Jnana's Red Barn

A Space for Work and Reflection

Tag: Design

Status | June 19, 2017

PRELUDE & FUGUE 29/

such a beautifully speckled trout
balancing on its head

*   *   *

n June
swirling
a long fish
a fish as long as the boy

a boy balancing a large fish on his head
in June swirling a long fish

a fish as long as the boy
a boy balancing a large fish on his head in June
swirling

a long fish as long as the boy
balancing a large fish on his head

red, yellow, blue, and green
under a decorative fish such a beautifully
speckled trout of a man running
back with quahogs and a tan Beyond Frog Hollow
tours halibut? red, yellow, blue, and green
man running tours under a decorative
fish back with quahogs and a tan
halibut? such a beautifully speckled trout
Beyond Frog Hollow red, yellow, blue, and green
a man running tours of halibut?
I really do need to get to know fish:
how to identify them under a decorative
beautifully speckled trout
red, yellow, blue, and green back with quahogs
and a tan Beyond Frog Hollow man runs
tours under decorative quahogs and a tan halibut or
such beautifully speckled trout Beyond Frog Hollow
I really do need to identify

~*~

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see all 50 Preludes & Fugues, click here.

Leave a comment
Status | June 12, 2017

HEARTBEAT

she’s the one with the comb and scissors

the fruit of my womb

for her thirteenth birthday
she wanted a rented limousine
six hours, unlimited mileage, to sashay

through the Mystery Cafe “where murder
is always on the menu” but even then
adjusting our calendars was the killer

maybe I’d appreciate the suggested list
to just pull the trigger
against Mother Nature and Aging

what I was fit to tap out this evening

please stay tuned or advise with directions

crazy for lovers

Adam and Eve at puberty, separated by a large apple

a red candle-lit cloud kiosk on Copley Square in Boston

let you peruse the 

apple perched on a suspended steamer trunk

a map of European geology free of political borders

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see the full set of Partitas, click here.

Leave a comment
Status | June 5, 2017

PRELUDE & FUGUE 39/

a dingy moored on still water
dancing to Bix tonight
in front of the boulder and island

*   *   *

in front of the boulder and island
moored on still water
spires, houses, and the brick millyard
red between granite

a dingy in front of the boulder and island
moored on still water spires,
houses, and the brick millyard

red between granite
a dingy
in front of the boulder and island
moored on still water

spires, houses, and the brick millyard
red between granite
a dingy

dancing to Bix tonight in a blue lake
against mountains reflected foliage
along a green river moose drab
on a sandbar amid dancing to Bix
tonight foliage along a green river
in a blue lake against mountains moose
amid reflected sallow dancing tonight
foliage along a green river, Bix on a sandbar
looking down from the hill in blue
lake against mountains dancing
to Bix tonight moose dun foliage along
a green river sandbar in blue mountains
against moose reflections looking down the hill

~*~

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see all 50 Preludes & Fugues, click here.

Leave a comment
May 29, 2017

COMMITMENT TO LIBERTY

I didn't ask the name of the reenactor, lower right. He was proud of his unit, and now stands representing all of them.

I didn’t ask the name of the reenactor, lower right. He was proud of his unit, and now stands representing all of them.

Public sculpture typically celebrates famed men or mythological figures, but the Memorial to Robert Gould Shaw Memorial and the Massachusetts 54th Regiment, which sits across from the State House, is in a league of its own.

Within its unified design, the focus turns to each of the enlisted black soldiers as they resolutely march to battle to free slaves. Every face is unique, sympathetic, tragic, and each body moves with muscle, even anger and justice. If August Saint-Gaudens had created no other work, this masterpiece would have sealed his reputation.

Each face is unique and distinctive.

Each face is unique and distinctive.

 

The ugency and motion compressed into the relatively narrow sculpture is amazing. By the way, as the reenactor pointed out, the artist knew he was placing the canteens on the wrong side of the soldiers. It was a matter of artistic license.

The urgency and motion compressed into the relatively narrow sculpture is amazing. By the way, as the reenactor pointed out, the artist knew he was placing the canteens on the wrong side of the soldiers. It was a matter of artistic license.

Boston is a rich and varied destination – the Hub of New England, or the Universe, as they used to say. Living a little more than an hour to the north, we’re well within its orb.

 

 

 

Leave a comment
Status | May 22, 2017

BRAINCHILD

a feathered and furred woman
bare shouldered, face painted white
black mouth and black exaggerated eyebrows
a black veil over her face

where is the balm?
the salve for stinging nettles?

potted plants on a white mantle

a bowl of sprouts atop a handwritten note
spread over a blue napkin

richly patterned fabric
behind a waxy flower

a pile of Valentines

reeds and songbirds
home is a refuge or should be

a bar of soap wrapped in pale-tea ribbon
a hole cut in a painting left open with crossed ribbons

two men in an open briefcase, as dolls torn apart
so many screws and nails and tense threads
for connections

a barn owl in front of a red barn

a red house with shiny metal roof in the woods

red hen, red comb, red alarm

Bright day in the valley

Lincoln’s Indiana legacy
in a place that couldn’t support a used bookstore

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see the full set of Partitas, click here.

