Jabberwocky and Oona-the-Brave

19 Saturday Jan 2013

Posted by Tea-mahm in Jabberwocky, Poetry, word-dancing

≈ 2 Comments

The book! Illustrated by Graeme Base

Jabberwocky

by Lewis Carroll

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!

The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun

The frumious Bandersnatch!”

He took his vorpal sword in hand:

Long time the manxome foe he sought —

So rested he by the Tumtum tree,

And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,

The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,

Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,

And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through

The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!

He left it dead, and with its head

He went galumphing back.

“And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?

Come to my arms, my beamish boy!

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!’

He chortled in his joy.

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

<> <> <>

Borogrove and Mimsy

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland came out in 1865. Then came the second book. Jabberwocky is found at the end of the first chapter

Lewis Carroll

of Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There. After Alice has entered the looking-glass (mirror)…she opens the book in which Jabberwocky is written. The poem is written backwards, and she is unable to read it until she realizes that it’s a looking- glass book, and that she must hold it up to the mirror to decipher it…. Oh, yes, this is the kind of adventure in the written word that I love!

Lewis Carroll was the pen-name for Charles Dodgson, who lived from 1832 to 1898. He was one of eleven children. He became a mathematics professor at Oxford University in England. Adults found him difficult to deal with, and he got along best with children. He was fond of magic and sleight of hand, and as a child he dabbled in puppetry. http://www.thepublictheatre.org/education/study_guides/2010-11/Jabberwocky.pdf

THREE IS NOT TOO YOUNG FOR THIS: a few days ago I was suggesting a nap to my granddaughter, Oona. She’s a sparkly three and a half years old. Will you read Jabberwocky, Tutu? (That’s me, Tutu is Hawaiian for grandparent. It goes with Tamam. Tutu Tamam.) I answered that I brought the beautiful new book I’d read her just once before. She leaned forward and went into a

Oona, ready for the Jabberwocky

conspiratorial tone: Jabberwocky, Jabberwocky! Jabberwocky! –– as much to herself as to me. Moments later she was on my lap and we entered the weird-word-world of Lewis Carroll. We were in the garden of beautifully drawn creatures, which I had mentioned to her as looking strange, odd, or fierce, but having something funny about them at the same time, and that tiny funniness kept them from being scary. A twinkle in their eyes, a silly color, some vulnerability made them more like us. Oona’s parents are both artistic and move toward the unconventional, so she can go there. You can see from her outfit, socks on her hands…

This fall Oona discovered strong moments; she has always had delight, now she could turn fierce or pissed off, trying out her power at home in the months after her third birthday. It follows that she was encouraged to be a bit milder. Be gentle. That stuff. This book challenged that. Was she strong enough to go on this adventure? A boy and a sword to slay the creature, then be adored by the dad for completing the task!

Look, Oona, the Borogroves! She answered: I think one is a Mimsey. We tracked the two pale green creatures, hidden skillfully on nearly every page. They were the “team” that went with the hero on his adventure. And the white horse, Borogroves and Mimsey – and us.

She had told me the first time I read the book that the hero was a girl. Now she began to correct me. I mean pronouns. He took his vorpal sword in hand. HER vorpal sword. Come to my arms my beamish boy.

Come to my arms my beamish GIRL…

GIRL, Tutu, it’s GIRL. We made it through the story and Oona said, AGAIN! I said if she got into bed, I’d whisper the poem to her –– without the book. All tucked in under the pink quilt, she closed her eyes. Her thumb found her mouth. But as I began to whisper, she corrected most of the seven pronouns he and his to SHE and HER! Beamish boy to Beamish GIRL.

I was stunned. I never heard of a three-year-old feminist! This is her journey. She can be all-powerful and be rewarded. She has weird friends. She is at home with them. Not only teddy-bear and dolly stuff! Go Oona.

Jabberwocky as preferred by Oona (she and her and girl)

by Lewis Carroll

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

“Beware the Jabberwock, my Girl son!

The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun

The frumious Bandersnatch!”

She He took her his vorpal sword in hand:

Long time the manxome foe she he sought —

So rested she he by the Tumtum tree,

And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought she he stood,

The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,

Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,

And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through

The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!

She He left it dead, and with its head

She He went galumphing back.

“And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?

Come to my arms, my beamish girl boy!

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!’

He chortled in his joy.

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

<> My favorite version is Jabberwocky by Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter in Tim Burton’s 2010 film, “Alice in Wonderland.” He ends this unique reading of the poem speaking to Alice, saying –– “It’s all about YOU, you know.” Which brings us back to Oona, and the girl champions of our era. Alice falls down a hole after spotting an unusual rabbit. Arriving in a strange and surreal place called “Underland,” she finds herself in a world filled with talking animals, villainous queens and knights, and frumious bandersnatches. Alice realizes that she is there for a reason–to conquer the horrific Jabberwocky and restore the rightful queen to her throne. Check this out! You may have to copy this pesky URL <http://viralverse.net/wordpress/?p=3405v=uTvNIxeipqs>

And this! A girl a bit older than Oona recites Jabberwocky: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTvNIxeipqs <>

~WORDSWORDSWORDSWORDS~ WORDSWORDSWORDSWORDS~

For my friends the writers, here is Poetic Analysis:

Each stanza is cross-rhymed (ABAB). The first three lines of each stanza have 8 syllables (4 roughly iambic feet), and the fourth line has 6 (3 feet).

