pens from Andrea. I used all the pens drawn in random order and no
other pens or media. Andrea sugegsted we share what we are doing in
our returned moles.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Daisies in my Moleskine
pens from Andrea. I used all the pens drawn in random order and no
other pens or media. Andrea sugegsted we share what we are doing in
our returned moles.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Everyone We Love
Everyone We Love, by Mary Stebbins Taitt. For Jim Doran. The sad fact is that everyone we love will die--including ourselves. WAHN! ;-(
I've been working on this off and one for a week. The original is 3 x 4 inches. (Moleskine size and smaller). It may be done now, but I'm not sure, probably not quite.
It came from an accident where I inadvertently printed a DAISY on the instructions brochure for the paper which had gotten put into the printer with the paper by mistake. The third image is one where I attempted to put back the original daisies--it is called "Pushing up daisies, but I don't like it; it's too messy looking and hard to distinguish.
The second image is a scan of the original picture, which was done with markers over the top of daisy on the how-to brochure. If you look closely, you can still see the daisy underneath. You can click on it to see it bigger--remember, the original size was very small. On the third iamge, I attempted to add the daisy back in, and called it "Pushing Up Daisies," but I don't like it because it looks messy and is hard to decipher.
Monday, July 27, 2009
The Broken Ear and all its Monsters
The Broken Ear and all its Monsters
Waving a spoon back and forth over a candle,
like the master of an ancient and primitive ritual,
my father heated oil to pour into my brother's ears.
I imagine, but don't remember, a quiet incantation,
his voice soft and low, mumbling strange phrases
and the room darkening dreamlike from its ordinary
brightness. Earaches plagued my brother, who
was maybe eight then, and the warm oil, my father
said, would help. At nine, I did not believe him
and pictured ghastly torture. I watched
my father tip my brother's head, the bent
ear first, and ceremoniously pour a long thin stream
of oil into the offending ear. My brother winced,
my father held him steady, made him wait.
I stared at the bent edge of my brother's ear.
My father, when provoked, would grab
my that ear and twist it hard, hauling my brother
up and close to berate him. My brother
perfected the skill of needling my father—and
everyone else. Later, all three of us provoked him
with a thrashing teenage angst that began early
and lasted well beyond our teens, but my brother
started first. He grew out of it first as well, or managed
to hide it better. Then, he became my father's favorite,
and I the outcast. At nine, I thought my father's
repeated twisting of my brother's ear had broken it.
But perhaps he was born that way, broken,
with the seventh-generation curse from our pirate
ancestors or with some genetic psychic contortion
no nurture could overcome. Broken ears or not, we each
drew on ourselves the fury of first our parents
and then our partners with the flailing, incendiary
monsters we kept caged within.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
090728-1128-3a(3), 090724-1006-2a(2), 1st, Thursday, July 23, 2009, 12:43 PM
Waving a spoon back and forth over a candle,
like the master of an ancient and primitive ritual,
my father heated oil to pour into my brother's ears.
I imagine, but don't remember, a quiet incantation,
his voice soft and low, mumbling strange phrases
and the room darkening dreamlike from its ordinary
brightness. Earaches plagued my brother, who
was maybe eight then, and the warm oil, my father
said, would help. At nine, I did not believe him
and pictured ghastly torture. I watched
my father tip my brother's head, the bent
ear first, and ceremoniously pour a long thin stream
of oil into the offending ear. My brother winced,
my father held him steady, made him wait.
I stared at the bent edge of my brother's ear.
My father, when provoked, would grab
my that ear and twist it hard, hauling my brother
up and close to berate him. My brother
perfected the skill of needling my father—and
everyone else. Later, all three of us provoked him
with a thrashing teenage angst that began early
and lasted well beyond our teens, but my brother
started first. He grew out of it first as well, or managed
to hide it better. Then, he became my father's favorite,
and I the outcast. At nine, I thought my father's
repeated twisting of my brother's ear had broken it.
But perhaps he was born that way, broken,
with the seventh-generation curse from our pirate
ancestors or with some genetic psychic contortion
no nurture could overcome. Broken ears or not, we each
drew on ourselves the fury of first our parents
and then our partners with the flailing, incendiary
monsters we kept caged within.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
090728-1128-3a(3), 090724-1006-2a(2), 1st, Thursday, July 23, 2009, 12:43 PM
Friday, July 24, 2009
The Broken Ear and all its Monsters 0...
The Broken Ear and all its Monsters 090724-1006
Waving a spoon back and forth over a candle,
like the master of an ancient and primitive ritual,
my father heated oil to pour into my brother's ears.
