Month: July 2015

Posted on by Dave Bonta

Physics

Up by five o’clock, and after my journall put in order, to my office about my business, which I am resolved to follow, for every day I see what ground I get by it. By and by comes Mr. Cooper, mate of the Royall Charles, of whom I intend to learn mathematiques, and do begin with him to-day, he being a very able man, and no great matter, I suppose, will content him. After an hour’s being with him at arithmetique (my first attempt being to learn the multiplication-table); then we parted till to-morrow. And so to my business at my office again till noon, about which time Sir W. Warren did come to me about business, and did begin to instruct me in the nature of fine timber and deals, telling me the nature of every sort; and from that we fell to discourse of Sir W. Batten’s corruption and the people that he employs, and from one discourse to another of the kind. I was much pleased with his company, and so staid talking with him all alone at my office till 4 in the afternoon, without eating or drinking all day, and then parted, and I home to eat a bit, and so back again to my office; and toward the evening came Mr. Sheply, who is to go out of town to-morrow, and so he and I with much ado settled his accounts with my Lord, which, though they be true and honest, yet so obscure, that it vexes me to see in what manner they are kept. He being gone, and leave taken of him as of a man likely not to come to London again a great while, I eat a bit of bread and butter, and so to bed. This day I sent my brother Tom, at his request, my father’s old Bass Viall which he and I have kept so long, but I fear Tom will do little good at it.

solve for y
what ground comes
to matter

I will learn
the multiplication
of noon

instruct me
in the nature of the nature
that we fell from

so obscure
that x
like an old bass viol


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Friday 4 July 1662.

Posted on by Natalie d'Arbeloff

Sweet exiled words: two poems by José Luis Appleyard

This entry is part 18 of 38 in the series Poetry from the Other Americas

 

José Luis AppleyardThe deep emotional connection I have with Paraguay began when I was about six years old and landed, with my family and all our Parisian furniture including a grand piano, in a wild place which was to be our home while my father supervised his dream of building a road linking this small landlocked country to Brazil and beyond. (I’ve written about some of this in an ongoing online autobiography, which starts here.) The Paraguay I knew then, and much later as an adult, is shaped by my personal recollections and bears little resemblance to the harsh realities which its people have endured throughout their history. My affection for the Paraguayans, their joyous, sad, beautiful country, their Guarani-infused Spanish, their music and their voices continues unabated to this day. But it’s thanks to Via Negativa’s Other Americas project that I’ve just started to discover some of their poets, strangely and unfairly omitted from the major anthologies of Latin American poetry. José Luis Appleyard (1927–1998) was part of the so-called 50s generation of Paraguayan poets, along with such other luminaries as José María Gómez Sanjurjo, Ricardo Mazó and Ramiro Domínguez.


Words

Some words die
and no dictionary can revive them;
simple words, clear words, words which formed
on our lips the language of childhood.
In vain we search, trying to give them back life
a life the years have taken away.
Sweet exiled words
forsaken sounds
once the milestones
of our personal vocabulary.
No use looking for them, they’ve already crumbled
under the dictionary’s brutal weight.


Las palabras

A veces hay palabras que se mueren
y no las resucita el diccionario;
palabras simples, claras, que acrecieron
el verbo de la infancia en nuestros labios.
En balde las buscamos para darles
una vida que ha muerto con los años.
Dulces palabras nuestras exiliadas
solo sonido ya desamparado,
que por un tiempo fueron los mojones
de nuestro personal vocabulario.
Es inútil buscarlas, ya se han muerto
bajo el peso brutal del diccionario.


How Little I Understand Things

How little I understand things
The years have not succeeded in anchoring experience
in my memory
I’m always astonished that a pair of eyes exist
which see me in close-up, so very close.
I’m astonished at the dark power of their gaze
recalling the innocence of childhood
while simultaneously conjuring up the blackest night
born of secrets.
Like an old alchemist
I want to transmute the dreams in those eyes
I want to create with those eyes
looking at me so intently
a kind of oblivion taking me to their core.
And when their language becomes wordless
when it becomes the soft expression of something which is mine,
then I see what I don’t understand about things,
their reflections are shimmering in the air,
looking at me, timelessly,
speaking of me, of themselves, of everything.


Qué poco entiendo las cosas

Qué poco entiendo las cosas.
Los años no han logrado fijar en mi memoria
la experiencia
y siempre me sorprendo que existen unos ojos
que me miran de pronto tan cerca de mí mismo.
Me sorprende el oscuro poder de su mirada
que guarda ingenuidades de infancias manifiestas
y tiene, sin embargo, una profunda noche
nacida de secretas experiencias.
Como un viejo alquimista
yo quiero interpretarla trasmutando sus sueños,
quiero hacer con sus ojos
que me miran de cerca
una forma de olvido que me lleve a su centro.
Y así, cuando sus manos son lenguaje sin cifras,
cuando son la suave expresión de algo mío,
comprendo que no entiendo de las cosas,
y quedan en el aire sus reflejos,
mirándome, sin tiempo,
y hablándome de mí, de sí, de todo.