Line 1: Let’s take the word slithy as our first example. This word is two things: an example of onomatopoeia, and an example of portmanteau. What’s that second one? Well, a portmanteau is a word that’s made by squashing two words together. In this case, lithe and slimy. Onomatopoeia, as you might have encountered earlier in the discussion about this poem, refers to a word that sounds like what it means (think hiss or buzz). So we have a word that not only sounds slimy, but also is graceful, because of the inclusion of lithe (which means “supple and/or graceful”). Both the sound and the word combining give this new word force and depth of meaning.

Line 2-3: Gimble and mimsy echo each other (technically, it’s assonance, i.e., repeated vowel sounds) creating sonic cohesion, while the light i sounds give us a feeling of carefree-ness and peace.

Line 5: The word Jabberwock is harsh, and signals an impending violence. To jab also means to hit something, which further enhances the sense that this thing is something you don’t want to mess with.

Line 8: Similarly, the word Bandernsatch has hints of both bandit and snatch in it, the latter being something that the former would do (a bandit snatches your stuff and runs away with it).

Line 18: Snicker-snack! is also sonically resonant, as it mimics the sound of a sword hitting something. And about the sword: the word vorpal is a onomatopoetic, if you think about it. Say “vorp!” Doesn’t this sound like the swinging of a big, powerful weapon?

Line 23: The expressions of joy here are all sound-play. Frabjous is a bit like fabulous, and if you were to holler “Callooh! Callay!” people would probably think you were cheering.<http://www.shmoop.com/jabberwocky/sound-wordplay-symbol.html>

Lewis Carroll offered a definiton for ‘uffish thought’ in a letter he wrote in 1877: “I did make an explanations once for ‘uffish thought’! It seemed to suggest a state of mind when the voice is gruffish, the manner roughish, and the temper huffish.”

Oona likes the yellow one best….

I have a sign on the computer. THIS IS THE YEAR OF UFFISH THOUGHT! For me it is a magical state of thought, a doorway into the empowerment of granddaughters, and the sword of clarity taking out my jabber-confusion. May it be so!

<> <> <>

Wearing the Kuffiyeh on retreat

12 Saturday Jan 2013

Posted by Tea-mahm in Jordan, kuffiyeh, Naomi Shihab Nye, Poetry

≈ 7 Comments

Ghost of the olive tree,
Palestine

I’ve been on retreat for seven days. We are (sixty or so people) on a hill-top surrounded by fields, deer, and oak trees south of Petaluma California. We sit for 20 minutes – participate in music, chanting, and movement for 20 minutes – sit for 20 minutes (back and forth) every day for ten days the first week in January. This is our tenth year.

Today I’ve heard it snowed in Jerusalem! I’m wearing a gift, a black and white scarf made by Palestinians in Jordan. My friend Girija gave it to me. The Kuffiyeh is a symbol of Palestinian national sentiment. Here’s a translated excerpt from a spoken word piece by Shadia Mansour:

That’s why we rock the kuffiyeh, cuz it’s patriotic

The kuffiyeh, the kuffiyeh is Arabic

That’s why we rock the kuffiyeh, our essential identity

The kuffiyeh, the kuffiyeh is Arabic…

I sit in silence, deep into my days of meditation, wearing the black and white cloth that links me to the Arabs, and specially the Palestinians, as does my name – Tamam. It was given to me by Murshid Hassan, a Jordanian living in Nabulus in 1975. It goes with Kahn, my husband’s Jewish family name. I sit with both names. Both names sit together peacefully with me.

I sit with eyes open most of the time, and the man in front of me wears a jacket black on his shoulders and a deep blue on the back. It’s like looking at the ocean at night; our morning is evening in the Middle East. Near Jerusalem and elsewhere, many Palestinians live in pain and uncertainty. The hopeless feelings are ever-present, and the black flower of hatred blooms. I am stunned by my own reflections as my world here on the hill at IONS is safe and peaceful. I am with people who are trying to be kind to one another. We don’t question the certainty of our next meal and a warm bed. Here there are no bulldozers breaking the centuries-old olive trees, no rocket launchers, no rats, no fetid water. I can afford to be focused, present and awake now because I sleep safely at night.

My beloved mentor and friend, Naomi Shihab Nye is a world-class poet who lives in San Antonio. Her father grew up in Palestine, her mother – America. Here is a poem she wrote:

Luncheon in Nabulus city Park

When you lunch in a town

which has recently known war

under a calm slate sky mirroring none of it,

certain words feel impossible in the mouth.

