The road where I’m walking is an old railroad bed, so I’m already thinking of trains when a whistle travels the crisp air and shivers the dew, strung like lanterns from the tips of green poles.
This is such a beautiful poem! I love the Old Railroad scene you paint (words and pic both), and the idea of X marking the treasure of where we are in this exact moment.
Wow, this is beautiful and I just want to sit here pondering it. I love the feeling I get from your why question - to me it feels wistful and longing and genuinely curious rather than like a guise for finger pointing or blame. Why indeed?
This is incredible, Rebekah! It is vivid and descriptive and evocative of a rugged ladscape. "Why then this sea/ of ugly chevrons,/ stacked and pointing/up gullies and down aretes/ that few can safely follow?" Why indeed! I love your last line "This is what ruggedness looks like/at scale. These are the landforms/that lead to/air." A splendid poem from start to finish!
I expect when I read this again in the morning I will wince and self critique to excess. But in this midnight moment, pressing "post" seems like a victory!
Maps
^
In a lifetime of map reading,
loving the topo lines and
shades of geography,
These stacks of maps became my friends.
A comfort blanket for the times when I was lost.
^
Venturing out on the trail, the back country, a trip, an outing,
I always packed at least four maps.
One in waterproof secured safety,
another with excruciating detail,
always one detailing topography and terrain,
and one with a narrative, precious partner to the map.
^
So imagine how it feels in this perilous time,
when the darkness clouds the light,
the trails winding paths in dense forest,
and no matter how I strain I can’t see around the bend,
even the best maps won’t show where the journey ends.
^
All the maps created before the darkness fell,
depict another land, another kindom
where every mountain revealed a new possibility.
Now even the clearest maps are no longer reliable,
and I am lost, creating circles in the streams of my sadness.
“Creating circles in the streams of my sadness” - I feel this sadness with you, and it’s comforting to hear it so beautifully reflected and expressed. I love the idea of maps as your friends and the delight you found in topo lines. Maybe we need a story map for our future, one to try to live into. Or maybe we have to become cartographers of the ever shifting landscape?
I like the notion of being the cartographers of this new landscape. And your comment reminded me of the story maps we used to lead groups through when I worked at the University of New Hampshire. Thank you for your ever amazing poems and prompts.
This is beautiful, Larry -- certainly your morning self agreed! I so feel where you took this poem & it's more or less what I did with mine too. There is no map for these times. "Creating circles in the streams of my sadness" is so powerful.
I waited a few days to read this, mostly because when it first came up, I was overwhelmed and knew I wouldn't be able to appreciate it properly. I'm so glad to have come back to it today. It's stunning.
Maps are a great prompt. Here’s Deleuze and Guattari’s take on maps from “A Thousand Plateaus”.
“Make a map, not a tracing … What distinguishes the map from the tracing is that it is entirely oriented toward an experimentation in contact with the real … The map is open and connectable in all of its dimensions; it is detachable, reversible, susceptible to constant modification. It can be torn, reversed, adapted to any kind of mounting, reworked by an individual, group, or social formation. It can be drawn on a wall, conceived of as a work of art, constructed as a political action or as a meditation … A map has multiple entryways, as opposed to the tracing, which always comes back “to the same.” The map has to do with performance, whereas the tracing always involves an alleged “competence”. (D&G ATP pp 12-13)
This is such a wonderful quote. Somehow it feels connected to something I've been turning over in my mind - the difference between truth and facts and how a fixation on facts can sometimes subvert truth, and sometimes truth is most clearly rendered by fiction.
Very good, Lisa. Maps sure do conjure up a world. I have a map in my head of our mountain. There is almost no way to walk upward from here that I haven't walked but maybe today I'll go looking. Thanks
How lovely to have a mountain that’s such an intimate part of your life! I like the idea of you setting out to notice what’s still unknown. Just, you know, please don’t get surprised by any cliffs.
This is superb, Lisa! I am amazed with how you create such lovely poems out of everyday happenings, simple items, small moments and random and intentional encounters. I am so blessed to be among the crew who gets to read them right out of the gate!
I need a step by step google map (with a charming British accent),
To navigate creator's good road
with assholes.
......Recalculating....
Haha, what a marvelous ending!
Oh if we could select the accents of our GPS!
Haha, recalculating indeed! I love this one, Chuck.
I love this poem! So beautiful. And as always, I love the prompt.
As always, I appreciate your comment! Getting on substack is like getting a bunch of really lovely, warm hugs.
This is such a beautiful poem! I love the Old Railroad scene you paint (words and pic both), and the idea of X marking the treasure of where we are in this exact moment.
.
Here's mine:
.
I am hunting down the contours
of our actions, mapping them one
after the next to reveal
the true topography of this land.
We crave loose loops
of lake and meadow,
lineless valleys that can hold
us all. Why then this sea
of angry chevrons,
stacked and pointing
up gullies and down aretes
that few can safely follow?
