the cassandra pages

After a Party

Orchid and Dishes with Embroidered Tablecloth, 6" x 9", pen and ink on paper.

These recent drawings represent, I guess, a more inclusive view than some of my older, close-up still-lives. I've been adding some background indications of the interior space of the rooms for some additional complexity and a bit of close/far focus. It's also good practice in the sort of non-academic perspective I'm trying to achieve.

But there's a personal story, too. This drawing is a reminder of a special and happy evening with friends; I did it early the next morning, before we had cleaned up all the dishes and folded the leaves of our table back to normal size. We like using this tablecloth when we have a lot of guests - it's a deep red cotton, large, with twelve napkins, and came from Damascus, when my husband went there with his elderly father and his brother in 2000, before the wars. Originally, this type of tablecloth, called "Aghabani," must have been embroidered by hand in an elaborate chain stitch and traditional patterns. Later they were made in the countryside around Damascus by seamstresses who used embroidery machines.

The word "damask," of course, comes from "Damascus" -- the city was a center of elaborate silk weaving in the early Middle Ages, up until about the 9th century, because of its location as a trading center on the silk road. In a traditional flat-weave damask, there are contrasting warp and weft yarns, one shiny and one dull, that create the typical difference in sheen that characterizes a damask pattern. I don't know if these embroidered linens were done as a substitute for woven silk damask, or if they pre-dated them, but they utilize the same idea of a shiny design on a matte background. Jonathan brought back two for us - this red one, and another in pure white, but we also have a smaller grey one with gold embroidery that's very lovely. I never thought to use them as a base for still-lives before.

A book and its cover

This week at Phoenicia Publishing we've announced the pre-orders for this new book of poems by Luisa A. Igloria. As I wrote the posts for social media and the Phoenicia newsletter and blog, I thought back to when I first "met" Luisa, ten years ago -- she had submitted a poem to qarrtsiluni, which Dave Bonta and I were editing at the time, that blew us both away. Later Luisa edited an issue for us, and in November of 2010 she began writing a poem every day for Dave's Via Negativa site -- a practice she's continued to this day. It's an amazing and inspiring achievement, and I'm proud to consider her a friend, and to have published not one but two of her books at Phoenicia. The other, Night Willow, came out in 2009 and the title poem was inspired by an essay and watercolor that appeared on this blog.

The "Buddha poems" collected in this edition appeared in earlier forms on Via Negativa in 2016. They're humorous, poignant, down-to-earth, and both startling and revealing just as the best Buddhist stories are: they make us see our everyday world and our everyday selves in new ways. I've happy that Ivy Alvarez and Satya Robyn, both also longtime blog-friends of mine and Luisa's, are among the writers who have written blurbs for this book. I hope you'll buy a copy and support Luisa, but you can also enter to win one of two copies we'll be giving away on publication day in mid-March, by signing up for the Phoenicia email newsletter.

As part of the design process, I've been working hard on the cover art, using hand-painted paper, cut and glued onto a painted background as collage. I used a combination of gouache and acrylic for the color, and tried several papers before I was satisfied -- the background needs to be heavy enough not to curl, and the painted papers need to be substantial enough to hold the paint, but thin enough so that there is no shadow from their edges when they are pasted. It's a great technique closely related to some of my expressive calligraphies -- I love the rather enchanted feeling that results -- but it's very time-consuming and picky. Probably good for a Virgo like myself! Here's an earlier version that led, eventually, to the final one.

Making art is sometimes a lonely process, filled with doubts, but at other times, there's inspiration and collaboration. This design was my favorite of four I presented to Luisa, but at first she chose a different one. We took some time, and the next day she wrote to talk about this one with the brambles. Luisa told me what she liked here (the brambles and the ladyslipper) and said she'd like to see a bird rather than an eye. I also knew from her previous responses that she liked bright colors. Putting all of that together, and looking at some photographs of lady-slippers in their natural habitat filled with ferns and grasses in a woodland clearing, I was able to make the adjustments and changes that led to the final cover, which took several days of painting and cutting and gluing to complete because this is a new technique for me.

Hattie

I was sad to learn today of the death of Marianna Schaeffer, author of the blog "Hattie's Web," and a longtime commenter and friend of mine at The Cassandra Pages. Over the past months, she faced her terminal illness as she did everything else: with courage, honesty, and no nonsense. I'll miss her intelligent, straight-forward opinions and comments on contemporary affairs, especially politics, and I'll miss her friendship and companionship online. May she rest in peace.