Casualty: too casual, it must be changed.

A short man stacks mounds of pita bread

on each end of the table, muttering

something about more to come.

Plump birds landing on park benches

surely had their eyes closed recently,

must have seen nothing of weapons or blocades.

When the woman across from you whispers

I don’t think we can take it any more

and you say there are people praying for her

in the mountains of the Himalayas and she says

Lady, it is not enough, then what?

The gong sounds, ending the sit. The blue ocean before me tips over as the man acknowledges the end of the meditation with a small bow. I am gently holding the two worlds, rocking first there then here, wearing the soft fabric of hope. May all prayers for end to the conflict in the Holy Land reach the heart of the earth. May all be safe and happy and free to live a full life!

<> <> <>

Some people doing work for peace the Middle East:

http://jerusalempeacemakers.org

Home

New, Oscar-Nominated Documentary film: 5 Broken Cameras about a Palestinian family <http://www.kinolorber.com/5brokencameras/#/about>

my kuffiyeh…

The First Muslim by Lesley Hazleton ~ BOOK REVIEW

07 Monday Jan 2013

Posted by Tea-mahm in Lesley Hazelton

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Tags

islam, lesley hazleton

The First Muslim, the Story of Muhammad by Lesley Hazleton <>Review by Tamam Kahn

There is much that is wonderful about this book! I opened the manila envelope, slid the book out, opened it and began reading. Two hours later I was calling to my husband across the room, saying, “Listen to this…”

This is what it meant to be an orphan: the ordinary childhood freedom of being with out a care would never be his… At age six, he (Muhammad) was now doubly orphaned, his sole inheritance a radical insecurity as to his place in the world.

Accurate instinct on the basics. In all the years that I studied Muhammad’s life, I never gave much thought to Muhammad as an orphan. This fact is often mentioned by historians, but none make us feel the alien landscape in which the boy finds himself in the way this telling does. A certain wariness crept into the corners of his eyes and his smile became tentative and cautious; even decades later, hailed as the hero of his people, he’s rarely be seen to laugh.

Then Lesley Hazleton takes the reader deeper. At age five, he is returned to his estranged blood mother Amina; abruptly, a child between two worlds. In that same year, after the two of them visit relatives in Medina, several days journey North, she dies on the return trip. …now doubly orphaned.

The author describes life with the Beduin, something she herself knows, having lived in the Middle East ––including the desert there, for several years. This part is earlier in the book –– Hazleton brings us into the early years with a Beduin wet-nurse, living over the mountains from Mecca, with a life that was calculated for survival and building strength and endurance in a child.

His Beduin childhood would play a major role in making him who he was… Once weaned, he’d eat the regular Beduin fare of camel milk along with grains and pulses grown in winter pastures –– a sparse diet for a sparse way of life… there were no luxuries, not even the sweetness of honey and dates… The high desert steppe was an early education in the power of nature and the art of living with it: how to gauge the right time to move… how to find water where there seemed to be none...

We join Muhammad on his first job. He helps his uncle with a long caravan trip to Damascus, just a child, really, but with the wisdom of one comfortable with the desert and the animals. …the young Muhammad walked alongside, and once they’d unloaded the camels, fed them, and hobbled them… collected the oblong pellets of camel feces, so dry and densely fibrous that they gave off no odor… and coax(ed) them into a slow burn for cooking fires, or… watch(ed) through the night against predators like wolves, hyenas, and mountain lions. He learned everything about the journey, then later the business of trade, and soon was taking the caravans himself.

Chapter seven finds Muhammad, married man, father, and respected citizen of Mecca at the pivotal point in his life. He is on a solitary retreat on Mount Hira when Angel Gabriel squeezes him and commands him to recite: Imagine being breathed into – inspired – with such force that your body can hardly bear it. No gentle breath from heaven here, but air being impelled into your lungs with immense force, as though a giant were giving you mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

That encounter changes everything, especially politics, long-time alliances of protection, and the respect of the City Fathers of Mecca – the tide turns against him. Throughout Mecca, group loyalty was already being stretched to the breaking point as dissent over Muhammad’s message began to split families apart. And this: Muhammad was no longer merely mad or possessed, his opponents argued. He was far more dangerous than that. By trying to turn Mecca away from “the ways of the fathers” he was trying to undermine and overthrow the whole society.

Hazleton manages to give logical steps of the complex picture, so that we the reader, understands society in the 7th century in a fresh contemporary way. This paves the way for Part 2: EXILE.

The author is at her best when exploring a challenge like “the Night Journey.” It was controversial. Historian, Ibn-Ishaq, would “… omit the episode in his multi-volume history.” One of his followers “…begged him to keep quiet about it.” What about this mystical experience? Hazelton tells us:

…here is where it can be said that Muhammad fully assumes what the Hebrew Bible calls, “the mantle of prophecy…. This is where Muhammad first understands himself not merely as a messenger but as a leader.