I imagine, but don't remember, a quiet incantation,
his voice soft and low, mumbling strange phrases.
Earaches plagued my brother, who was maybe eight
then, and the warm oil, my father said, would help.
At nine, I could not fathom how. I watched
my father tip my brother's head, the bent
ear first, and ceremoniously pour a long thin stream
of oil into the offending ear. My brother winced,
my father held him steady, made him wait.
I stared at the bent edge my brother's ear.
My father, when provoked, would grab
my brother's ear and twist it hard, and my brother
had perfected the skill of needling him.
Later, all three of us provoked him
with a thrashing teenage angst that began early
and lasted well beyond our teens, but my brother
started first. He grew out of it first as well, or managed
to hide it better. Then, he became my father's favorite,
and I the outcast. At nine, I thought my father's
repeated twisting of my brother's ear had broken it.
But perhaps he was born that way, broken,
with the seventh-generation curse from our pirate
ancestors or with some twist of genetics that no nurture
could overcome. Broken ears or not, we each
drew on ourselves the fury of first our parents
and then our partners with the flailing, provocative
monsters we kept caged within.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
090724-1006-2a(2), 1st, Thursday, July 23, 2009, 12:43 PM
Waving a spoon back and forth over a candle,
like the master of an ancient and primitive ritual,
my father heated oil to pour into my brother's ears.
I imagine, but don't remember, a quiet incantation,
his voice soft and low, mumbling strange phrases.
Earaches plagued my brother, who was maybe eight
then, and the warm oil, my father said, would help.
At nine, I could not fathom how. I watched
my father tip my brother's head, the bent
ear first, and ceremoniously pour a long thin stream
of oil into the offending ear. My brother winced,
my father held him steady, made him wait.
I stared at the bent edge my brother's ear.
My father, when provoked, would grab
my brother's ear and twist it hard, and my brother
had perfected the skill of needling him.
Later, all three of us provoked him
with a thrashing teenage angst that began early
and lasted well beyond our teens, but my brother
started first. He grew out of it first as well, or managed
to hide it better. Then, he became my father's favorite,
and I the outcast. At nine, I thought my father's
repeated twisting of my brother's ear had broken it.
But perhaps he was born that way, broken,
with the seventh-generation curse from our pirate
ancestors or with some twist of genetics that no nurture
could overcome. Broken ears or not, we each
drew on ourselves the fury of first our parents
and then our partners with the flailing, provocative
monsters we kept caged within.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
090724-1006-2a(2), 1st, Thursday, July 23, 2009, 12:43 PM
Thursday, July 23, 2009
The Broken Ear and all its monsters
Brand new rough first draft not time to work right now:
The Broken Ear and all its Monsters
In a spoon waved back and forth over a candle,
like an ancient and primitive ritual, my father
heated oil to pour into my brother's ears.
I imagine, but don't remember, a quiet incantation.
My brother, maybe eight, was plagued with earaches
and the warm oil was supposed to help
in some way that I, at nine, could not fathom.
I watched my father tip my brother's head, the bent
ear first, and pour a long thin stream of oil,
my brother wincing and starting slightly.
My father, when provoked, would grab
my brother's ear and twist it. My brother
excelled at provoking my father , we, all three,
provoked my father, with our thrashing
teenage angst that lasted well beyond
our teens, but my brother started first.
Later, he became my father's favorite,
and I the outcast. At nine, I thought
it was my father's sudden twisting
that had broke my brother's ear. But perhaps
he was born that way, with the seventh-
generation curse from our pirate ancestors
or with some twist of genetics that no nurture
could overcome. Broken ears or not,
we each housed flailing monsters
who drew on us the fury of first our parents
and then our partners.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
1st, Thursday, July 23, 2009, 12:43 PM
.
The Broken Ear and all its Monsters
In a spoon waved back and forth over a candle,
like an ancient and primitive ritual, my father
heated oil to pour into my brother's ears.
I imagine, but don't remember, a quiet incantation.
My brother, maybe eight, was plagued with earaches
and the warm oil was supposed to help
in some way that I, at nine, could not fathom.
I watched my father tip my brother's head, the bent
ear first, and pour a long thin stream of oil,
my brother wincing and starting slightly.
My father, when provoked, would grab
my brother's ear and twist it. My brother
excelled at provoking my father , we, all three,
provoked my father, with our thrashing
teenage angst that lasted well beyond
our teens, but my brother started first.
