You never know what we'll churn up in cleaning a stall
One of the conundrums I’m left with in my new novel, What’s Left: What if you don’t like her father, her deceased Baba, as she recovers him? (Or recovers from him.) Is it essential to your enjoyment of the story?
Or worse yet, what if you don’t like her?
Continue reading “DO THEY HAVE TO BE SYMPATHETIC CHARACTERS?”
Thanks to everyone who responded to my earlier invitation for comments regarding a few possible covers for my newest novel.
The survey ended in mixed results and prompted some heated in-house discussion, ultimately sending me back to the drawing board for a more compelling design.
Just what do we want as a cover, anyway? Are people’s faces a help or a distraction? Does a jacket work best if it somehow reflects a scene in the story, as my earlier mock-ups attempted to suggest? Or is reaching for a less constrained, emotional reaction more effective?
As you see, I’ve opted for the later. Here the image invokes a sense of being broken out from a protected shell and falling through space. It’s also appropriate for a family that owns a restaurant – food being a theme running throughout the story. Will this cover encourage a browser to open the book to discover, in effect, just what happens to the yolk? Where it will land?
That, of course, is my goal. To see if it fits, go to Smashwords, where you can order your own Advance Reading Copy for free. The offer will expire after 90 days, when the first edition comes out at $4.95, so act now.
Your early reactions will be most welcome in preparing for that release.
an elephant with flowers painted
around the eyes and painted toenails
four zebras sipping water
* * *
luxurious green tent on safari white bone
ornaments through noses armed for the hunt
and cocktails already served
three African bushmen in a field of wrinkled flesh
eyelid (the elephant) the rain
is needed, sticky or no sticky (unlike the rhino)
zebras, black and white in a splash of vibrant green
with netting over the bed
luxurious green tent on safari white
bone ornaments through their noses
armed for the hunt and cocktails
already served three bushmen in a field
of wrinkled African flesh, an eyelid (the elephant)
the rain is needed, sticky or no sticky
(unlike the rhino) zebras, black and white
in a splash of vibrant green with netting
over the bed’s luxurious green safari tent
white bone noses armed for the ornamental
hunt cocktails served by three bushmen
in an African field of wrinkled eyelids needing rain
sticky or no sticky the elephant (unlike the rhino) or
zebras, black and white in a splash
of vibrant green netting over the bed ornaments
beasts leaping from dust into a tropical river
before a tiger atop a car spirals between
four zebras sipping water the way
a camel’s nose runs ahead of its mouth:
the hairy trunk and mouth of an elephant, so spotted
forages on hind legs, trunk and tusks upraised to the tree
the elephant with flowers painted
around the eyes and painted toenails
still leaps from the dust into a tropical river
a camel’s nose runs ahead of its mouth from hind legs
upraised to the tree in front of the tiger
atop a car of spiraling spots
the hairy trunk and mouth with flowers painted
around the eyes guarding four zebras sipping water
and the foraging beasts leap from dust into the river
running ahead of its mouth
a camel on hind legs, the tree painted with flowers
and toenails a feeling of life finally coming together
atop a car, four zebras leap from the dust
into a hairy river and forage
a feeling of life finally coming together these days
~*~
Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see all 50 Preludes & Fugues, click here.
I could imagine myself an orchestral conductor, but there are many things that must be trusted to the players themselves. Something like Rubato, within a musical phrase, comes to mind. And then, in a flash, it’s passed. Reflect on that with these poems.
~*~
For these poems and more, visit Thistle/Flinch editions.
When someone speaks of an event while quoting someone else, how accurate is that quotation? How much is a recasting by the teller, perhaps years after the event being related?
In drafting my newest novel, as I turned to a first-person narrative by someone who never even met many of the characters she’s telling about, I realized that her quoting them was actually a filtering through her own voice. In other words, the precision of their voice was in question. Would it be right to put their input in quotations marks? Or eliminate the quotation marks and let the telling float in and out of some recollection?
I’ve opted for the latter. Will it work for the reader, though? We’ll see.
These field notes from religious aspiration and practice spring from a muse of fire. As much as Dr. Bronner’s bottle-label diatribes arose from a splash of water, at least when we read them, usually while showering or bathing.