By page 145 I’ve underlined much more than I can use in this review. The colored tabs marking a page of interest are densely placed.

I appreciated how careful Hazleton is about choosing respected source material, yet I found myself disappointed that the strict referencing did not include the wife, Umm Salama’s, contribution to the victory at Hudaibiya, something I took from historian Martin Lings, who is reliable, but was not specific enough about sources for me to cite his primary reference to that event. I missed hearing her tell of the moment when Muhammad asks his wife what to do after his men won’t listen to him!

The author takes us into the exhaustion of the final year. Words like: The public demands on Muhammad increased by the day… give us the warning of the difficult time when he must hold up under immense pressure, this man in his sixties – old for that time and place. We are told earlier the physical toll from bringing in Revelation. The pain was an essential part of it, part of the birthing process, for this is what he was doing: verse by verse he was giving birth to the Qur’an.

Now he gets very ill. Here is a logical diagnosis. This was no mere headache but a fatal disease, and indeed the symptoms and the duration of Muhammad’s final illness – ten days – are classic for bacterial meningitis.

We are ready to see this man finally put to rest, buried in the dead of night. Buried where he had died, in the room belonging to his wife Aisha. As he entered his grave, he was simply a man again, free of the intense public scrutiny that had hemmed him in.

This humanizing of the man, Muhammad, is the thread running through the book. Often, in the media, what is written about Muhammad or the word “Muslim” is overlaid with dramatic and political innuendos to support a variety of loud viewpoints.

Here, it’s like she begins by talking to us in a quiet tone on that noisy street. Come inside where it is calm, and listen to Lesley Hazleton tell about a man who became The First Muslim. It’s a good story.

Legos, Legos, the update!

02 Wednesday Jan 2013

Posted by Tea-mahm in Legos, Uncategorized, Updates

≈ 2 Comments

billiards

Here is my fourth annual Lego blog! I’ve assembled some rockin, eye-poppin stats and pix for the Lego fans and would-be Lego fans. I have to start with my zaniest discovery ~10 Google pages of LEGO HATS – 40 on page 1! Each one is finger-size and brightly colored. I love that. <http://bricks.argz.com/partcat/Minifig%2C%20Headgear>

Lego science? Lego as investment? Lego weaponry? Lego Hellfire? (if you are into the absurd, the colorful, and stunning numbers, you will enjoy this Lego article!) Here we go…….

Literary Lego people, for you –aside from the Merwin piece, to the book, contained in a pop-up book called The Lego Poem; and The Great Order of the Universe: a poem by Christian Bok, I’ve been unable to find good Lego poetry. (They are in an earlier blog: The LEGO and the written word, and on the WEB.) I challenge you to find others!

On a practical note, how DO you make a Lego piece? I mean really. Plastic and?

All of the basic Lego elements start out as plastic granules composed primarily of acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS). A highly automated injection molding

Lego granules

process turns these granules into recognizable bricks. The making of a Lego brick requires very high temperatures and enormous pieces of equipment, so machines, rather than people, handle most of their creation.

When the ABS granules arrive at Lego manufacturing facilities, they’re vacuumed into several storage silos. The average Lego plant has about 14 silos, and each can hold 33 tons of ABS granules. When production begins, the granules travel through tubes to the injection molding machines. The machines use very accurate molds — their precision tolerance is as little as 0.002 millimeters.

The machines melt the granules at temperatures of up to 450 degrees F (232 degrees C), inject the melted ABS into molds and apply between 25 and 150 tons of pressure. After about seven seconds, the new Lego pieces cool and fall onto a conveyor. At the end of the

assembly hall

conveyor, they fall into a bin. When the bin fills, the molding machine signals a robot to pick it up and carry it to an assembly hall. In the Billund factory, eight robots move 600 bins of elements per hour…. 1

There are about 6.5 billion people on planet Earth, and about 4 billion Lego minifigures.

Are you kidding? That’s not just pieces or “bricks,” that’s 4 billion “guys,” as my kids used to call them.

Here’s a landscape of minifigures in Hell.

Lego Hell

It is frightening to see the expressions on their little lego faces. Can you imagine opening this set on Christmas day, stacking up the flames… “Look, Mommy! I finished building my IN HELL Lego set!”

Lego GUNS

What are toys coming to? OK this page is really troubling to me. How to build Lego GUNS? What do we do with this kind of craziness? It is hard for me to even think about this.

Calm down, it’s just TOYS……. or is it?

Investment opportunity: $$$$ Investing in Lego bricks may sound ludicrous to those who see them just as toys. But savvy investors can get a big score if they know how to buy the toys from stores, hold them and then sell them online later…. I was told One investor has more than 3,000 Lego sets piled high in a climate-controlled storage facility. Most of the sets he bought years ago, with the plan of selling them a year from now for a profit. Doing this again and again generates a tidy 10 percent to 15 percent annual profit, he said. That tops the 10 percent long-term average return of stocks.

