the fence
An abandoned shovel
Grass growing high around it
Left behind after some project
Or perhaps someone called them away
And they thought they'd finish some other day

Not Quite Ready

Time
Moving
Ceaselessly
I get older
I number my days
The days that I have left
Become fewer and fewer

There is beauty in the sunset
And peace in faces I won't forget --

Eternity beckons and yet, and yet . . .

First Day Poem

Sky
Low clouds
A slight wind
A cool morning
There's not much traffic
On Sunday it's quiet,
Before I go to Meeting
I stop by the local cafe
For some good coffee to start my day --
The barrista is proud of her figure,
We have known each other for a lot of years,
We check in with each other on our hopes and fears,
Then I sit down at a table and sip my coffee,
Conversing with some strangers before I go on my way.