10.31.2021 – visited the sea

visited the sea
mermaids in the basement
came to look at me

Emily spent the day at the beach.

Emily Dickenson that is.

Emily Dickenson spent the day at the beach and wrote her poem, “I started Early – Took my Dog.”

One poetry website states that in this poem, through these words, Ms Dickenson:

“ . . . reveals a lot about the author and her fear of being close to people.

The author was afraid of being known, and she was afraid of knowing others.

Although she had intense desires to know and be known, her fear trumped those desires, and though she was able to express her desires through this poem, her readers may never know whether she was able to fulfill these desires in reality.”

Okay.

Maybe.

That is one opinion.

I think maybe she went to the beach with her dog early to get a parking spot and the mermaids in the basement came out to look at her.

Things happen like that here on the beach.

Some see all that that the commenter saw in Ms. Dickenson’s words.

Some see the mermaid.

As Alain de Botton wrote about chair backs in his book, The Architecture of Happiness (2009, Vintage Books);

Consider the struts on the backs of two chairs.

Both seem to express a mood.

The curved struts speak of ease and playfulness, the straight ones of seriousness and logic. And yet neither set approximates a human shape.

Rather, the struts abstractly represent two different temperaments.

A straight piece of wood behaves in its own medium as a stable, unimaginative person will act in his or her life, while the meanders of a curved piece correspond, however obliquely, with the casual elegance of an unruffled and dandyish soul.

The beach is a place of meanders and curves.

Here is the poem.

I started Early – Took my Dog –
And visited the Sea –
The Mermaids in the Basement
Came out to look at me –

And Frigates – in the Upper Floor
Extended Hempen Hands –
Presuming Me to be a Mouse –
Aground – opon the Sands –

But no Man moved Me – till the Tide
Went past my simple Shoe –
And past my Apron – and my Belt
And past my Boddice – too –

And made as He would eat me up –
As wholly as a Dew
Opon a Dandelion’s Sleeve –
And then – I started – too –

And He – He followed – close behind –
I felt His Silver Heel
Opon my Ancle – Then My Shoes
Would overflow with Pearl –

Until We met the Solid Town –
No One He seemed to know –
And bowing – with a Mighty look –
At me – The Sea withdrew

With much cheek, I include this haiku in the series based on afternoons spent at the beach on Hilton Head Island.

To include anything inspired by Miss Dickenson with my 17 syllable efforts is perhaps a worlds record for reach.

AND I hate to think what some grad student would write about me if these efforts were ever dissected for myself behind the words.

I wanted to see if I would be ‘inspired’ by what I saw, by what I heard, by what I smelled, by what I tasted, what I felt emotionally and what I felt tactilely.

Some turned out okay.

Some were too forced.

Some were just bad.

Some did involve some or all of those feelings.

As far as it goes, I guess I was inspired by by what I saw, by what I heard, by what I smelled, by what I tasted, what I felt emotionally and what I felt tactilely.

Click here for more Haiku from the BEACH

10.30.2021- toddlers into waves

toddlers into waves
scream delight expressed with voice
joyful abandon

It is there inside me.

Waiting to get out.

That joyful abandon.

I watch the toddlers at the beach.

Granddaughter at the Beach – January 2021

Their determined unsurefootedness as they toddle towards the ocean.

They slow, they speed up, they slow, totter left and right.

Then their feet hit the waves.

They stop and hunch forward.

They look down at their feet.

They look down at their feet in the water.

They look up.

They look around.

Then they scream,

They scream giving voice to the delight in their heart.

And they run into the water.

It is there inside me.

I want to scream and give voice to the delight in my heart.

I want to give in to the joyful abandon.

But I am old.

I am not allowed.

I have to wonder and worry what might other people think.

But then I have to wonder who are these other people.

Why do I care what they think?

In the words of Nick the Bartender (Hey! Get me! I’m giving out wings!) to George Bailey, “What’s that got to do with it? I don’t know you from Adam’s off ox.”

I don’t know them folks.

These folks at the beach don’t know me.

Don’t know me from Adam’s Off Ox.

Adam’s Off Ox?

I had to do the Google.

And the Google says, “The saying in any form, however, is another of the numerous ones commonly heard but of which no printed record has been found. But in 1848 the author of a book on ‘Nantucketisms’ recorded a saying then in use on that island, ‘Poor as God’s off ox,’ which, he said, meant very poor. It is possible that on the mainland ‘Adam’ was used as a euphemistic substitute. (From A Hog on Ice by Charles Earle Funk (1948, Harper & Row).

So I don’t know these people from Adam or his ox or even his off ox.

Joyful abandon.

It is in there.

It is going to get out.

One of these days.

Part of a series based on afternoons spent at the beach on Hilton Head Island.

I wanted to see if I would be ‘inspired’ by what I saw, by what I heard, by what I smelled, by what I tasted, what I felt emotionally and what I felt tactilely.

Some turned out okay.

Some were too forced.

Some were just bad.

Some did involve some or all of those feelings.

As far as it goes, I guess I was inspired by by what I saw, by what I heard, by what I smelled, by what I tasted, what I felt emotionally and what I felt tactilely.

Click here for more Haiku from the BEACH

10.29.2021 – sunny sunshine sounds

sunny sunshine sounds
waves, birds, wind, kids screaming squeals
pop of a pop top

Sitting on the beach in South Carolina on Hilton Head Island on a Saturday afternoon can be a lot of things.

Quiet is not one of them.

Start with all the sounds of the beach.

Add in all the sounds of people at the beach.

Through it all, like a knife, I can hear the clear click of a pop can (beer can, flavored sparkling water can) cut across on the audio clutter.

On a hot day, it sounds good.

Back in the day in 7th Grade science class at Riverside Junior Highschool in Grand Rapids, Michigan, our teacher Mr. Bultman, was preparing a demonstration.