Then there are the adults who get to play with Legos for work:

“I meet a lot of really jealous kids who want my job,” says Certified Professional Sean Kenney, a New Yorker who left a technology job at Lehman Brothers in 2002 to build Lego models full time. “Their parents are often really jealous, too.”

… Grown-ups forked over more than $1,000 for a recent 5,922-piece Lego Taj Mahal

Lego-Taj-Mahal

and equally big bucks for rare vintage kits. Lego is catering to the booming market with offerings that make youngsters yawn, like bricks in subtle pastel hues and models of Frank Lloyd Wright houses.2

And this Lego Fan who has crossed some kind of line beyond hobby time…

Jonathan [Eric] Hunter’s passion for Lego building has led him to create cars, a replica of the Quest Software Building in Irvine and golf carts. He vies to become the new kid on the Legoland block Friday in a contest to pick a master model builder. …Hunter estimated he has about 10 Lego models of his creation on hand at any given time. He also has about 15 models from kits, not of his creation. He started buying bulk Legos by the bin. He bought five bins last week of 180-190 pounds of Legos. “I’m just trying to stock up on parts,” Hunter said. “It has to be over a million at least and that’s probably a conservative guess,” he said of his entire collection.

’61 Jaguar XKE by Jonathan Eric Hunter

Hunter shares the home with his live-in girlfriend Patricia Spear, 29. Spear owns two pet pigs and two dogs. And if Hunter doesn’t clean up his Legos in the living room, she said the pigs munch on the Legos. “He undoes some of them,” Spear said of Hunter’s Legos. “Mostly it’s all in his room but gradually it’s been taking over the living room.”3

But wait — there is the futuristic teccie-nerd lego product called MINDSTORMS NXT:

The newly-released Lego MINDSTORMS NXT set includes the

“intelligent brick,” which contains a microprocessor, as well as three motors, four sensors, programming software and 571 TECHNIC elements. A group of users — the MINDSTORMS User Panel — helped the Lego Group create the new system. On the MINDSTORM NXT: You connect your computer to the brick using either a USB cable or a Bluetooth wireless connection. The wireless connection is very cool. The brick can link with a computer, with other bricks or even with Bluetooth phones or PDAs.

The kit comes with three motors. …The kit also comes with four sensors: a touch sensor, a light sensor, a sound sensor and an ultrasonic range finder. The touch and light sensor are bigger than, but otherwise similar to, their RIS 2.0 equivalents.4

Lab crane, scientific instrument Lego

Using a Lego Mindstorms NXT kit, Daniel Strange, 25, built and programmed a crane that moves in a set path, raising and lowering the sample between beakers containing solutions. The lab now has two of them working round the clock. “They’re a bit wobbly but they do the job precisely,” Strange says. The kit retails for around £300; a similar scientific instrument would cost thousands. “We use the kits for a bunch of projects. It’s a very flexible platform.”5

I will end with A tribute to Chanel’s clutch – Lego Fashion, Lego fine jewelry, Legos of famous people, Lego animals, butterflies, lego food, my granddaughter Oona, and her Duplo house (junior legos), Nephew Jaden, and some lego guys talking story.

OOOO! Chanel Lego clutch

Jacqueline Sanchez ~ Forever Young jewelry

1″Making Lego Bricks” by Tracy V. Wilson http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com

2 Wall Street Journal 11/17/11 Daniel Michael.s

3 Article: “Anything But Child’s Play” by Jessica Peralta for California Sun Post News.

4 Mactech Journal vol.23, Issue 04 article by Rich Warren.

5 Photo and quotes from Wired Magazine July, 2012 article by Daniel Cossins.

bronx zoo tiger

The famous Afgan Girl from the cover of National Geo…

after MC Escher

Oona and her Duplo house (junior Legos)

Jaden and his Lego piece

That’s all!

2012 ~ a wrap-up: Mexico

30 Sunday Dec 2012

Posted by Tea-mahm in Uncategorized

≈ 6 Comments

The countries from visitors to my blog. Darker, more frequent visits…

This blog had 23,000 views in 2012. Where did they come from? See the map above… 131 countries in all!

WordPress just sent me the stats for 2012. I am amazed especially since my LEGO posts got the most hits of all! In honor of that I will be posting a lego update soon. Next two postings were on Solomon, my beloved son, who died January 31 in Thailand. Then comes my writing. I’m glad that is getting attention, as I’m working on a new book. So here’s to my viewers! THANK YOU! I include some new pix and a new poem in honor of this amazing sad, beautiful and powerful year.

My granddaughters, Oona and little Maeve

These are the posts that got the most views in 2012.

1 The Lego Update… November 2011 (Imagine! Legos RULE!)

2 My son Solomon: 7/11/77 – 1/31/12… February 2012

3 Solomon’s Memorial… April 2012

4 Fatima poems… July 2010

5 Organic Roses of Ecuador… September 2011

SOLOMON honored, December, 2012. Shabda and I went to Sayulita, Mexico for Christmas with Nicole, her parents, Varvara and Jason, and two of Solomon’s close friends, Ryan and Ean. One day we boated to an island off the coast and released some of Solomon’s ashes in a beautiful spot in the lea of the this small bird island. Here are the pictures.