Later, he became my father's favorite,
and I the outcast. At nine, I thought
it was my father's sudden twisting
that had broke my brother's ear. But perhaps
he was born that way, with the seventh-
generation curse from our pirate ancestors
or with some twist of genetics that no nurture
could overcome. Broken ears or not,
we each housed flailing monsters
who drew on us the fury of first our parents
and then our partners.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
1st, Thursday, July 23, 2009, 12:43 PM
.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Breathing Fire in a Vacuum
Breathing Fire in a Vacuum
The glaze that films your eyes like a skim of ice
on an autumn pond worries me. When I speak,
your ear bends to the sound of a distant motorcycle
or the hum of a twin engine plane, rather than to me
and my words, and your eyes stray to flowers,10
roving insects, dead mice, anything but my face.
Shadow by shadow in the long afternoons,
your attention leaves me. And who would not
be bored with prattle about insomnia
and fibromyalgia unless they, too, housed
an invisible fire-breathing dragon? Remember Florence
going on about her heart? If anyone had listened,
could we have saved her? Can we still save us?
I think so. Pain stretches the distance between us,
but sometimes we still reel it in with a touch.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
For BB
090721-1414-1st4702
The glaze that films your eyes like a skim of ice
on an autumn pond worries me. When I speak,
your ear bends to the sound of a distant motorcycle
or the hum of a twin engine plane, rather than to me
and my words, and your eyes stray to flowers,10
roving insects, dead mice, anything but my face.
Shadow by shadow in the long afternoons,
your attention leaves me. And who would not
be bored with prattle about insomnia
and fibromyalgia unless they, too, housed
an invisible fire-breathing dragon? Remember Florence
going on about her heart? If anyone had listened,
could we have saved her? Can we still save us?
I think so. Pain stretches the distance between us,
but sometimes we still reel it in with a touch.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
For BB
090721-1414-1st4702
Painting Grandma
Painting Grandma
Like curls of bean tendrils, memories twist green
from the old, sepia-dark photo. It hangs crooked, clipped
to the easel, small, faded and bent at the edges. Forgotten
dreams creep into my painting, a third thing, not the memories
or the photo, but an awkward merging. Brushed in first,
flat-bottomed brown clouds sail through a sea of brown sky,
bearing tumbles of white cotton candy. I borrowed them
from the photo, too poignant in brown to paint in blue.
Tall pole beans wind around rows of poles and pile
one onto the next over mounds of cloud, sepia brown
on the bottoms and gradually greening toward the top.
I paint a woman between the rows, roundish, wearing an apron
pink with red flowers over a faded blue housedress.
I paint her square face tea-stained brown, leathery and wrinkled
as a shed layer of sycamore bark. The old photo invades
my dimming memories, but she is still the brightest
point in the painting. Her thin grey-black braids wind
around her head and she reaches with heavy arms to pluck beans
from the plants I paint before her. The tips of their leave overlap
her reproachful face. I remember the smile that stern face
always turned toward me and I smile toward the dark visage.
"Don't," she warms my father, "Point that camera at me."
Through the shining and iridescent lens in my father's hands,
she cannot see the granddaughter who holds the brush
that traces the sun edged clouds, shape of her face,
the bean-burgeoning apron nor see, beyond me,
the great granddaughters and great, great granddaughters
who touch her still-damp face across five generations.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
For Nicolina Ciaranello
090721-0856-2, 1st 090719 on back of SMM Ms in pen in car
Like curls of bean tendrils, memories twist green
from the old, sepia-dark photo. It hangs crooked, clipped
to the easel, small, faded and bent at the edges. Forgotten
dreams creep into my painting, a third thing, not the memories
or the photo, but an awkward merging. Brushed in first,
flat-bottomed brown clouds sail through a sea of brown sky,
bearing tumbles of white cotton candy. I borrowed them
from the photo, too poignant in brown to paint in blue.
Tall pole beans wind around rows of poles and pile
one onto the next over mounds of cloud, sepia brown
on the bottoms and gradually greening toward the top.
I paint a woman between the rows, roundish, wearing an apron
pink with red flowers over a faded blue housedress.
I paint her square face tea-stained brown, leathery and wrinkled
as a shed layer of sycamore bark. The old photo invades
my dimming memories, but she is still the brightest
point in the painting. Her thin grey-black braids wind
around her head and she reaches with heavy arms to pluck beans
from the plants I paint before her. The tips of their leave overlap
her reproachful face. I remember the smile that stern face
always turned toward me and I smile toward the dark visage.
"Don't," she warms my father, "Point that camera at me."
