LIGHT IN A GLASS ROOM

Glass porch in the morning

The glass porch in our Louisiana home is my favorite room. True, the glass is smudged with bayou country grime from lack of care during the months we are away. Or perhaps the glass is cloudy because the porch is a place friends have visited to tell some dark stories about broken relationships, illnesses, quarrels — the glass porch has often housed usual and unusual tales of human tragedies.

However, this four-season indoor/outdoor room also holds the hopes for new perspective…it is a living room with a better view. Sometimes I go there to write, but the room doesn’t invite labor or action. I frequently fall asleep sitting in a comfortable wicker chair while the sunlight beams through on my winter-pale face.

The room also houses a few of the glass pieces created by Karen Bourque, a talented Church Point, Louisiana artist, and adds to the idea of inspiring joy in this life, albeit smudged with our tragic stories.

All homes should have such a room, perhaps now more than ever in this time of Covid. I went into the glass sanctuary this morning to share in the grief of my dear friend, Kathy, who lives in Sewanee, Tennessee, and who just lost her sister, Mary Kay, to the dread Covid disease.

Wicker chair on glass porch

The glass porch is also a place of prayer. Another smudge has appeared on the glass, and another prayer goes up for Kathy’s release from suffering. The sun fills Karen’s pieces with light in this small blessed space, and I ponder the idea of glassing in our little front porch at Sewanee. However, the porch faces dark woods and only collects shadows…and spiders.

Vickie Sullivan’s photographs capture the essence of this space on a cold winter morning, and I wish that I could say, “Come and sit awhile,” but this open-to-sunlight room doesn’t tolerate masked visitors!

 

 

THE MIND OF TREES

Live Oak on Bayou in Arnaudville

This morning amidst the continuing news about mass shootings and tragedy of the last few days, and while I pray for peace in our troubled country, I received an email from my dear friend, Karen Bourque, a master of glass artistry who lives in Church Point, Louisiana. She had attached a photograph of her latest glass piece featuring a tree in Cajun Country. Like many of Karen’s glass pieces, the work brought with it a feeling of peace. The piece wasn’t requisitioned by me, but Karen shares images of a lot of her work with me, and I share my poetry with her — an exchange of inspiration, and sometimes synchronicity. She said she was reading a poem each night from my latest, The Consolation of Gardens, and meditating on it, and I was cheered by the thought that, although I’m not on any bestseller list, some of the poems have carried the “consolation of gardens” to cherished friends.

The email with an image of her lovely glass piece reminded me of an oak tree that Karen, Darrell, Vickie, and I viewed after lunch one afternoon in Arnaudville, Louisiana and that Karen used as a model for the cover of my book, A Slow Moving Stream, published in 2016. One of the poems, “The Mind of Trees,” captured my mood and “spoke to my condition” this morning. It is partially excerpted below:

The trees outlasted their language.

No matter who came

the language disappeared into English:

French, Spanish, German, Chitimacha.

English filled the horizon,

the patois of each clan banned,

buried under the oaks, the words waiting.

The trees absorbed all of it

and when hurricanes felled them

they were cut into logs,

the loggers, finding stories in their language

imbedded in the rings,

began to preserve what had been lost.

Word by word they created

an articulation of arriving,

the sound of memory offering itself

from a distant longing. They heard

what they had been told not to hear —

testimonies for their being there.

And they praised the trees

for finding a way without them.

The poem is open to interpretation, but I believe it’s pertinent to what is going on in our country and am glad to repeat it here. Thanks for the “pass along” this morning, Karen Bourque.

Photograph in “The Mind of Trees” by Victoria I. Sullivan and glass piece image on the cover of A Slow Moving Stream by Karen Bourque.

THE VOICE WITHIN THE VOICE

Most mornings in fair weather (often not so fair in spring and summer in Louisiana), Darrell Bourque, Louisiana’s premier poet, can be found writing the lines to a new poem while walking an old path near his home in Church Point, Louisiana. He’s a master of what poets call “voice,” often entering into the voice of some lesser-known figure who has made a significant contribution to the culture and history of his/her native state. 

Bourque’s latest book, From the Other Side, is beautifully illustrated with the art of Bill Gingles, a Shreveport artist, and features poems about Henriette Delille, a former New Orleans religious figure. During the 19th century, Delille organized a group of devout Christian women called the Sisters of the Holy Family to nurse the sick, care for and teach indigent and illiterate Black and Creole children, as well as immigrating adults who settled in the French Quarter of New Orleans. This group was formally recognized in 1942 by St. Augustine Church in the Treme of New Orleans, and Delille, who died in 1862, was first deemed Servant of God in 1988, then advanced to Venerable in the process of canonization by the Roman Catholic Church. Her inclusion in the process continues — the next two steps are beatification and canonization.