Solomon, we miss you and love you. Shine on!

Nicole with the ashes

my release

Shabda sending the ashes into the ocean

We had some beautiful, joyful moments together. Here is one:

N+E+R

Christmas Eve in the square in Sayulita. Ryan, Nicole and Ean ~ a moment of JOY!

<> <> <>

Here is a recent poem from my new work on the life of Fatima, daughter of Prophet Muhammad.

May the New Year Bring LOVE, JOY, and PEACE to the people of the world!

<> <>

me and beautiful Nicole

Losing a Child, losing twenty….

16 Sunday Dec 2012

Posted by Tea-mahm in Uncategorized

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Losing a child

Losing a child, losing twenty

Today I honor the beautiful children and teachers who died on December 14th in a first grade class in America. To lose a child is a terrible thing. Our hearts are with the families, as many hearts were with ours when we lost our son, Solomon, in sudden car accident, less than a year ago. The way back from sudden tragedy of this proportion is full of sorrow. The loss of a child, a sister, a parent, a friend – opens the heart. What we make of that is up to us.

Lets focus on sending love and support to the families.

RIP Rainbow

Gun control, yes, but what about mental health? Here are words from Morgan Freeman, who asks us to not focus on the shooter but instead:

“You can help by forgetting you ever read this man’s name, and remembering the name of at least one victim. You can help by donating to mental health research instead of just pointing to gun control as the problem. You can help by turning off the news.”

Imagine the media frenzy around the families by today’s voracious, people-hounding press. I send them prayers of protection, and a shield against unwanted, invasive attention. That’s what they need, protection.

And this very powerful article in the Huffington Post from a mother with a violent, mentally ill thirteen year old son she is “terrified of.” This is something we can work to fix, in memory of all these children and teachers who died.

< http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/16/i-am-adam-lanzas-mother-mental-illness-conversation_n_2311009.html>

~~ First Graders: Charlotte, Daniel, Olivia, Josephine, Ana, Dylan, Madeline, Catherine, Chase, Jesse, James, Grace, Emilie, Jack, Noah, Caroline, Jessica, Avielle, Benjamin, Allison ~ ~

~~ Adults: Rachel, Dawn, Anne Marie, Lauren, Mary, Victoria.

Victoria Soto, First Grade teacher

Victoria died a hero. She hid her first graders in the cabinets and closets after hearing the gunfire. When the shooter came to her classroom, she told him that her students were in the gym. He shot her. She saved the lives of all of her students. Please pass this on if you see it. She deserves to be remembered for her bravery.

May you go peacefully into heavenly fields! May you be with angels of light!

Noah Pozner age 6

Emily Alice Parker age 6

Untold and Madonna at the concert in NYC

16 Friday Nov 2012

Posted by Tea-mahm in Announcements, Events, Kay Turner (folklore), Madonna, Poetry, Untold, Updates

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“I went down to Rockaway Beach yesterday with my children and we saw what was going on there, we saw the destruction,” she said. “It was really sad but we also saw amazing acts of humanity. People sharing with other people, people working hard, cleaning houses, handing out food, blankets giving love and a hug.” Madonna

This October 8 I gave a reading in Tribeca, NYC. A new friend, Ishwari, bought my book and gave it to the director of Brooklyn Art Council, Dr. Kay Turner. I looked her up. Dr. Turner loves Folklore as “the oral basis of culture, bringing the past into the present…,” she mentioned in an interview conducted by Diana Taylor for HIPP, NY.

Here’s where I pick up the thread. Kay thanked Ishwari with an email that said this:

“I am devouring Untold. I love it! Thank you!!! You will appreciate that I took it with me to Madonna’s concert on Monday night. To read about the Wives while I waited for Her!! Ha! Xok”

Best book review I’ve gotten. Thank you Kay! Pop Royalty and the royalty of the 7th Century – together – at Madison Square Garden…. oh, yes. It makes me smile.

And this on the concert: from reviewer Cory Midgarden: [November 13th for MTV online News]: NEW YORK — “Madonna fans were in for a treat Monday night when the Material Girl packed Madison Square Garden for her MDNA Tour. While concertgoers waited for more than an hour between her set and her opening act …. it all proved to be worth the delay once the original Queen of Pop took the stage.

The 54-year-old confirmed the title was still hers as she opened the night wearing a black skintight ensemble that was hard to imagine Britney, Beyoncé or Gaga pulling off in 25 years’ time. But it was not just her flawless appearance that garnered ear-piercing screams throughout MSG. As Madonna worked the crowd with her single “Girl Gone Wild,” it was clear to everyone in attendance that they were in the presence of pop royalty…. The mood changed dramatically before her performance of “Masterpiece,” however, where Madonna expressed her condolences for those affected by Superstorm Sandy.”

