Via Negativa

December 30, 2024December 29, 2024 by Luisa A. Igloria

Overtone Singing

river in November light between bare woods and mountain

When my daughter leaned her head against her father's as he spoke,
she said his voice seemed to come from both his throat and chest,
almost like in overtone singing— The singer manipulates the vocal tract
to make it seem like more than one pitch sounds at the same time.

She said his voice seemed to issue from both his throat and chest.
Each word reverberated: one note split across two registers.
It seemed his voice plucked more than one pitch at the same time,
a kind of counterpoint to widen the effect of saying, or singing.

Each word brightened, reverberating across two registers.
In the kitchen, after cooking, a shimmer of oil still hangs in the air.
A counterpoint is one way to widen the effect of saying, or singing.
Sounds from the road or the river at night also make a kind of singing.

In the kitchen, the heat's turned off but a shimmer hangs in the air.
A note of garlic remains, even after I've washed my hands at the sink.
Sounds from the road or the river at night also make a kind of singing.
The fingers that hold my pen smell of both words and the world.

Herbaceous or mild, any overlay of scents on just-washed skin—
Like in overtone singing, when the singer manipulates the vocal tract,
what overlapping riches we hold in our speech and in song. It's what
my daughter heard, leaning her head against her father's as he spoke.

December 29, 2024 by Dave Bonta

Civilization

(Lord’s day). Long in bed with my wife, and though I had determined to go to dine with my wife at my Lady’s, (chiefly to put off dining with Sir W. Pen to-day because Holmes dined there), yet I could not get a coach time enough to go thither, and so I dined at home, and my brother Tom with me, and then a coach came and I carried my wife to Westminster, and she went to see Mrs. Hunt, and I to the Abbey, and there meeting with Mr. Hooper, he took me in among the quire, and there I sang with them their service, and so that being done, I walked up and down till night for that Mr. Coventry was not come to Whitehall since dinner again. At last I went thither and he was come, and I spoke with him about some business of the office, and so took leave of him, and sent for my wife and the coach, and so to the Wardrobe and supped, and staid very long talking with my Lady, who seems to doat every day more and more upon us. So home and to prayers, and to bed.

with time enough
to rot in a meeting

among the choir
or in some soft office

war seems every day
more upon us

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Sunday 29 December 1661.

December 29, 2024December 26, 2024 by Luisa A. Igloria

Clamor

Life has kept asking me 
to give, and I have given.

But what did I give 
that may have harmed another?

I never desired praise: 
just wanted happiness as much

as anyone else. I admire 
those who know how to fold and unfold

a sheet of paper, revealing
painted scenes that morph from one 

thing into another. A magic 
lantern, an infinite grid. Life

is the hand that washes 
the foreground in a spill of blue

then skips rocks 
across a lake. Should a bridge

vanish or a mountainside erode,
I must refrain from thinking of it

as a personal message from the universe.
It's not because I ate dark

instead of white meat, or stared 
at the moon while incubating 

life in my womb. Though life is also
that which we slap across the soles

of its feet as it comes through
the portal, to get it howling.

December 28, 2024December 28, 2024 by Luisa A. Igloria

Solstice

Limbs all clean, 

the tree in winter.

At any moment, the long 

sleep descends and all 

turn face down into 

the soil of their 

own remaking. 

In the soil 

they turn face down.

Sleep descends and all

the moments lengthen.

Tree in winter,

limbs all clean.

December 28, 2024 by Dave Bonta

Fortified

At home all the morning; and in the afternoon all of us at the office, upon a letter from the Duke for the making up of a speedy estimate of all the debts of the Navy, which is put into good forwardness. I home and Sir W. Pen to my house, who with his children staid playing cards late, and so to bed.

home office
a fort for my child
playing late

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Saturday 28 December 1661.