With a large beaker of water, Mr. Bultman poured filled up a tall graduated cylinder.

As Mr. Bultman poured, you could hear a glug glug glug with a rising interogative like an Australian sentence.

The class went quiet.

The sound stirred something in all of us.

Mr. Bultman stopped pouring and set the beaker down.

Mr. Bultman looked out at us, smiling in the quiet.

“Pour me one of those too,” said Mr. Bultman with a big grin.

The class paused.

Then burst out laughing.

The whole room was on the the same page.

It sounded … delicious.

Part of a series based on afternoons spent at the beach on Hilton Head Island.

I wanted to see if I would be ‘inspired’ by what I saw, by what I heard, by what I smelled, by what I tasted, what I felt emotionally and what I felt tactilely.

Some turned out okay.

Some were too forced.

Some were just bad.

Some did involve some or all of those feelings.

As far as it goes, I guess I was inspired by by what I saw, by what I heard, by what I smelled, by what I tasted, what I felt emotionally and what I felt tactilely.

Click here for more Haiku in the BEACH category —

10.28.2021 – fearlessness of kids

fearlessness of kids
facing each wave after wave
fearlessly fearless

Louder than gulls the little children scream
Whom fathers haul into the jovial foam;
But others fearlessly rush in, breast high,
Laughing the salty water from their mouthes-
Heroes of the nursery.

Robert Graves – The Beach

Robert Graves or Robert von Ranke Graves (24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985) maybe more well known for his books on mythology that were all college reading lists but could be safely avoided as no Professor who ever include an exam question based on them.

From Wikipedia: Robert Graves was a British poet, historical novelist, critic, and classicist.

His father was Alfred Perceval Graves, a celebrated Irish poet and figure in the Gaelic revival; they were both Celticists and students of Irish mythology.

Graves produced more than 140 works in his lifetime.

His poems, his translations and innovative analysis of the Greek myths, his memoir of his early life- including his role in World War I – Good-Bye to All That, and his speculative study of poetic inspiration The White Goddess have never been out of print.

It was Mr. Graves who once said, “The remarkable thing about Shakespeare is that he really is very good, in spite of all the people who say he is very good.”

I like that.

But it is his quote on money and poetry that I will get on a T Shirt.

A T Shirt that I wouldn’t wear but I am not getting a tattoo so what can you do?

Anyway, Mr. Graves said, “There’s no money in poetry, but there’s no poetry in money, either.”

That suits me fine.

Part of a series based on afternoons spent at the beach on Hilton Head Island.

I wanted to see if I would be ‘inspired’ by what I saw, by what I heard, by what I smelled, by what I tasted, what I felt emotionally and what I felt tactilely.

Some turned out okay.

Some were too forced.

Some were just bad.

Some did involve some or all of those feelings.

As far as it goes, I guess I was inspired by by what I saw, by what I heard, by what I smelled, by what I tasted, what I felt emotionally and what I felt tactilely.

Click here for more Haiku from the BEACH

10.27.2021 – despair of being

despair of being
able to convey my own
idea of this place

My wife tells me to stop writing about how beautiful this place is.

Keep it up, she says, and everyone will come here.

I know what SHE means.

Still …

I do think I should stop writing about being here in the low country of South Carolina in general and more specifically the beaches of Hilton Head Island the bluff overlooking the May River in Bluffton.

Not because I worry about visitors.

But because I only have words to use.

Anthony Trollope, the English novelist, once wrote about Sydney Australia, “I despair of being able to convey to any reader my own idea of the beauty of Sydney Harbour.”

I know what HE means.

I grew up in West Michigan and they were lots of places that would also bring me to despair if I tried to describe.

But there is something beyond here.

Maybe its that the landscape doesn’t turn white 6 months of the year.

Maybe I am older.

Maybe after a dozen years in Atlanta.

Maybe it is just me and other people have other places.

Thomas Jefferson described the view of Harper’s Ferry, where the the Potomac and Shenandoah rivers come together, from what is known as ‘Jefferson’s Rock’ with the words, “This scene is worth a voyage across the Atlantic.”

I have been to Harper’s Ferry a couple of times.

I have stood on Jefferson’s Rock.

As I was about 12 years old, the view didn’t move me to despair at being able to convey my idea of the place.

It was cool.

That was all the words I needed.

I mention that you are no longer allowed to stand on the rock itself and it is cordoned off today.

I have to say, in the spirt of transparency, I have never made a voyage across the Atlantic.

When Mr. Jefferson wrote, “This scene is worth a voyage across the Atlantic,” it was quite the tribute as a voyage across the Atlantic was no picnic.

As Mr. Johnson* more of less said, “All the fun of jail with the chance of drowning thrown in.”

But then comparing the spot to the experience of the voyage, maybe the bar was set low by Mr. Jefferson.

Again from something close to what Mr. Johnson said, “Worth seeing, but not worth going to see.”

Maybe, just maybe, here where I am now, IS quite a spot.

Worth seeing.

Worth going to see.

Worth a voyage across the Atlantic.

I can say that for sure.

But I despair over the lack of words to convey my idea on how to convey the beauty of this area.

Just typing those words I despair at how limited the word ‘beauty‘ is.

In spite of my despair, I am quite content.

Content to sit on the beach and watch.

Content to sit on the bluff and look.

Content to be still.

It says in the Book of Psalms, “Be still, and know that I am God.”

It says in the Book of Psalms, “I will be exalted in the earth.”

I guess that is they key to understanding this type of places.

God will be exalted in the earth.

These places are God just showing off.

These places cannot be conveyed in words.

I am going try.

Often called Dr. Johnson (1709-1784), was an English writer who made lasting contributions … according to Wikipedia, but known mostly for today for those two quotes.