Darrell Bourque and his wife, Karen, became interested in this passionate and empathetic nun several years ago — an interest which culminated in Karen designing and rendering a glass triptych for a window of Christ the King Roman Catholic Mission Church in Bellevue near the Bourque’s home in Church Point, Louisiana. The recent publication of Darrell’s book of poetry, From the Other Side: Henriette Delille followed last month’s dedication of this window. 

Although Henriette Delille spoke French (as does Bourque), Bourque captured her voice in what he terms persona sonnets in English within From the Other Side, an impassioned voice that speaks of orphans and the uneducated on the streets of the French Quarter of New Orleans — a voice derived from Bourque’s meditations on the images and colors in Gingles’ paintings; e.g.,:

What If You Dreamed

                    …We teach 

                    reading here the way we teach children to sing. Old

                    women wander from arches to see what this reach

                    

                    will reach. We start with the names of flowers sold

                    on the streets in the Quarter & the Marigny, peach-

                    colored, pink & red & blue-dyed flowers, white gold

                   

                    flowers named how they are named: Daisy, Bream,

                    Belle, Violet, Hyacinth & Myrtle, William, Iris, Reed, 

                    Sorrel & Olive, Lillie & Camellia, Rose, Red & Gleem.

                    We start with who they are & go to what they need.

One of my favorites, All the Time, is accompanied by Gingles’ painting by that name, an acrylic panel including scarlet forms resembling poppies in which Bourque presents Delille’s voice speaking about the work of the Sisters of the Holy Family: 

                       …We moved quietly from one need to another need

                       as we found it. We brought things inside our houses, kept our candles lit,

                       We let the world be the world, let the heart be heart, let creed be creed. 

This is one among many poems in the volume that show Bourque’s ability to achieve what A. E. Housman called “not the thing said but a way of saying it.”

Another poem in which Bourque imagines Delille speaking of her dedication to work with children of the New Orleans streets is the poignant:

The Difference Island 

              …My wings

              are who I am. They flew me to this difference island where I am no more

              a trace or line. We crossed bayous & bays & lakes & rivulets as fine as lace

              to this other world beyond geographies where I knew what I had to live for,

              the poor despised, the cipher bought and sold, what I saw in an orphan’s face.

Bourque used the titles of Gingles’ paintings for all of the poems in this volume and points to the language of the paintings as influencing the language of his poems. “Without these paintings I know I could not have accessed this particular set of poems spoken by the powerful and holy human being Henriette Delille is,” he writes in the acknowledgements to From the Other Side. I would add that Bourque’s deft gift of imagining the voice within the voice (“…What’s just beyond the tree leans on what we never knew we knew…”) influences the reader’s understanding of “the other side”and the art that takes us there. 

The Sisters of the Holy Family continue to carry out Delille’s mission in retirement homes, schools, and other sacred service organizations in New Orleans, Shreveport, Galveston, Little Rock, Washington, DC, in California, in Belize, and in Africa. Delille’s original prayer penned in French was a simple but cogent one: “I believe in God. I hope in God. I love. I want to live and die for God.”

Order from yellowflagpress.com or darrellbourque@gmail.com. 

MY KIND OF MARDI GRAS

Karen & Darrell's house

It's that time of year again — Mardi Gras in French Louisiana. If readers want the full Monty about this celebration, a foray into Lyle Saxon's Old Louisiana provides an extensive account of this season preceding Lent. Saxon, one of the brightest raconteurs of his day, lived most of his life in New Orleans and devoted the first six chapters of Old Louisiana to Mardi Gras, explaining that the very name New Orleans "brings to mind a Mardi Gras pageant moving through the streets at night: crowds of masqueraders, rearing horses, great decorated floats glowing with color and glittering gold-leaf. Aboard the swaying cars are centaurs, mermaids, satyrs, gods and men, illuminated by flaring torches carried by strutting negroes robed in red..." Saxon sat on a balcony in front of the St. Charles Hotel during Mardi Gras, 1946, and described the first Mardi Gras to occur after WWII over a national radio broadcasting chain. Readers could say that he was talking about Mardi Gras while dying; a few days after his broadcast, he was hospitalized with cancer and died.