This is what ruggedness looks like
at scale. These are the landforms
that lead to
air.
Wow, this is beautiful and I just want to sit here pondering it. I love the feeling I get from your why question - to me it feels wistful and longing and genuinely curious rather than like a guise for finger pointing or blame. Why indeed?
This is incredible, Rebekah! It is vivid and descriptive and evocative of a rugged ladscape. "Why then this sea/ of ugly chevrons,/ stacked and pointing/up gullies and down aretes/ that few can safely follow?" Why indeed! I love your last line "This is what ruggedness looks like/at scale. These are the landforms/that lead to/air." A splendid poem from start to finish!
I expect when I read this again in the morning I will wince and self critique to excess. But in this midnight moment, pressing "post" seems like a victory!
Maps
^
In a lifetime of map reading,
loving the topo lines and
shades of geography,
These stacks of maps became my friends.
A comfort blanket for the times when I was lost.
^
Venturing out on the trail, the back country, a trip, an outing,
I always packed at least four maps.
One in waterproof secured safety,
another with excruciating detail,
always one detailing topography and terrain,
and one with a narrative, precious partner to the map.
^
So imagine how it feels in this perilous time,
when the darkness clouds the light,
the trails winding paths in dense forest,
and no matter how I strain I can’t see around the bend,
even the best maps won’t show where the journey ends.
^
All the maps created before the darkness fell,
depict another land, another kindom
where every mountain revealed a new possibility.
Now even the clearest maps are no longer reliable,
and I am lost, creating circles in the streams of my sadness.
“Creating circles in the streams of my sadness” - I feel this sadness with you, and it’s comforting to hear it so beautifully reflected and expressed. I love the idea of maps as your friends and the delight you found in topo lines. Maybe we need a story map for our future, one to try to live into. Or maybe we have to become cartographers of the ever shifting landscape?
I like the notion of being the cartographers of this new landscape. And your comment reminded me of the story maps we used to lead groups through when I worked at the University of New Hampshire. Thank you for your ever amazing poems and prompts.
Memories of train whistles
Stirring the ghosts
Of thousands of Bison
Murdered to make way
For the metal engines
On Arterials for profits
Of capitalistic greed
Just a thought in middle of night
I can see the bison ghosts lifting their head as the whistle sounds!
Sorry if being a little bit of a downer. I’ll back off for awhile.
No need to apologize at all! The world isn’t all rainbows and unicorns, and poetry is here to hold it all, not just amplify the happy moments.
So, are you and your readers, each Hawking Radiation that escaped from Black Holes of the modal beliefs of western civilization?
I'm afraid I'm not smart enough to offer an intelligent answer to that question. 😂
This is beautiful, Larry -- certainly your morning self agreed! I so feel where you took this poem & it's more or less what I did with mine too. There is no map for these times. "Creating circles in the streams of my sadness" is so powerful.
Thank you Rebekah!
STUNNING
All caps! Thank you so much!
I waited a few days to read this, mostly because when it first came up, I was overwhelmed and knew I wouldn't be able to appreciate it properly. I'm so glad to have come back to it today. It's stunning.
Thank you so much, A! I'm wishing you glimmers of other easier feelings amidst or alongside the overwhelm.
Maps are a great prompt. Here’s Deleuze and Guattari’s take on maps from “A Thousand Plateaus”.
“Make a map, not a tracing … What distinguishes the map from the tracing is that it is entirely oriented toward an experimentation in contact with the real … The map is open and connectable in all of its dimensions; it is detachable, reversible, susceptible to constant modification. It can be torn, reversed, adapted to any kind of mounting, reworked by an individual, group, or social formation. It can be drawn on a wall, conceived of as a work of art, constructed as a political action or as a meditation … A map has multiple entryways, as opposed to the tracing, which always comes back “to the same.” The map has to do with performance, whereas the tracing always involves an alleged “competence”. (D&G ATP pp 12-13)
This is such a wonderful quote. Somehow it feels connected to something I've been turning over in my mind - the difference between truth and facts and how a fixation on facts can sometimes subvert truth, and sometimes truth is most clearly rendered by fiction.
Very good, Lisa. Maps sure do conjure up a world. I have a map in my head of our mountain. There is almost no way to walk upward from here that I haven't walked but maybe today I'll go looking. Thanks
How lovely to have a mountain that’s such an intimate part of your life! I like the idea of you setting out to notice what’s still unknown. Just, you know, please don’t get surprised by any cliffs.
This is superb, Lisa! I am amazed with how you create such lovely poems out of everyday happenings, simple items, small moments and random and intentional encounters. I am so blessed to be among the crew who gets to read them right out of the gate!
And I’m so grateful that anyone is willing to read my right-out-of-the-gate poetry! 💜
Anytime, Lisa! I'll be waiting at the gate ready to catch the next one!