Susan Elbe

Yesterday the news came that we had lost Susan Elbe, one of the best poets I have known, a good friend, and a kind, loving, and deeply concerned person. Dave Bonta and I first met her through qarrtsiluni, published a number of her poems, and worked with her as a guest editor of the "Health" issue; that mutually-supportive relationship has continued through the years. I was looking forward to publishing a book of hers one of these days, and am very sorry that this won't happen.

 

I wanted to share a link to Susan reading one of her poems at qarrtsiluni, from November 2011, titled "Between Us and the Slow Fall." The kind of person she was comes across clearly through both her voice and her words. We shared September birthdays, political views, and a genuine friendship though we had never met in person. I will miss her.

 

Cold Hands, Warm Heart (or: "Swim Nerds Meet for Coffee and Then Freeze Their Tails Off")

This morning I met a friend for breakfast at one of Montreal's little neighborhood cafes: the sort of place where you can have excellent coffee - we both had bowls of latte - and a fresh croissant or chocolatine or muffin, and sit at a pleasant table in the sunlight for a long chat. She and I met through singing, but now we're both swimmers too, and we spent a good part of our time together today being swimming nerds, talking about goggles and suits and stroke mechanics, and alternate-side-breathing vs one side, and how our necks aren't symmetrical. You would have loved it. No? Well, that's why we needed to get together.

We caught up on family stuff and singing and talked a little about politics, but agreed not to dwell on it. It turns out that we're both thinking about studying another language, or taking up a new instrument. It was a great way to start a day, and reminded me of the importance of seeing the people you love, and continuing to do the things that you're passionate about, regardless of what's going on in the world, as much as you can, for as long as you can.

Then we bundled up, and she walked back to her place, and I walked back to the studio, and, I swear by the leaping polar bears, was it ever cold! There's a storm system approaching from the south and it's damp as well as cold; I was OK in my body and head underneath layers of down and fleece, but my legs felt the way they used to when I was a kid walking home from school - first cold, then almost numb. I had on leather gloves and woolen mitts over the gloves, and even so I kept having to stick my hands in my pockets. For long walks on days like this, I told myself, I need to wear tights under my jeans, or an even longer coat.

I ducked into the sheltered entryway of this flowershop, to warm up.

I stopped at the market and bought a couple of cans of tunafish, to warm up.

I stopped at the artisanal bakery and bought a loaf of bread, to warm up.

You've really got to be crazy to live up here, I thought, as the wind howled down the alley. But there's something so exhilarating about it, too: the extremes, the survival, the memories you accumulate of adventures in winters past, and the delight of going into the warmth of an interior after being out in it, as you thaw out and the feeling returns to your skin and something warm to drink spirals down your throat.

On the street, I watched a young mother and her child as they approached me and went past. The mother, bubbling with enthusiasm, carried a bright orange plastic sled, and had a small dog on a leash; they must have been going off to the park. The little boy, only 2 or 3, trudged behind her, all bundled in his puffy snowsuit and boots, and wearing a red hat with an animal face on the brim and little floppy ears. He looked up at me and grinned, his cheeks so red from the cold, but without a hint of complaint, and I thought, yep, he's already Canadian.

One Week Later: Report from Washington DC

This is a guest post by my friend Vivian Lewin, who went to the Women's March in Washington last weekend, traveling from Montreal to a friend's house in Pennsylvania by car and then to D.C. Vivian and I met more than ten years ago through Christ Church Cathedral, and quickly realized we had much in common - being American, being writers and readers, loving textiles and sewing for just a few. She is a veteran of many marches, and we both wanted to share her experience and perspective here.

At 5:30 a.m. on January 21, 2017, the parking lot of Harrisburg Area Community College was already filling up when we arrived: Five people—two living nearby, two from Poughkeepsie, one from Montreal. We had all slept in Camp Hill, gotten up at four, eaten breakfast, and brought our lunches and charged-up phones/cameras to board a chartered bus and go to DC. A local woman who uses a walker joined us; the six of us managed to keep together all day.

 Holly, Candice, Tom (wearing a hat made by Vivian), Bonnie, and Samantha

People kept arriving, forming a long line in the dark. It was chilly, but that’s not what gave me goosebumps. I’m a dual US Canadian citizen and a Florida voter. After having watched the US election by myself on November 20, and having listened to the Inauguration Day coverage in the car alone on my drive from Montreal the day before, it seemed like a miracle to be in the company of like-minded women and men. I thrilled to think how many other parking lots were filling, how many other groups of people were converging on Washington. How many buses rolling through the night—some from Canada. How many friends and relations had sent us off with pink pussyhats (thank you, cassandrabeth!) or prayers or sandwiches. “Take a few steps for me,” one friend wrote, and other emails arrived too. “Be safe.” “My thoughts are with you.” I was there for others, not just anonymous others but carrying the hopes of people I know.