Posted on by Dave Bonta

Craft talk

Up by four o’clock and to my office till 8 o’clock, writing over two copies of our contract with Sir W. Rider, &c., for 500 ton of hempe, which, because it is a secret, I have the trouble of writing over as well as drawing.
Then home to dress myself, and so to the office, where another fray between Sir R. Ford and myself about his yarn, wherein I find the board to yield on my side, and was glad thereof, though troubled that the office should fall upon me of disobliging Sir Richard.
At noon we all by invitation dined at the Dolphin with the Officers of the Ordnance; where Sir W. Compton, Mr. O’Neale, and other great persons, were, and a very great dinner, but I drank as I still do but my allowance of wine.
After dinner, was brought to Sir W. Compton a gun to discharge seven times, the best of all devices that ever I saw, and very serviceable, and not a bawble; for it is much approved of, and many thereof made.
Thence to my office all the afternoon as long as I could see, about setting many businesses in order. In the evening came Mr. Lewis to me, and very ingeniously did enquire whether I ever did look into the business of the Chest at Chatham; and after my readiness to be informed did appear to him, he did produce a paper, wherein he stated the government of the Chest to me; and upon the whole did tell me how it hath ever been abused, and to this day is; and what a meritorious act it would be to look after it; which I am resolved to do, if God bless me; and do thank him very much for it.
So home, and after a turn or two upon the leads with my wife, who has lately had but little of my company, since I begun to follow my business, but is contented therewith since she sees how I spend my time, and so to bed.

Writing is a secret
as glad as a gun to discharge
and not a bauble.

I look into my ear,
produce a paper to tell me
how to see.


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Thursday 3 July 1662.

Posted on by Dave Bonta

Grave goods

Up while the chimes went four, and to put down my journal, and so to my office, to read over such instructions as concern the officers of the Yard; for I am much upon seeing into the miscarriages there. By and by, by appointment, comes Commissioner Pett; and then a messenger from Mr. Coventry, who sits in his boat expecting us, and so we down to him at the Tower, and there took water all, and to Deptford (he in our passage taking notice how much difference there is between the old Captains for obedience and order, and the King’s new Captains, which I am very glad to hear him confess); and there we went into the Store-house, and viewed first the provisions there, and then his books, but Mr. Davis himself was not there, he having a kinswoman in the house dead, for which, when by and by I saw him, he do trouble himself most ridiculously, as if there was never another woman in the world; in which so much laziness, as also in the Clerkes of the Cheque and Survey (which after one another we did examine), as that I do not perceive that there is one-third of their duties performed; but I perceive, to my great content, Mr. Coventry will have things reformed.
So Mr. Coventry to London, and Pett and I to the Pay, where Sir Williams both were paying off the Royal James still, and so to dinner, and to the Pay again, where I did relieve several of my Lord Sandwich’s people, but was sorry to see them so peremptory, and at every word would, complain to my Lord, as if they shall have such a command over my Lord. In the evening I went forth and took a walk with Mr. Davis, and told him what had passed at his office to-day, and did give him my advice, and so with the rest by barge home and to bed.

The messenger
sits in his boat
expecting us.
How much
difference there is
between the old
and the dead!
As if there was never
another world
but my things—
and as if they
shall pass
with me.


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Wednesday 2 July 1662.

Posted on by Jean Morris

Gotas de lluvia / raindrops: four more haiku and a tanka

This entry is part 17 of 38 in the series Poetry from the Other Americas

 

Dreaming of rain on a hot, parched day in London.

Many Latin American masters tried their hands at haiku…


Mario Benedetti

soundless rain
under the umbrella
a perfect kiss

llueve sin ruido
pero bajo el paraguas
funciona el beso


Jose Juan Tablada

Rainy day:
each flower is a vessel
of tears…

Día lluvioso:
cada flor es un vaso
lacrimatorio…


Carlos Fleitas

a withered tree
raindrops sparkle
in the moonlight

arbol marchito
brillan gotas de lluvia
bajo la luna


Octavio Paz

Rain in May:
the whole world
is a sheet of paper

Lluvia de mayo: 
es hoja de papel 
el mundo entero.


Jorge Luis Borges

Sad is the rain
Falling on marble
Sad is the earth
Sad are the absent days
Of men, their dreams, their dawns.

Triste la lluvia
Que sobre el mármol cae,
Triste ser tierra.
Triste no ser los días
Del hombre, el sueño, el alba.

Posted on by Dave Bonta

Consultant

To the office, and there we sat till past noon, and then Captain Cuttance and I by water to Deptford, where the Royal James (in which my Lord went out the last voyage, though [he] came back in the Charles) was paying off by Sir W. Batten and Sir W. Pen.
So to dinner, where I had Mr. Sheply to dine with us, and from thence I sent to my Lord to know whether she should be a first rate, as the men would have her, or a second. He answered that we should forbear paying the officers and such whose pay differed upon the rate of the ship, till he could speak with his Royal Highness.
To the Pay again after dinner, and seeing of Cooper, the mate of the ship, whom I knew in the Charles, I spoke to him about teaching the mathematiques, and do please myself in my thoughts of learning of him, and bade him come to me in a day or two.
Towards evening I left them, and to Redriffe by land, Mr. Cowly, the Clerk of the Cheque, with me, discoursing concerning the abuses of the yard, in which he did give me much light. So by water home, and after half an hour sitting talking with my wife, who was afeard I did intend to go with my Lord to fetch the Queen mother over, in which I did clear her doubts, I went to bed by daylight, in order to my rising early to-morrow.

At noon the captain
would have her teach
the mathematics of evening—
the red land, the coursing water,
a moth in clear daylight
rising early.


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Tuesday 1 July 1662.