The Farm at Wilcox

ProetryPlace Blog 60     haibun: Wilcox

    My older sister and brother and I squirm and stretch in the cramped back seat of the 1932 Buick sedan. For hours we have counted horses on one side of the highway or the other, then buried them when a graveyard appeared. Now the highway, US 41, runs through the tall second growth pine forest of northern Wisconsin. No more horses. No more graveyards.

    My younger brother, in the front seat with Mom and Dad, asks the inevitable, “Are we there?”

    Dad says, “Watch for the marker.”

    We all know he means the roadside plaque that denotes the 45th parallel, the magical marker halfway between the equator and the North Pole. We know then the road to the farm is very close.

    The road is exactly one mile long, unpaved and closely surrounded by trees. The cool, shady passage is doubly welcome on a hot mid-summer afternoon. As we turn off the highway onto the gravel, six voices in unison whisper, “If you’re very quiet, you might see a deer.” Then we laugh. Ritual. And sometimes we do see a deer behind a tree. Or think we do.

    The road at last spills out of the forest onto flat fields and pastures. As we slow at the railroad crossing marked Wilcox, the old barn and its single tall silo come first into view, then the sturdy, gray weathered farmhouse. Smoke from the black kitchen stove curls from the chimney. We can already taste Aunt Annie’s light as air, fresh hot biscuits. She stands in her long white apron on the back porch, smiling her welcome as we pile from the car.

~

    This small farm near Peshtigo, Wisconsin was home to my father. Dear Aunt Annie and Uncle Charlie took him and his two younger sisters in to live with them when the children’s parents both died of tuberculosis at a young age. It is here he took the family for his one week of summer vacation for many years.

    The farm held a fascinating strangeness for children from the city. Even the lack of electricity and indoor plumbing held their own odd measure of enchantment. At the end of the week we invariably plead, “Please! Can’t we stay just one more day?”

    In the 1940s, while the killer, Polio, stalked children and adults on the streets of Milwaukee, my parents sent me to the farm alone to spend the entire summer vacation. Seventy years later, I still think of those wonderful days.

kerosene lantern

circle of warm light

holding back shadows

great cast iron stove

graceful curved legs

steam from the kettle

Sears catalog

tractors, shotguns, brassieres

three hole library

last biscuit, chicken bones

you’re excused from the table

adult talk begins

player piano

The Death of Floyd Collins

again and again

rhythm and music

warm milk from the udder

plays into the pail

fresh milk every day

chicken on Sunday, fat

mice in the granary

headless, bewildered

chicken running in circles

unable to cluck

Ned and Roscoe

strain haunches against leather

wagon wheels groan

neighbors together

chicken, hot biscuits and pie

the grain sacked and stacked

evening shadows

long, cool pump handle

the taste of iron

Richard Allen Anderson     http://richardandersonblogs.blogspot.com     27 July 2014

ProetyPlace Blog 59

When Less is More and More is Still More

   I’ve been thinking.

    (Not so unusual as you might suppose.)  About my writing. About my next book. About this blog.

    I’ve been writing.

    Poetry. Mostly haiku. Several longer pieces. Some memoir too. Scraps and pieces, disjointed.

    I’ve just about decided.

    I want to meld some of my writings for my next book. The title of this blog, ProetryPlace already suggests some combination of prose and poetry, but I’ve always kept the various genre separate. Now I want to mix them, blend them in some aesthetically satisfying form. Not quite sure how that is going to take shape, but here are some thoughts after doing a little research on the concept.

    First off, my bright new idea of mixing poetic and non-poetic forms of writing isn’t all that new. Been around maybe a millennium or so, in a variety of forms.

    Maybe you’ve read The Divine Comedy written in the early 14th century. It’s an epic piece by the poet Dante, written late in his lifetime. I read it in college and loved it. Well, Dante wrote an earlier work called La Vita Nuova (the new life) when he was a young man to express his love (at incredibly great length) for the lovely Beatrice. This work (I’ve read only snatches of it) is built around 25 sonetta (sonnets) and a few other poetic forms. But Dante uses, often quite long, prose narratives to explain his poetry. Proetry.

    Also from medieval times, a French literary form called chantefable was performed by alternating sung verse with recited prose narratives.

    Probably more familiar, and in English: the plays of Shakespeare. The Bard freely combines prose and poetry in his plays using a variety of techniques to suit the situation.

    The Japanese have been mixing prose and poetry since ancient times. Haiku started its life as a short introduction in verse (non-rhyming) to a much longer essay (renga or renku). The famous Japanese poet, Basho, who wrote in the mid-17th century was probably the most renowned leader in the art.

    Sometime during this period, a form called haibun appeared. and more recently it has been adapted into English. Haibun in English combines relatively short, sometimes lyrical, sometimes matter-of-fact prose followed by one or more related haiku.

An example titled  Sweetgrass from Hortensia Anderson’s collected haibun, The Plenitude of Emptiness:

(available from Lulu Enterprises, Inc., Raleigh, NC)    

    She shows me how to weave blonde baskets with a light hand.

    As we braid the oval reeds with sweetgrass, their delicate but rich

    green runs through the wicker like rivulets after rain.

         darkness woven

         through the tangled leaves—

         summer evening

    I am drawn to haiku by its imagery, its brevity, its difficulty and by the unexpected, sometimes perplexing, turns it takes to shake and enliven my perception—seventeen syllables that stand alone to tell a story or awaken an emotion. Hortensia Anderson’s haiku in her haibun, Sweetgrass, does that, but the brief prose that introduces it enhances and adds dimension to the imagery.