I felt we all shared a resolve that this day be as deeply meaningful as we could make it. Knitting hats, making posters by hand, meditating, praying, reserving hotel rooms or arranging car shares takes forethought and a resolute determination.

We reached DC around 9:30. To get to the actual march we six walked through the enormous parking lot of RFK Stadium—full to capacity with tour buses— to the metro entrance with an elevator. People made way for Bonnie and her walker. The cars were filled with marchers—they applauded Bonnie—and our train took us near the Mall.

Bonnie and her walker: "“I bought this especially for today. It’s supposed to be good for rough terrain and only weighs 13 pounds.”  

A woman in our metro car...

We emerged to find the street already filled with people. You’ve seen the photos. We only got that overview from the giant screens along the way. Gloria Steinem was talking. We walked towards the unseen stage until the crowd was too thick, then planted ourselves where we could watch a screen, and stood in front of it for hours under a leaden sky. The crowd—each person in it—was as inspiring as the speeches. We photographed each other—friends and strangers alike. The memorable speeches began to blur together.

I was tired. My feet hurt. Cell service was limited and nobody knew whether we would march, or where. One network said the march was cancelled but a security guy said it would go towards the Washington Monument. Slowly, we threaded our way in that direction, single file through the crowd. Eventually, the actual march crawled in that direction, too. I was pretty numb; the day became an endurance exercise. When an officer in a police car said we were over a million, I told my friends and one of them started to cry. Yes indeed, it was all worth it! I told random strangers (not really strangers any more) as they passed, just to see the joy on their faces. We sat on the curb to rest as the crowd poured past on their way to the Ellipse. “What does democracy look like?” one fellow called and the crowd bellowed back “THIS is what democracy looks like.” Nobody wanted to stop that chant.

My decision, early on, to go to Washington felt personal, stubborn, even helpless. What I could write or do that would be more useful? Was it a kind of pilgrimage? I’d say, in retrospect, that I went to witness my resolve. There’s a prophetic tradition of doing acts that seem absurd—that put the lie to worldly power. Amazing to experience such an act manifested in the sea of people who had, together, come.

There is much work to do. I’ve marched in other “protests” that felt angry, or giddy, or triumphant. I didn’t feel that way on Saturday. This is one for the long haul. As James Louder wrote this morning, “The enormities of Trump’s first week are so enormous and so diverse, so wantonly and widely destructive that the mind boggles before any attempt of analysis…”. So it’s good to hold on to the memory of this day. I know that my experience will keep me keeping on. (See also “Activism 101, and Regular Life” in the Cassandra Pages)

Vivian Lewin is a Montreal writer who grew up in Pennsylvania. She attended Oberlin (AB honors English) and the University of Florida (MFA creative writing). She is a dual citizen of Canada and the US, and is a Florida voter. Vivian has made poems and quilts during the course of her life and has taught quilting; now she is a spiritual director and Lay Reader in the Anglican church and also works with a Healing Pathway group.

Ice Mountain: the back story according to Dave

In January, Phoenicia will be publishing Ice Mountain: An Elegy, a book of short poems by my longtime close friend and collaborator Dave Bonta. The cover linocut illustration and design are by me, and the book will also include five of my original linocut illustrations, inspired by Dave's poems.

Dave has just written a post at Via Negativa , "The Ice Mountain Cometh," about the genesis of the book, and how it morphed into a collaboration that includes me, and will soon extend to the videographer Marc Neyes and perhaps others, and I thought you might find it as interesting as I did. In his post, Dave talks not only about poetry itself, but print vs digital distribution, and his own commitment to poetry being accessible to everyone, not just to read, but to use and build on creatively. But he's also aware of the financial realities of putting books into print, and discusses how we made the decisions about publication and creative access for this project.

And, last but not at all least, he tells the story of the "porcupine tree" on the cover and what has strangely happened to it...

The picture of Dave above was taken by Alison Kent, and he notes that the sweater he's wearing was knit by Rachel Rawlins according to a traditional Icelandic design named after Odin, the Norse god who brought the gift of poetry to humans.