Through the shining and iridescent lens in my father's hands,
she cannot see the granddaughter who holds the brush
that traces the sun edged clouds, shape of her face,
the bean-burgeoning apron nor see, beyond me,
the great granddaughters and great, great granddaughters
who touch her still-damp face across five generations.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
For Nicolina Ciaranello
090721-0856-2, 1st 090719 on back of SMM Ms in pen in car
Monday, July 20, 2009
Memories and Repcruussions 2
Memories and Repercussions
All my faces I burned at the your door, stepped
over your threshold blank as the first piece of paper
slid from a newly opened ream. I fanned the ashes
of self into your dogwoods and lilacs, but they filtered
in through the poisoned earth to remind me who I was
before I met you. Those shadows, though immolated
in flames, still dance in dreams. Every day a new face, old
as its tortured scars, blossoms from the blank visage
I donned for our wedding. One by one, I claw
them off and they scuttle like rats under our bed
to screech and whine for my attention. They interrupt
the soft touch of your hand on the curve of my hip
during the long wakeful hours as I listen, helplessly,
to their squabbling and pronouncements. So many
of them pile around our rooms, like wadded
and rejected drafts, that I can no longer find the unblemished
self I tried to give you. For your protection. And mine.
Nor can we find each other now among the heaps of drooling
faces, the raging masks that bury and drown us both.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
For K
090720-1254-2, 090720 1st
All my faces I burned at the your door, stepped
over your threshold blank as the first piece of paper
slid from a newly opened ream. I fanned the ashes
of self into your dogwoods and lilacs, but they filtered
in through the poisoned earth to remind me who I was
before I met you. Those shadows, though immolated
in flames, still dance in dreams. Every day a new face, old
as its tortured scars, blossoms from the blank visage
I donned for our wedding. One by one, I claw
them off and they scuttle like rats under our bed
to screech and whine for my attention. They interrupt
the soft touch of your hand on the curve of my hip
during the long wakeful hours as I listen, helplessly,
to their squabbling and pronouncements. So many
of them pile around our rooms, like wadded
and rejected drafts, that I can no longer find the unblemished
self I tried to give you. For your protection. And mine.
Nor can we find each other now among the heaps of drooling
faces, the raging masks that bury and drown us both.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
For K
090720-1254-2, 090720 1st
Memories and their Repercussions hf
I've been working on a new novel, a children's novel and sequel to Frog Haven. I am hoping to send Frog Haven out soon (again). But I wrote a new poem last night (on paper, not transcribed yet) and another new one this morning (below) (Oops I've revised it, see new version above):
Memories and their Repercussions
All my faces I burned at the door to your house, stepped
over the threshold blank as the first piece of paper
slid from a newly opened ream. I fanned the ashes
of self into the dogwoods and lilacs, but they filtered in
through the poisoned earth to remind me who I was
before I met you. Every day a new face, old
as its tortured scars, blossomed out of the blank visage
I'd tried to don for our wedding. One by one, I clawed
them off and they scuttled like rats under our bed
to screech and battle for my attention. They interrupt
the soft touch of your hand on the curve of my hip
during the long wakeful hours as I listen, helplessly,
to their squabbling and pronouncements. Now,
so many of them pile around our rooms, like wadded
and rejected drafts, that I can no longer find the unblemished
self I tried to give you for your protection. And mine.
Nor can we find each other among the heaps of drooling
faces, the raging masks that bury and drown us both.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
For K
090720 1st
Memories and their Repercussions
All my faces I burned at the door to your house, stepped
over the threshold blank as the first piece of paper
slid from a newly opened ream. I fanned the ashes
of self into the dogwoods and lilacs, but they filtered in
through the poisoned earth to remind me who I was
before I met you. Every day a new face, old
as its tortured scars, blossomed out of the blank visage
I'd tried to don for our wedding. One by one, I clawed
them off and they scuttled like rats under our bed
to screech and battle for my attention. They interrupt
the soft touch of your hand on the curve of my hip
during the long wakeful hours as I listen, helplessly,
to their squabbling and pronouncements. Now,
so many of them pile around our rooms, like wadded
and rejected drafts, that I can no longer find the unblemished
self I tried to give you for your protection. And mine.
Nor can we find each other among the heaps of drooling
faces, the raging masks that bury and drown us both.
Mary Stebbins Taitt
For K
090720 1st
Friday, July 10, 2009
Thursday, July 02, 2009
Daisy Rain
on my recent trip to Whitehall. Sandwiched in Picasa.
through a window darkly lightly
trials of car failure. I'm hoping to make one or more art pieces from
this.
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