    I respect the ancient roots and traditions of haiku, but have often experimented with the genre in form and content. I am not alone in doing so. Modern haiku in English more often than not tends to be even more brief than the traditional 17 syllable form, sometimes with good effect, sometimes not. A well-known example of English language haiku (by Cor Van Den Heuvel) that still provokes imagery through extreme brevity is the single word

tundra

centered on a blank page.

    It is not necessary to know what was in the poets mind as she wrote to appreciate any poem. It is not necessary to experience the same emotions that stirred the poet’s soul when reading her words. Still, poetry, more so than prose, does attempt to communicate those thoughts and emotions in condensed, intensified or elevated way. Especially haiku.

    I shall continue to write haiku as well as other poems as suits my thoughts and emotions, but I am intrigued by the possibilities of haibun and how the best qualities of both prose and poetry can be further enhanced by their juxtaposition in a single composition, a fusion of the forms into one entity, call it haibun or call it proety.

     Now let me get to work.

Richard Allen Anderson     http://richardandersonblogs.blogspot.com     20 July 2014

Of Guns and Governments

ProetryPlace Blog 58                              OF GUNS AND GOVERNMENTS

    Starting now, the first week of July 2014, licensed individuals are allowed to “carry,” concealed or openly, handguns in the state of Georgia.

    A license is not required to own a handgun in Georgia, and registration is explicitly forbidden. Essentially the only requirement to own a handgun is that the individual must be at least 18 years old.

    “Carry” means to keep the weapon on one’s person or readily available. A license is required to carry. The carrier must be at least 21 and must have passed federal screening tests for handgun ownership.

    Gun violence seems to be out of control and more prevalent than ever in this country. This is used as an argument both for and against gun ownership and carrying of hand guns. Carry proponents argue that arming every individual for self-defense will deter gun violence—“Don’t mess with me bro, see my gun!” Those in the anti-carry and anti-ownership camp seem to think the opposite—no guns, no violence. Both arguments carry a parcel of truth. Which should prevail?

    The Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States guarantees the right of individuals to own guns—or does it? The amendment consists of a single sentence: “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” What do the words mean? What was the intent of the framers of the Bill of Rights in 1789? Is the constitution a living document, subject to reinterpretation by each new generation?

    At the heart of the debate is the question of whether the Second Amendment was meant to apply to individual rights or merely to the states’ right and ability to maintain a state militia. The latter view is certainly supported by the lead-in reference to militias, and, in 1789, the term “bear arms” was commonly  applied only to acts and times  of war. Additionally, the issue of state versus federal power was a hotter subject in 1789 than it is now. Thus, until very recently, the Supreme Court in several cases asserted that individuals do not have the constitutional right to possess guns and that local, state and federal governments may regulate firearm possession.

    Still, the amendment does clearly state that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. In a 2008 and later cases, the Supreme Court changed its “collective rights” interpretation to one of individual rights and proclaimed that the Second Amendment established the right for individual U.S. citizens to possess firearms. And so it stands today.

    I support the concept of individual rights to own guns, but I consider the Georgia Carry Law to be borderline insanity. This macho, vigilante mentality is full of flaws and dangers and does not effectively speak to preventing the kinds of gun violence that is foremost in the public mind, the unprovoked madman massacres in our schools or streets or theaters.

    I do not know whether these kinds of events can be prevented by more perceptive screening of gun purchasers. In many previous cases, early warning signs were evident, yet preventive action was not taken. I doubt, however, that allowing all individuals to carry hand guns into these venues of violence will have any beneficial effect where it is needed most against such premeditated acts.

    Much violent crime is not premeditated. It is spur of the moment, prompted by sudden rage or distress. Having a finger on an available trigger at such moments can lead to disaster. Most often the perpetrator is filled with regret and remorse moments after the event. Too late for the victims. This is my major objection, aside from ineffectiveness, to free carrying of guns in public.

    I support gun ownership based on my individual right to defend myself, my home and my family. I see this as not only protection against other individuals who would seek to harm me, but protection against a government that might become tyrannical in its regulation or suppression of its citizens. Look only to the Middle East, to Egypt, to Syria, even Iraq. Remember 1776 when our own country was born from revolution against the oppressive yolk of England on its colonies.

    “When in the course of human events . . . .”

    Far-fetched?  I hope so. Impossible? Certainly not. Mistrust of our federal government is at the highest level I have known in my lifetime.

     Consider infringements on the Fourth Amendment in the name of national security. The amendment states in part: “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures shall not be violated . . . . “ This amendment provides our protection from arbitrary arrest, stop and frisk police actions, wiretaps and other forms of surreptitious government surveillance. Hello Edward Snowden. Goodbye privacy.

    Of course, we routinely give up individual freedoms, recognizing that in many cases they must be sacrificed for the sake of a functional society. Regulatory ordinances control many of our actions, at the same time providing for our protection against the unbridled actions of others. Injury at the hands of another individual or organization can be addressed and rectified by legal actions. Suppression or infringement of individual rights at the hands of government when it oversteps its powers is more difficult to act on. And the government has guns.

    As we celebrate the birth of our great nation, recognize again that an informed and politically active citizenry is the best safeguard against government infringement on our rights and freedoms. Arming individual citizens with handguns on our streets, in our schools, churches, bars, most any public venue in the name of individual freedom is a step backwards fraught with the greatest of dangers and little imaginable benefit.

Richard Allen Anderson     http://richardandersonblogs.blogspot.com     5 July 2014