Leave a comment
Status | May 15, 2017

PRELUDE & FUGUE 40/

three dogwood

two owls

a stone barn

*   *   *

stone fence
halfway up the valley of silos, tractor trailers
in mirrored sunrise

the symmetry, yee hah! of fence half stone
up the valley silos, tractor trailers, in the mirror
of sunrise coming home, yee hah!
setting forth along stone fence halfway up
the valley silos, tractor trailers,

in glittering yee hah! sunrise
so fleeting, unbalanced
between the gloved hands

a rosebud, three dogwood, two owls
a stone barn with blossoms that God
in front of a lone maple looks down

in a rosy stone barn fronting a lone dogwood
three maple blossoms look on two owls
that God, in a rousing talk in front of the lonely

fireworks of dogwood, owls, rosebud
blossoms, by God, around a stone barn

in front of a lone dogwood, what blossoms
into a conversation of two owls with God
looks up, looks down, looks around fireworks

~*~

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see all 50 Preludes & Fugues, click here.

Leave a comment
Status | May 8, 2017

OUVERTURE

welcomed into my orbit

a Chicago-Baltimore axis
its own perspective

a shadowbox with sixteen cells of teeth numbered
out of the thirty-two originals

to whip up something before a martini

a gray vase with a cow skull
places I once treasured
since lost, yes, lost. And now?
how often, not the place as much as fragile
in the void of letters, Well, kiddo
all the right intentions

a postcard of Florida seashells

a secretary (white blouse, tight black skirt, black heels)
waiting for the midday train in a suburb

three close-lipped fishermen wait to build a fire
on a rocky bend of the river

a woman in a blue dress pauses at the end of the blue deck
before leaping into subtropical ocean

the blurry backside or figure with bent leg
reaching for balance

to sit, wearing blue jeans and a blue polo shirt
in a corner office overlooking parking in a desert

to enter a tall office building housing a Jekyll and Hyde club
befit with gargoyles, sculpted climbers, human skulls,
and Ionic columns

to pose standing in a powder blue wrapper
under a Greek male torso and the head of a stallion

to leap in a fiery ballet costume
from the Brooklyn Bridge before breakfast
onto a parked Harley on cobblestone

dazzling Shakti Style weavings

a Celtic bowl with three mermaids as snakes

Open 24 Hours
misery, in spicy flavors

modern glass teacups and teapot
modern glass table lamps
modern plastic table radio

all I’ve inhabited but won’t return, ever

no, waiting for a “better” scheduling day means
another couple of years, at best, so let’s do it while we can

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see the full set of Partitas, click here.

Leave a comment
Status | May 1, 2017

PRELUDE & FUGUE 43/

green drapes
the first week of leaf

before the coral color of cooked lobster

*   *   *

coral (stars) (in a buds of) still birches
(with the wind) an ocean of northern lights

divers (however) shamefaced
avoid the first leaf
draping some fancy coral (yet)

northern lights drape the stilled birches
shamefaced, avoiding some fancy ocean
frogman first

(as) the coral northern lights
leaf out, draping

some still sand bar
beyond fancy birches
(shelters) a roseate sea nymph

(at noon) divers are shamed
facing (her) (the one as fleeting as the) first leaf
or northern lights avoiding (possession) (capture)

(at midnight) hanging still (as) birches, divers
in their shame, avoid facing
(their) fancies, first leafing
(in the) still briny reef

lobster footwork
coming clear

the still green lobster
works its feet in coming
to the clear green

the rippling lobster foot
works clearly
in the coming
green

~*~

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see all 50 Preludes & Fugues, click here.

Leave a comment
Status | April 24, 2017

REHASH

the return of the Princess Wen-Chi

 400 years later I understand it wasn’t
my fault we never connected
but the hardness she’d become

with the curtain already up
when the lights took hold

unicorn and gazelle in repose

too weird, too impractical, too brash, too arrogant

hypodermic syringe on a porcelain teacup

favorite hardware
goof balls, golf balls

perhaps annoy or anger, delight
and so on and on. It never ends, does it?

above the treetops
astrologers, even witches

but mostly the aroma of freshly cut grass

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see the full set of Partitas, click here.

Leave a comment
April 17, 2017

SPIRE OF INSPIRATION

Old North Church, in Boston's North End.

Old North Church, in Boston’s North End.

Lanterns in the spire of North Church signaled directions to Paul Revere and other riders at the outbreak of the American Revolution. The race to Lexington and Concord was on.

Boston is a rich and varied destination – the Hub of New England, or the Universe, as they used to say. Living a little more than an hour to the north, we’re well within its orb.

 

2 Comments