Please! May we all continue to send prayers and help to those who are still suffering from this terrible storm. <>

Jack Gilbert, Master Poet dies

14 Wednesday Nov 2012

Posted by Tea-mahm in Jack Gilbert, Napa Valley Writers Conference, Poetry

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Dorianne Laux writes: “This photo was reclaimed from a box left out in the rain. Even water was turned to a great fire when it came to Jack.”

I was saddened by the news that the great poet Jack Gilbert just died today. Here is a very good bio and interview from years ago in The Paris Review.<http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/5583/the-art-of-poetry-no-91-jack-gilbert>

and here is a tender beautiful piece on Linda Gregg… and Jack: <http://alexdimitrov.tumblr.com/post/36726870922/meeting-jack-gilbert-and-linda-gregg>

from Burning (Andante Non Troppo)

We are all burning in time, but each is consumed

at his own speed. Each is the product

of his spirit’s refraction, of the inflection

of that mind. It is the pace of our living

that makes the world available. Regardless of

the body’s lion-wrath or forest waiting, despite

the mind’s splendid appetite or the sad power

in our soul’s separation from God and women

it is always our gait of being that decides

how much is seen, what the mystery of us knows,

and what the heart will smell of the landscape….

I went back over a poem I wrote in Jane Hirshfield’s class at Napa Valley Writer’s Conference over 5 years ago.I re-worked it, and will continue to do so for awhile. The bones of his poems are so strong, you can build a house or another poem from the inherent structure of his words. So here’s my tribute to Jack Gilbert and his poem it sprouted from. There are references to other poets and I use the titles of two of Ruth Stone’s poetry books, In an Iridescent Time, and Simplicity, as well as lines from Shelley and Gilbert.

Retail – [after Jack Gilbert’s Going Wrong] ~ by Tamam Kahn

For Ruth Stone

The dress is beautiful. Pleated shibori.

Folded shivers. Sculpted silk that eases

toward the hem and respects the line

of a woman’s hip. It’s like nothing else

in the shop. In an Iridescent Time,

the woman hums, smoothing it.

“What can you know of my silks!”

demands the Malicious Muse. Simplicity,

the woman answers as she lifts the mannequin

to the display window, rotates the base.

The muse gestures dramatically. “I have shown you fabric

dyed with lines from Shelly: “God save the Queen!”

All you come up with is –– simplicity?”

The woman walks outside, tilts her head slightly

and takes in the whole window. She steps back in

and selects a branch of forsythia. “You have lost

the elegant link between word and textile,” She takes

a chenille scarf and scrunches it. “Your references

are obscure, color choice at odds with Caucasian skin.

Silk worms would find your efforts clumsy.”

I am not clumsy, she thinks, watching the

edge of the silk end in “three knots and a space…”

She smiles and picks up the smooth tagging gun.

Not clumsy. Ferocious.

Notes:

In an Iridescent Time, Simplicity: books by Ruth Stone

Shelly wrote “A New National anthem” which repeats: “God save the Queen.”

Jack Gilbert, “Having the Having:” “…three knots and a space…”

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Going Wrong by Jack Gilbert

The fish are terrible. They are brought up

the mountain in the dawn most days, beautiful

and alien and cold from night under the sea,

the grand rooms fading from their flat eyes.

Soft machinery of the dark, the man thinks,

washing them. “What can you know of my machinery!”

demands the Lord. Sure, the man says quietly

and cuts into them, laying back the dozen struts,

getting to the muck of something terrible.

The Lord insists: “You are the one who choses

to live this way. I build cities where things

are human. I make Tuscany and you go to live

with rock and silence.” The man washes away

the blood and arranges the fish on a big plate.

Starts the onions in the hot olive oil and puts

in peppers. “You have lived all year without women.”

He takes out everything and puts in the fish.

“No one knows where you are. People forget you.

You are vain and stubborn.” The man slices

tomatoes and lemons. Takes out the fish

and scrambles eggs. I am not stubborn, he thinks,

laying all of it on the table in the courtyard

full of early sun, shadows of swallows flying

on the food. Not stubborn, just greedy.

It is sobering to see how ordinary and even the language is. It reminds me of great musicians who seem to be doing very little, as they pull on your heartstrings and move you to tears.

I am grateful to have read his words, even the titles are wonderful. Here are a few:

Haunted Importantly, Scheming in the Snow, Having the Having, The Container for the Thing Contained, Naked Except for the Jewelry, Failing and Flying, and Half the Truth…

Jack Gilbert, by Robert Toby

Thank you Jack Gilbert for all I have learned from your poetry. <> <>

Sandy, the terrible storm: Some poetry

30 Tuesday Oct 2012

Posted by Tea-mahm in Uncategorized

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photo hurricane

photo: Hurricane by Michelle McLoughlin Milford Conn.