Darrell, Diane, Karen

For the tourist, New Orleans is the place to be during Mardi Gras activities, but, of course, Cajun Country has its own Carnival balls, parades, and private celebrations. At my age, I prefer the latter, especially when it takes place in the home of the Bourques in Church Point, Louisiana. Like Saxon, Darrell Bourque, the former poet laureate of Louisiana and his wife Karen, a glass artist, have an abiding interest in "living well." When we get together with them, the atmosphere is charged with the energy of two accomplished artists — books are stacked on desks, in bookcases everywhere; regional art fills every room in their home and studio. The studio is an old shotgun style house the Bourques renovated to resemble a Creole cottage, complete with heavily-battened blue shutters, facing the cobbled New Orleans style courtyard. A new addition is a wrought iron fence enclosing the cottage that adds to the Creole ambience.  Each time we visit the studio, I discover glass pieces I've viewed before, but see them as new, in every corner. I find different displays of their grandson William's paintings, perhaps a new poem lying on the tall table where the two artists create both glass work and poems — everything is viewed as new. I tease my friends about my becoming a permanent guest holed up in their studio to write.

Thursday, a Mardi Gras centerpiece decorated the dining table where we dined and talked for two hours. The food! Darrell cooks a magnifique pork roast with homemade sauce of roasted peppers and onions; Karen, a sweet potato casserole, fresh asparagus salad with homemade dressing, and Darrell always insists that we have nahn, which he knows I learned to love while living in Iran. "This is our Mardi Gras," Darrell said, and we toasted our long friendship as a way to celebrate that which is fun-filled and gracious in our lives. No loud fanfare, parades, costumed folks, no dancing in the hall — just lots of talk and doubling-over laughter.

Vickie @ Mardi Gras table

We got up from the festive table and went outdoors, where I usually insist on taking photographs so we can reminisce when we return to Sewanee for the spring/summer season. Four or five shots of us are required for me to look decent, linked with these two handsome artists, and Thursday we posed in front of one of Darrell's prize camellia bushes. Darrell, a consummate gardener, also raises grapefruit, lemons, and oranges and usually has a bumper crop of ginger but the last freeze destroyed these beautiful plants. His white camellias would rival the prize camellias in the gardens of Jefferson and Avery Islands, Louisiana.

No Hail Rex and his royal court, no bursts of music, little parades of glittering floats, or the unrealness of a Mardi Gras scene... but the realness of a good time enjoyed by all. We came away feeling well-cared for following our celebration in the prairie country of St. Landry parish, a region of Louisiana I've learned to love after viewing it through the eyes of these elegant south Louisiana artists.

BIRDS, CHAPTER 2

A few days ago, I wrote a blog about a variety of birds splashing in clean water that my friend, Dr. Victoria Sullivan, had put in the bird bath in the front yard. She kept filling the bath with water from the reverse osmosis filtered water tap in the kitchen, but yesterday she decided to fill the bath via the garden hose as the process for filling was so much easier. But the result wasn’t the same! To our surprise, no birds appeared for their morning bath. We waited, checking hourly for the appearance of our feathered friends. By afternoon, we decided to change the bath, filling it with purified water again. Voila! One by one, the sparrows, cardinals, catbirds, nuthatch, titmouse and other small species took turns splashing in the bird bath until supper time, then departed before dusk for their home in the clump of blackberry bushes by the drive.

“How did they know that the water was purified?” I asked Vickie.

“Maybe those small heads have more brain power than humans think they have.”

“I guess because they live here at Sewanee, the bastion of elitism, they think they’re entitled to pure water.”

“Or maybe they’re just spoiled for me and my ministrations,” Vickie concluded.

Dr. Sullivan is a botanist, not an ornithologist, so I consulted my old friend, Google, and the only answer that made sense for me was a simple one: birds don’t like the additives in ordinary tap water. In fact, some bird lovers relate that they’ve seen birds drinking from mud puddles before they’d drink from bird baths filled with ordinary tap water. Think of it – chlorine, fluoride, and other chemicals pollute water that even birds disdain; in fact, many of them become ill from drinking tap water. Unfortunately, there’s no water control board in the bird world, so they’re on their own about finding good water sources.

There are many reasons for humans to watch the behavior of birds, including, it seems, that of learning good health habits. One cardinal was so grateful for the return of purified water, he dared to walk up to the herb bed by the front door and peek in. He was accompanied by a catbird who looked as if she wanted to engage in a flirtation, but the cardinal wasn’t playing. When the catbird turned her head, the cardinal lifted wing and flew off.

