Writing Spaces

"Gentlemen,
     Regarding the recent rejection slip you sent me.  I think there must have been a misunderstanding.  What I really wanted was for you to publish my story, and send me fifty thousand dollars.
     Didn't you realize that?"

—Snoopy, and Charles Schulz

Grace

The elder with the walker who

has talked to us about the turtle eggs

visits the swan, late afternoon:

his favorite friend, his self-appointed charge. 

One, all careless grace,

the other clumsy and conspicuously careful,

come to grace

the slow, excruciating way around.

—Christie

Writing Spaces

image:  Bench with Roses

On the Bookshelf

On the bookshelf,

Shorebirds

Santi

and Sherlock Holmes—

three guides


into the unknown

and then

the flopeared flannel rabbit

my painted teacup

the terracotta artist pen

to see me safely through

another day

—Christie

Writing Spaces

image:  vintage photo

Persistence

an African basket

full of green beads,

the broken strands

confided to it

months ago, forgotten

there, let go

but coiled in

the mindful darkness,

in the way of sleeping

animals or seeds,

luster abides

—Christie

Writing Spaces

One of Matisse's women reading—but what?  What writer gets to occupy that Matisse space?

Guacamole

The surest thing

I've ever done—

ripe avocado

     skin rough and pit silky, fitting the palm

bright lemon

     stinging just a little in a cut finger

sea salt

a clove of garlic

onion and tomato

crushed red chile, seeds and pods

time

     to breathe

time

     to become

and then the glazed blue bowl

     textured like avocado skin

yielding its alchemy.

No measuring,

just practice, taste,

this ritual I've followed

almost all my life

that always brings

a kind of clarity

I'd forget otherwise

and gives me back myself

my Santa Fe childhood

those gatherings of friends in later years

     on Angel Island in the San Francisco Bay

that hillside in Mallorca, where after

deliberating words all day

with other writers

we'd have gin and tonic

little grilled peppers

and guacamole

while the sun went down below us

in that distant sea

strange and always familiar

—Christie

Writing Spaces

From one of my collage notebooks . . .

Instead of Housecleaning

Instead of housecleaning

it helps to think of it

as visiting the things I love—

painted Italian candlestick

San Ildefonso pot

my paleography collage

with bits of a Larousse

binoculars

cottonwood drum

the alabaster jar

from the hilltown

of the Etruscans

where I walked

with mad dogs

in the noontime sun—

my long-ago

peregrinations

down to this

dreamy circling

of the threadbare cloth,

this unheroic

shooing off of dust.

—Christie