December 27, 2024 by Dave Bonta

Story time

In the morning to my Bookseller’s to bespeak a Stephens’s Thesaurus, for which I offer 4l., to give to Paul’s School; and from thence to Paul’s Church; and there I heard Dr. Gunning preach a good sermon upon the day (being St. John’s day), and did hear him tell a story, which he did persuade us to believe to be true, that St. John and the Virgin Mary did appear to Gregory, a Bishopp, at his prayer to be confirmed in the faith, which I did wonder to hear from him. Here I met with Mr. Crumlum (and told him of my endeavour to get Stephens’s Thesaurus for the school), and so home, and after dinner comes Mr. Faulconberge to see me, and at his desire I sent over for his kinsman Mr. Knightly, the merchant, and so he came over and sat and drank with us, and at his request I went over with him, and there I sat till the evening, and till both Mr. Knightly and Mr. Faulconberge (for whom I sent my boy to get a coach to carry him to Westminster) were both drunk, and so home, but better wine I never drank in all my life. So home, and finding my wife gone to Sir W. Pen’s, I went thither, and there I sat and played at cards and supped, and so home and to bed.

each day a story
to believe to be true

I pray from a thesaurus
come to see at night

all my life in one
played card

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Friday 27 December 1661.

December 27, 2024December 26, 2024 by Luisa A. Igloria

Not-Exactly-Ode to my Sadness

Yes, you— my most constant dance
          partner, activator of the learned
instinct to compartmentalize big,
          messy feelings and wear a face
trained not to betray the seething 
          underneath— I hold you fully 
responsible for my current 
          inability to let loose 
the floodgates, for the choke-
          hold that tamps the ugly
sobbing so far down, only weak
          tears sputter forth though my grief
is a furious mill wheel driven by
          volumes of water. I've heard of regions
that haven't experienced rain for millions
          of years, and also of how, by 2050, 
the world's smallest glaciers are predicted 
          to disappear. Yet here I am,
still trying to find a small sweet spot 
          between desert, oasis, and snowmelt.

December 26, 2024 by Dave Bonta

Takeout

This morning Sir W. Pen and I to the Treasury office, and there we paid off the Amity (Captain Stokes’s ship that was at Guinny) and another ship, and so home, and after dinner Sir William came to me, and he and his son and daughter, and I and my wife, by coach to Moorfields to walk; but it was most foul weather, and so we went into an alehouse and there eat some cakes and ale, and a washeallbowle woman and girl came to us and sung to us. And after all was done I called my boy (Wayneman) to us to eat some cake that was left, and the woman of the house told us that he had called for two cakes and a pot of ale for himself, at which I was angry, and am resolved to correct him for it. So home and Sir W. Pen and his son and daughter to supper to me to a good turkey, and were merry at cards, and so to bed.

morning weather
in a bowl

a sun as done
as a cake to go

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Thursday 26 December 1661.

December 26, 2024December 24, 2024 by Luisa A. Igloria

Other Worlds

In those infinite, alternate 
universes where there are other 
mes and other yous, perhaps 
I'll no longer dread the thought 
of either of us passing away 
and leaving the other behind. 
I'll rest in the idea of our being
carried beyond understanding 
to a place where I can be content 
to watch moonlight wash every 
leaf in the silvery light of no 
judgment, knowing that even there,
you'll come to me in your own time.

December 25, 2024 by Dave Bonta

Apart

In the morning to church, where at the door of our pew I was fain to stay, because that the sexton had not opened the door. A good sermon of Mr. Mills. Dined at home all alone, and taking occasion from some fault in the meat to complain of my maid’s sluttery, my wife and I fell out, and I up to my chamber in a discontent. After dinner my wife comes up to me and all friends again, and she and I to walk upon the leads, and there Sir W. Pen called us, and we went to his house and supped with him, but before supper Captain Cock came to us half drunk, and began to talk, but Sir W. Pen knowing his humour and that there was no end of his talking, drinks four great glasses of wine to him, one after another, healths to the king, and by that means made him drunk, and so he went away, and so we sat down to supper, and were merry, and so after supper home and to bed.

a door in the open door
a home alone

becomes a house of glass
to a mean drunk

Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Wednesday 25 December 1661.