“If St. Francis of Assisi could get birds to sit on his shoulders, perhaps we have a chance to befriend them,” I told Vickie.

The reply to this was downright insulting. “But he was a person who had given up all the luxuries of this world, and those birds sensed his holiness.”

“I guess his stance of poverty means no allowances for purified water,” I said dejectedly.

I've written many bird poems, most of them about crows and grackles, but here’s an old “snippet” (as distinct from a full-bodied poem) from A Moment Seized that’s a bit more inclusive. It’s entitled “Spring Feathers”:

“Mockingbird shrieks in the spring air

making a stand-off with a plump jay,

too much the warrior in his incaution.

A brief fight and they glide away,

reminders of fleeting friendship.

In their tiny brains spring is a code,

a minute groove in mockingbird, robin, sparrow

foretelling the resurrection—

light out of shadow,

bloom out of folded bud,

sooth in the heart of a pistil,

the brief flurry of feather.”

Glasswork of Painted Bunting by Karen Bourque, glass artist, Church Point, Louisiana. Photographed by Dr. Victoria Sullivan as it hangs in a window of our Sewanee house.  

CHRISTMAS CELEBRATIONS AND FRIENDS

Mary Ann and Darrell

The Greek word philia means affection or friendship, and C.S. Lewis wrote one of the best treatises about this special relationship with others in The Four Loves, my favorite book by the great Anglican apologist of the 20^th century: “It may be a common religion, common studies, a common profession, even a common recreation. All who share it will be our companions; but one or two or three who share something more will be our Friends. In this kind of love, as Emerson said, ‘Do you love me?’ means ‘Do you see the same truth?’”

Pistachio cake

The Christmas season provides fertile soil for commonality among cherished friends, and lately I’ve been blessed to have been invited to a few celebrations in which I’ve enjoyed the “real glory of friendship,” as Lewis puts it. The most recent of these celebrations took place this week when I and my friends Vickie Sullivan and Mary Ann Wilson, went over to Church Point, Louisiana for dinner especially cooked by Darrell and Karen Bourque. Darrell, a former poet laureate of Louisiana and acclaimed poet (as well as my mentor in poetry), had prepared a succulent pork roast, fresh asparagus, quinoa with chunks of sweet potato; and Karen, master glass artist, had created an artistically-arranged green salad with thinly sliced avocado and homemade dressing. The piece de resistance was a beautiful white pistachio cake with coconut frosting, pictured here.

Karen and Diane

As we sat around the table, I thought about Emerson’s words: “Do you see the same truth?” Most of the conversation centered on common interests: books, art, and politics, but table talk soon turned to concerns about a mutual friend who has been diagnosed with cancer, and we discussed the humanitarian work she has done during her almost-80 years. Our friend, Jane Bonin, a former professor of English at the University of Louisiana, Lafayette, was affiliated with the Hunger Project for many years, presenting talks to various groups to raise the consciousness of people regarding the problem of hunger in both Acadiana and Washington, D.C. where she migrated after leaving Lafayette, Louisiana. She was dedicated to the sustainable end of world hunger and to the maxim of “Creating An Idea Whose Time Has Come.” A few years later, she joined the Peace Corps and served in both Malawi and Niger, Africa for six years. Her experiences in Africa have been recorded in The Color Of A Lion’s Eye, released earlier this year.

The note of solemnity that had begun the conversation about Jane’s condition, changed to one of shared acknowledgement as we talked about Jane’s resilience and strength. And after a few moments, we were laughing about adventures several of us had experienced with her; e.g., “The 6-Day,” a leadership training course in which we rappelled off the side of a mountain and endured the famous “Tyrolean Traverse.” During this exercise, we were strapped at our waists and had to propel ourselves, hand over hand, across a wire strung above a ravine yawning beneath us. What we remembered was how long some of us (Jane and I included) hung in the middle of the wire and, finally, those who had made it to the “farther shore” sat on the end of the wire so that it sloped downward, and we could get off. These efforts of fellow participants underlined the support we had been promised when we entered the rigorous program. We were greeted by cheering supporters who massaged bound muscles in our arms and told us how accomplished we were to have moved across the wire. Actually, the Tyrolean Traverse is a good metaphor for the support of friends.

It was late when we drove away from the dark countryside near Church Point, but the three of us left the celebration at the Bourque’s table feeling not only the warmth of strongly-supportive relationships in which all of us “saw the same truth” but were buoyed by the “real glory of friendship.”

And we just know that Jane is going to make it across that yawning ravine again.