(Ice Mountain: An Elegy is now available for pre-order at a special price, and will ship in late January. 10% of all proceeds will benefit local and regional conservation efforts in central Pennsylvania.)

 

Lyre, Lake

When I was a young girl, my grandfather, who had a real estate and auction business and was also a skilled woodworker, gave me a pair of antique Hitchcock chairs. They were small, with low, caned seats suitable for a child, and traditional stenciled decoration, but instead of fruit or flowers, my chairs had a lyre in the center: I was the musical child. For almost sixty years, those chairs have been with me, too small and delicate to be practical, but impossible to part with because they were such an early affirmation from someone who didn't need words to tell me he loved and knew me. The cane seats have been replaced once, but the stencils are in remarkably good condition. I ate my lunch today, as I usually do, seated on one of those chairs, with its golden lyre pressed against my back.

---

We slept in that bedstead with the carved lyre last week, while visiting friends on Lake Champlain, in a small old town that used to be the summer home of affluent families from New York City, as well as longtime local families. The town has the mansions and summer hotel one might expect, but the storefronts along the one main street are mostly empty now, the hotels and inns turned into rental apartments, or even torn down. So, the town and the lakeshore were quiet except for migrating flocks of Canada geese and smaller groups of ducks, or the occasional hawk or vulture or heron overhead, and the lake itself was calm, with long ripples instead of waves that caught the light and slowly progressed from the opposite shore towards us, as if a long knife had sliced the water at an angle from below.

Our hosts took us for a short but steep climb up a nearby mountain, to a rock outcrop that gave a panoramic view of the high peaks, the lake, and Vermont's Green Mountains beyond it; we lounged on the warm rock, eating apples and almonds, while their basset hound crunched acorns with his strong teeth. My knees were grateful for collapsible hiking poles, especially on the descent, but we were happy to find we were in pretty good shape for hiking.

 

Later, we sat on the porch in sweaters, drinking vodka and eating homemade gravlax, watching the lake until the sun set, and then ate dinner at the kitchen table, and talked into the night.

Camel's Hump, in Vermont, seen from the New York side of the lake.

In the morning, a long breakfast of eggs and Montreal bagels with labneh and grilled peppers, another walk, and then a slow drive back to the city, along the lake for a while. We stopped at a farmstand where workers -- there to dig potatoes? pick cabbages? apples? -- were sleeping in the grass under the trees, and again for lunch at a diner in a deserted village, bought some apples at an orchard, and made it back to Montreal in time for choir rehearsal, feeling like we had been away far longer than we actually had.

 

A Note to You, Dear Readers:

Thank you, always, for your comments. Usually I try to answer longer comments by email, but sometimes I don't manage to get to it, so please check back in the comment thread (such as on the previous post) as I almost always post my replies there. Some of you don't have working email addresses so it's hard for me to reply to you that way, too. Love to you all, and Happy September.

A Brooklyn Evening

I've just returned from five days in Brooklyn, celebrating the launch of the latest book by my friend Teju Cole, a collection of essays called Known and Strange Things. When you read it, which I certainly hope you will, along with essays from the New Yorker and New York Times you'll see some words that appeared first here at The Cassandra Pages -- a tribute both to Teju's generosity and our long friendship, which has at times allowed him to freely publish work here that didn't fit in more mainstream journals.

That generosity was also manifest on Monday night, when, during the course of a party in honor of his own book, Teju invited me and two other contributors to Documentum 2: Pictures and Words, Wah-Ming Chang and Emily Johnson, to hold a New York mini-launch of the issue, presenting our work along with his, as one of the guest-curators of the issue. Our photography was projected on a large screen in the garden as we each read from our pages, and the guests formed an attentive and appreciative audience. It was a special pleasure for me to read my own work, because as a publisher I'm usually the one organizing events, or encouraging and promoting other people's writing -- probably I should do it more often.

Jonathan and I had helped during the day to get the venue ready for the party, and one of our tasks - most happily accepted - was to do the flower arrangements. Fortunately the food was catered, and it was an extremely delicious Palestinian feast. As it turned out, there was a small group of Middle Easterners present, who sort of "found" each other during the course of the evening - people from Lebanon, Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Palestine, along with Africans and African-Americans, Indians, and a few boring white Americans like myself -- it was great, and so was the music, selected by D.J. Teju himself.

I'll have more to say about the trip and about Teju's book later, but for now, I wanted to share these photographs with you. It was wonderful to be in Brooklyn, and in New York City, and -- most of all -- to be with dear friends.