A brief flash. Something that sparkles or shimmers. A half-seen motion, perhaps recollected later. Illumination. A beacon. A guide. A break in the night. Sometimes, this is something even the blind perceive. A word of truth. Prophecy or healing. A vision of eternal mysteries. A star or hint of coming dawn. And then, as James Nayler instructed: “And as thou followest the light out of the world, thou wilt come to see the seed, which to the world’s wisdom and glory is crucified” (Journal, 349). Everything is transformed and made new. Mind the Light.
~*~
Tat Ekam
that one thing
prakriti, pra = before
or kriti, creation
a sutra is only a note / a stitch / a knot
Wading into holy waters
to sink or be overwhelmed
decades later,
thunder
within
silence
returning to art
“keeps my feet on the ground”
carving wood and marble, “It’s so smooth”
these steps leading down to the water
in the sense water
is always below you
unless, that is, you’re in
up to your neck, as it were
some calm other than drowning
“We’re descended from lower-level gods
who mated with apes.”
Now outraged at other deities
next, we’ll encounter human brains
in tigers prowling along the street
all thanks to science.
Mine owners will be confined to the lands they’ve debauched / despoiled.
The Hidden Way –
Sometimes it’s Tao
Sometimes, passion
Sometimes, only a sunset
Or fog lifting
The saved love letters
become curled, black crumbling leaves
falling from the fire.
to UNBURDEN
AND MAKE NEW
first, burn all of the out-dated financial records,
then all of the old passionate drivel
that is, to MAKE FEW
as the Hidden Way
Is the route that opened
Through Glint’s own sea of reeds
Parting, at the base of mountains
she’s come through
a prayer of the earth, actually, of Seed
clearing, recentering
LIFT JESUS HIGHER
painted at the top
of a barn roof
Poem copyright 2017 by Jnana Hodson
For more, click here.
with fiddles and crows
tracing a map of yellow leaves
* * *
on a map of frosted snow
three crows with their fiddles
in the crown of their living
of a rock face map, frosted snow
three crows with their fiddles
in the crown of their living rock face
on a map, frosted snow, three crows
with their fiddles in the crown
out of their rock face, tracing some life
atop scree, another one at the bottom, wintergreen
~*~
Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see all 50 Preludes & Fugues, click here.
What opens with a dance tune perchance deflects into the reaction to a blow or injury, to a fly fisherman’s reel, the canisters of a movie, or even a soaring eagle. These poems span experiences of touch and coupling, however chaste at times, and of flight and emerging lightness. To be light on one’s feet, then, and light-hearted in the end, if not a little dizzy.
~*~
First, the snow a sheet of ice
shiny as cake frosting.
Then the Asian dental hygienist greets me:
“Sorry to make you waiting.”
Maybe it’s all in the skin.
A flourish we extend. A touch or care.
Excellence in a small thing, somewhere,
a note of gratitude or worship
placing everything in the larger context
of conception, especially through its monotonous stretches.
A few hours later, lavender mountains at sunset:
the Monadnocks, viewed from my studio window,
incredibly purple, even more than blue.
That night:
Sing. Dance. Fiddle. Doodle.
And away I go.
Poem copyright 2017 by Jnana Hodson
For more, click here.
sprawled on the floor, a barefoot bride without makeup
* * *
along with a martial arts master sprawled out
on the floor a barefoot bride without
makeup everyone you knew thought
it only a fragile joke and then
you pulled the trigger: blood runs
toward the tub drain what made you think
I had any clue what was afoot? martial arts student
sprawled out on the floor, a barefoot bride
without makeup, everyone thinking it only fragile
joke blood running toward the tub drain what
made you think I had any clue what was afoot?
a martial arts master sprawled out on the floor
a barefoot bride without makeup everyone you
knew thought it was only a fragile joke
blood runs toward the tub drain? what made you think
I had any clue what was afoot?
kick higher, kick higher
from the floor
~*~
Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see all 50 Preludes & Fugues, click here.
Susquehanna remains one of my favorite words in the language. (And to think, it’s an import, from the New World.) I love the way the syllables dance around in the mouth and roll off the tongue.
So what is your favorite word?
~*~
For more of my exploration of the word in its world, click here.
Jnana's Red Barn 