…round the clock warnings followed by wet drumming in the flower beds….. <>Patricia Smith “Ghazal” from Blood Dazzler

The end of the street here, open like the archetypal breach in a castle wall… a war of water. Sandy. Then there’s the morning photo of the subway in New York City that made my heart drop [see below]… down there in the shosh and dark water, collapsed dream of cars-on-tracks gliding beneath the city. It helps to put words to this impossible, terrible wreckage. Here are some poetry lines that speak to catastrophe. Patricia Smith’s National Book Award winner: Blood Dazzler, about Katrina, has some phrases that resonate with Hurricane Sandy. Here the hurricane speaks:

Weather is nothing until it reaches skin,

Freezes dust, spits its little swords.

Kept to oceans, feeding only on salted water,

I was a rudderless woman in full tantrum,

Throwing my body against worlds I wanted….. <>Patricia Smith, “Katrina”

100 years and more have passed since Bryant wrote these words:

Lord of the winds! I feel thee nigh,

I know thy breath in the burning sky!…

…in your place

The shadowy tempest that sweeps through space,

A whirling ocean that fills the wall

Of the crystal heaven, and buries all.

And I, cut off from the world, remain

Alone with the terrible hurricane. <>William Cullen Bryant, “The Hurricane”

Oh Hurricane ravaged East Coast! You are in my prayers and the prayers of the world. Sending all the people strength!

New York Peace Walk, and remembering the Plaza

15 Monday Oct 2012

Posted by Tea-mahm in Events, New York Peace Walk, peace pilgrimage, Plaza Hotel, Sufi, Travel

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Last week Shabda and I were in New York City for a gentle Peace Walk, inspired by Jack Kornfield. Buddhist, Muslim, Sufi, Jewish, and Christian leaders, we set the pace. I know that the power of that intention of peace held by nearly a thousand people walking in a line makes a kind of rain-of-light that falls on the intended wounds in our earth, and acts as a balm. When a Yogi sits in a cave peacefully, the crime rate in the world drops a little bit. And I believe this is practical thinking, not airy-fairy silliness. So I walk for Peace on Earth, particularly in the Middle East.

New York City knows pain. I feel when I am there, a kind of collective experience, a bit of the maturity the Europeans have. To give words to the feeling: Yes, we have known the harm of 9/11 directly, and that teaches us to overlook our differences and acknowledge a kind of brother-sisterhood beneath petty competition. It is just a layer, a whiff, like the smell of chestnuts, or the subway heat coming up through a sidewalk grill on a cool day. I notice it. I honor it. I am sensitive right now to loss. <>

THE PLAZA HOTEL

It is right to mourn

For the small hotels of Paris that used to be

When we used to be….

The Lost Hotels of Paris ~ Jack Gilbert

A day or so after the walk, I went to 5th Avenue and Central Park. We were meeting my sister-in-law for a stroll in the park. I was drawn to the Plaza Hotel. It is one of my childhood homes, and this year I have been going inside them all: near Chicago this spring – my own house of the first eighteen years; my deceased Grandmother’s beautiful place two miles away; and now the sublime Plaza, her sister, my Great Aunt Marie’s home for part of every year in the decades when the Plaza served as residences as well as hotel rooms. She was one of the last of those who got their mail there, and called it “home.” My eccentric Great Aunt took a special interest in me. She had no children of her own. My mother was unable to care for me in my teen years, and I was sent away to school, then college just outside New York City. Mrs. Paul Healy the permanent guest on the 13th floor was a kind of mother to me. My time with her was the sixties.

Me and Aunt Marie back in the day

Aunt Marie married the man who founded Lyon and Healy music stores, which did well in the depression. He played high-stakes Bridge on the French Riviera. Paul Healy died early, but she was a financial genius who played the stock market from the 40’s through 60’s, so she could afford this life in her widowed years. A strong independent woman!

She lived in the Plaza spring and fall, The Everglades Club in Palm Beach in the winter, and Claridges in London and the Meurice Hotel in Paris in the summer. She wore a reddish wig she called her transformation, gold lace-up heels, fancy French clothing and white gloves every time she went out. She would send me to Elizabeth Arden’s to get cleaned up, have my messy curls set in a Mad Men bee hive.

I’m ready to go…right out of Mad Men

We would go downstairs to the Persian Room for dinner to see Diahann Carroll sing: Everything’s Coming up Roses. I loved bringing my college friends to meet my “Auntie Mame.” For them it was a movie. Sometimes she fixed me up with men friends in their 50’s because at age 85, we all seemed young to her. She had hopes for me that I would marry “royalty,” but those were dashed when I became a hippy in the late 60’s. She stopped writing me. Wouldn’t speak to her beloved niece who had moved to California and disappointed her so. I was bereft when she died before she saw my life bloom…

So as I walked from palatial room to room, the Palm Court, the Oak Room, The Edwardian Room, where we shared quiet dinners, [now a fancy men’s boutique,] I gave a silent thanks to my wacky, wonderful Aunt Marie who shared her glorious Manhattan with me years ago.

New salon where the Persian Room used to be: The Plaza