smoke...? mirrors...?

IKEBANA

To prepare the body,
aim for the translucent perfection
you find in the sliced shavings
of a pickled turnip.
In order for this to happen,
you must avoid the sun,
protect the face
under a paper parasol
until it is bruised white
like the skin of lilies.
Use white soap
from a blue porcelain
dish for this.

Restrict yourself.
Eat the whites of things:
tender bamboo shoots,
the veins of the young iris,
the clouded eye of a fish.

Then wrap
the body,
as if it were a perfumed gift,
in pieces of silk
held together with invisible threads
like a kite, weighing no more
than a handful of crushed chrysanthemums.
Light enough to float in the wind.
You want the effect
of koi moving through water.

When the light leaves
the room, twist lilacs
into the lacquered hair
piled high like a complicated shrine.
There should be tiny bells
inserted somewhere
in the web of hair
to imitate crickets

singing in a hidden grove.

Reveal the nape of the neck,
your beauty spot.
Hold the arrangement.
If your spine slacks
and you feel faint,
remember the hand-picked flower
set in the front alcove,
which, just this morning,
you so skillfully wired into place.

How poised it is!
Petal and leaf
curving like a fan,
the stem snipped and wedged
into the metal base—
to appear like a spontaneous accident.

Cathy Song

Cathy Song, “Ikebana” from Picture Bride. Copyright © 1983 by Cathy Song.

A WORK OF ARTIFICE

The bonsai tree
in the attractive pot
could have grown eighty feet tall
on the side of a mountain
till split by lightning.

But a gardener
carefully pruned it.
It is nine inches high.
Every day as he
whittles back the branches
the gardener croons,
It is your nature

to be small and cozy,
domestic and weak;
how lucky, little tree,
to have a pot to grow in.
With living creatures
one must begin very early
to dwarf their growth:
the bound feet,
the crippled brain,
the hair in curlers,
the hands you
love to touch.

Marge Piercy

Copyright © 1969 by Marge Piercy

and where's the line
between copy and inspire?
just which flower is the poppy of desire?
who's the who to whom you must be true?
once you've lost it, how can you find you?

still dancing!

listen to this song while viewing

JUNE IS BUSTIN' OUT ALL OVER

March went out like a lion
Awakin' up the water in the bay;
Then April cried
and stepped aside,
And along came pretty little May!
May was full of promises
But she didn't keep 'em quick enough for some
And the crowd of doubtin' thomases
Was predictin' that the summer'd never come

But it's comin' by dawn,
We can feel it come,
You can feel it in your heart
You can see it in the ground

You can see it in the trees
You can smell it in the breeze

Look around! Look around! Look around!

June is bustin' out all over
All over the meadow and the hill!
Buds're bustin' outa bushes
And the rompin' river pushes
Ev'ry little wheel that wheels beside the mill!

June is bustin' out all over
The feelin' is gettin' so intense,
That the young Virginia creepers
Have been huggin' the bejeepers
Outa all the mornin' glories on the fence!
Because it's June...

June, June, June
Just because it's June, June, June!

Fresh and alive and gay and young
June is a love song, sweetly sung

June is bustin' out all over!
The saplin's are bustin' out with sap!
Love has found my brother, Junior,
And my sister's even loonier!
And my Ma is gettin' kittenish with Pap!
June in bustin' out all over

To ladies and men
are payin' court.
Lotsa ships are kept
at anchor
Jest because the captains
hanker
Fer the comfort they kin only get in port!

Because it's June... June, June, June
Just because it's June, June, June!

June makes the bay look bright and new
Sails gleamin' bright on sunlit blue

June is bustin' out all over
The ocean is full of
Jacks and Jills,
With the little tail a-swishing'
Ev'ry lady fish is wishin'
That a male would come
And grab 'er by the gills!

June is bustin' out all over!
The sheep aren't
sleepin' anymore!
All the rams that chase ewe-sheep
All determined there'll be
new sheep
and the ewe-sheep aren't even keepin' score!

On acounta it's June! June, June, June
Just because it's June, June, June!

Rodgers & Hammerstein

M O D E R N

SHARP-DRESSED MAN (Share otoko) 1924

(Adaptation of Gay Caballero)




In the village I am the one they call the
The number one mobo.
Vain, conceited, smug,
I came to Ginza in Tokyo.

To begin with, my style consists of
A blue shirt with crimson necktie,
A derby hat and horn-rimmed glasses (Lloyd-style)
And baggy sailor pants.

The woman that I have fallen in love with
Has jet black eyes and bobbed hair.
She's short and built,
And she is brazen down to her toes.

I first got to know her at the cafe',
Now it's your place, dear.
Shall we have cocktails
Or Whiskey, which should it be?
Politely hiding your feelings
You're being too reserved.

Doing as she said, I had two or three glasses
With a smile she said, have another.
The woman became slightly flushed (cherry color)
Hahaha, in all I had another drink

Do you know?
My father is the landlord, the head of the village.
The village head is a rich man and I,
his son,
Am single even now, a bachelor!

'Oh my, that's lovely'
If you've got the prestige and the money,
For example, even if a man has no looks'
[Women say,] 'I like you dear.'

Oh, my be- lov- ed one,
How my body trembles
If it's with you I'd go anywhere
I would leave you even if I die.

Is it a dream or is it a figment of my imagination?
Just then, the woman's husband comes rushing at me.
Without saying a word, I am engulfed by a flurry of fists.
Beaten to a pulp, I faint.

My wallet, my watch have been taken!
My precious woman is gone!

What a fearsome place Tokyo's Ginza is!
I am a mobo who cannot cry, even if I feel like it.

(popular song in 1924)

(click here to watch the video)

not so fast....

once the sight of women in kimono inspired western women to toss their corsets, clothing designers invented the 'hobble skirt,' which occasionally was augmented with something to bind the knees or ankles. these were embraced as a way to make it easy for women to take tiny small steps.... like the geisha....



j.g. domergue