Art to Soothe Your Sun-Battered Eyes

My choice of painter for this hot, muggy season is American tonalist Thomas Wilmer Dewing (1851-1938). For a brief bio, click here.

Bathe your eyes in his soothing wash of colors!

"A Reading"

"In the Garden"

"The Blue Dress"

"Summer"

"Lady in Gold"

"Before Sunrise"

De quoi écrire?

"De quoi écrire?"
Hermann Fenner-Behmer

     What to write about?

     When it comes to blogs, journals, or personal letters (you remember—those things you write to a friend and put in the mailbox with a postage stamp), should we ever really ask ourselves that question? Probably not. Blogs, personal ones anyway, shouldn't feel like a writing assignment, nor should journals or letters. They should all come under the heading of "leisure," even "fun." Yet, inevitably, they sometimes become an obligation—an obligation that, admittedly, we place on ourselves. We should keep reminding ourselves that even that long-overdue letter can wait another day, another week; after all, if the recipient is a true friend, he or she won't hold the delay against you.

     Of the three, I feel least guilty about my journal because, supposedly, it's there for me and not vice-versa. The same is true of this blog, but only to an extent; I do have readers, and I know I feel disappointed if one of the blogs I follow doesn't post anything for a week or more. (If it gets on to two months or more, I usually unfollow them. My blog list is too long as it is!)

     The painting above reminds me so much of my salad days, when I would hole up in a café with my journal and a book, feeling very Left Bank-ish and literary. I'd fill page after page with angst or random ramblings, imagining that someone fifty or sixty years down the road would find my journal in an antique shop and be utterly fascinated by my life and my verbal stylings. My book would usually be a Virago title; back then, Viragos were clad in black or the later green. They were visually unmistakable—at least, they were by other readers of middlebrow, neglected authors. My coffee would grow cold, and the server would tire of coming by to warm up my cup, because I sat there so long. The ashtray (yes, those were the days not only when I smoked, but when smoking was allowed in cafés and restaurants) would be overflowing with squashed butts. Ah, those were the days!

     Nowadays, I look at the blank "New Post" page on my screen, scratching my head and mentally asking myself, "De quoi écrire?" No, not really. I may be pretentious, but I do think in English.

The Painting I'd Like to Step into Today

View of the Amalfi Coast
by
Carl Frederic Aagaard



Just 'Cuz I Love It

Eugène de Blaas
"God's Creatures"

Naturally, I love art that depicts nuns, and especially Dominican nuns. In my opinion, the Dominican habit is more "artistic" looking than any other habit, except possibly the Trappist/Cistercian habit, which is also black and white. The Dominican habit today is more white or ivory than cream; otherwise, it has changed very little over the centuries. However, some communities in warmer climates, such as Texas, have done away with the guimpe and forehead covering, retaining only the veil over a close-fitting cap. I do miss wearing the habit.

Reflection: Looking Inward and Backward

     I thought it fitting, this being the start of a new year, and everyone reflecting on the old year, to post a sonnet that's "backwards." I call it "Sonnet in Reflection" for two reasons: 1) the meter is trochaic pentameter rather than iambic and therefore backwards, or in "reflection" as in a mirror; and 2) it is a sonnet about reflection in solitude. When we are alone in silence or near-silence, we tend to self-examination and/or meditation on the past. That is only human nature, whether we like it or not.

     I suppose I could have taken the backwards concept all the way and put the ending couplet at the beginning. In fact, I could still do that; the poem would still work starting with the couplet, then the rest as is. Maybe I will do that someday. But I'll leave it for now. It's not my favorite poem, nor do I think it's my best effort. If I were to revise it, or try to write an altogether new "sonnet in reflection," I'd attempt to make the linebreaks more graceful, using fewer enjambments, and use nothing but two-syllable rhymes (to better reinforce the trochees). But someone liked this one enough to publish it, and for that I'm grateful!

Sonnet in Reflection

Thoughts loom larger in a room made narrow
by necessity, and blunted dreams take
on a sharper edge; the days, once furrowed
with the care of ordinary things, make
smoother strides from dark to light. Reflections
are the tapestries of solitude; their
stitches stitch themselves, and vivisect one's
reasoning in disconcerting ways. Bare
images emerge that one would rather
keep beneath one's clothing, manifesting
secrets spun where old ambitions gather
dust: the stuff of truth, the soul's divesting.
Self, obscured by living, now is clearer,
seen in solitude's relentless mirror.

© Leticia Austria 2009
First published in The Lyric



"Lady Looking in the Mirror"
John William Waterhouse



Venite, adoremus Dominum!

"Adoration of the Shepherds"
Tiepolo



A Painting I Love

"Couch on the Porch"
Frederick Childe Hassam
source



Passeggiata (Stroll)

"Lovers in a Woodland Clearing"
John Atkinson Grimshaw



 

I know there are no pine trees in this lovely painting; still, I thought the image well-suited to this poem, one of my earlier efforts, and the first to be published for a wider audience.

 

Passeggiata (I)
[pah-sed-JAH-ta - the "i" is not pronounced]

 

Walk with me.

The path beckons, winking in the dawnlight,

And the pines' drowsy whisperings call us

To quiet joy.  The sun through the branches

Welcomes our like hearts with perceptive arms

Limpid with the memory of darkness.

Now is our moment of peace.  We are led

On this narrow way through familiar lands

Defined in my mind; for I have mapped out

All my memories in these woods and fields;

Each blade and limb and stone has its country,

And all sing to me of God's sure blessing.

Could He begrudge me your dear company,

Poignant and wistful as the rain lily

I pressed among words of silent longing?

You are here, belovèd, bright in my heart,

Mine alone for this all-too-fleeting joy,

This, my moment of highest fulfillment:

My spirit and yours, walking together,

Hand in hand.

Cammina con me.
Il sentiero accenna, ammiccando nella luce dell'alba,
E il sussurrare sonnolento dei pini si chiama
Alla gioia tranquilla.  Il sole fra i rami
Accoglie i nostri cuori con braccia perspicaci
Limpidi con la memoria del buio.
Ora è il nostro momento di pace.  Siamo condotti
Su questa stretta via attraverso terre familiari
Definite nella mia mente; perché ho mappato
Tutti i miei ricordi in questi boschi e campi;
Ogni filo d'erba e ramo e pietra ha la sua patria,
E tutto canta a me della certa benedizione di Dio.

Potrebbe Lui invidiarmi la tua cara compagnia,
Commovente e malinconica come il giglio selvatico
Da me pressato fra le parole di desiderio silente?
Tu sei qui, adorato, radioso nel mio cuore,
Il mio solo per tutta questa troppo fuggevole gioia,
Questo, il mio momento di maggiore appagamento:
Il mio spirito ed il tuo, a camminare insieme
Mano nella mano.
 

© Leticia Austria 2007
First published in English in The San Antonio Express-News

Italian translation by Federica Galetto, published in La Stanza di Nightingale

 

Just 'Cuz I Love It

"The Reader"
Emily Bobovnikoff



A Painting I Love

William Orpen
"The Window Seat"



The Painting I'd Like to Step into Today

"The Long Walk at Kelmscott Manor" Marie Spartali Stillman, 1905
(click image to enlarge)