Blackberries for Amelia

Blackberries for Amelia

Fringing the woods, the stone walls, and the lanes,
Old thickets everywhere have come alive,
Their new leaves reaching out in fans of five
From tangles overarched by this year's canes.

They have their flowers too, it being June,
And here or there in brambled dark-and-light
Are small, five-petaled blooms of chalky white,
As random-clustered and as loosely strewn

As the far stars, of which we now are told
That ever faster do they bolt away,
And that a night may come in which, some say,
We shall have only blackness to behold.

I have no time for any change so great,
But I shall see the August weather spur
Berries to ripen where the flowers were—
Dark berries, savage-sweet and worth the wait—

And there will come the moment to be quick
And save some from the birds, and I shall need
Two pails, old clothes in which to stain and bleed,
And a grandchild to talk with while we pick.

-by Richard Wilbur

 Bedouin Shepherdess Spinning, Beersheba, Palestine, 1932

Unknown Photographer

AUGUST CAN'T COME SOON ENOUGH.

East/West/East

The sunset is classic today.
Clouds scratch across the sky from the north east and point in the direction of home; southward, westward. Arching high above the prairie, they too seem to think that this is "fly-over country". I wanted to come here so that I could know the un-ness of that idea. To touch the ground, touch the country. They are white and high and straight as arrows that made this land work. They end together in the corner of my left eye, a soft peach patch next to the sun. And above those clouds and their lightness and whiteness and highness and straightness and pointingness, the sky is the softest, babiest blue that can't help itself but to remind me of my brother as a baby. Maybe that color is given to all baby boys; he was the one I knew the most, the one I held first.
The clouds look like they were stretched, or maybe that they are running. They are like a masthead that is leading a ship to the west, to the south, to "America".

....................................................................... 

I was thinking today about how I am an un-pioneer these days: pushing myself backwards from the history of my faith, from the narrative that had been my cultural harbor in so many ways, but that has also repelled and rejected me, and left me alone, here, in the middle.

Ogden, my birthplace, with its train memorabilia: Jack Kerouac talked about it once and made me feel valid and liberally liberated. My people settled this place and they dot the land there. Children of the "last living son of a Utah pioneer", they learned to love the land, and it pumps in my veins in very real ways. That baby boy. That summer dust in my nose.

And then westward, ever westward, the American Dream; Manifest Destiny. Progress.

San Diego, flourishing under early Mormon community, and the land of my adolescence. My people are there still, at least physically. Go west; paradise is there.

But I always push back. I always rupture the narrative.

Provo, with that university and my heart's home. This is where I found myself and came to know myself as the best that I could be. This is where I was first the happiest. There will be more, I know, but this was my first.

Lincoln now, where trains do not exist in memoriam, but in shining and cutting reality, declaring themselves consistently set to a schedule I cannot untangle. Where is the Mormon trail here? The trail my people plodded? There is a cemetery a little less than an hour away that I haven't yet been to, that might tell me more. I wonder if they were here. I wonder if they would care about me. That I am reversing their trail.

Un-cross the continent.

Those clouds are a deep purple now, yet they push all the same. They are reminding about how the west was won. Won from what? I am not homesick for a real home, but for a place that may have never existed; for vapor, high, white clouds that point ever west. Eventually, the land runs out.

The birds and the squirrels all assembled themselves in the trees outside of my window to watch the sunset. I have never seen such a thing. It might be because I have never lived at the height of treetops before. The birds fluttered and flitted around a good deal before they claimed their positions, sort of a clumsy dance. The looked more like they were falling, flapping their wings only to lift themselves high enough to avoid crashing. It seemed like they were contending, because once they settled, they stayed until dark.

-summer, boo-

I slept in a tree house last night.
It was a night full of innocent and funny jokes, tube lighting, sleeping bags, funny boys, face-kicking, chickens, planks, and hips.

May every night this summer be so delightsome.

i'm going to learn to build an ark

                                     
                                         and I'm going to go hang out with these guys

duh.

i have gone, i have seen, and i have returned.

And I will leave again.

 

I went to Lincoln, Nebraska last week for a visit. Despite having  a difficult week with my neckmeats, I had a rather lovely time. I met some great new friends, and was thoroughly impressed by this new city. I hope the Midwest is ready for this jelly, because I accepted the offer (tuition+health insurance+stipend+gainful employment) at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln.

It feels strange to really have a new goal in achievable sight, and to see the future looming so forcibly in front of me. (I will soon enough have a master's degree... who would have thought that would be the case?) I hope that I am ready and able to live up to the expectations I have placed upon me.

I hope most that I will figure out what I really really love before I am too committed. 

How do you know what you love?

Maybe I am scared of commitment?

In the meantime, the rest of April promises to be lovely. I am here until August. I hope to maximize my time in Provo, which is as much or more my home than anywhere else on earth at this time. Come visit me in Nebraska?

roots.

I just finished another book last week. It makes for seven so far this year (secret wish: 2011 will be the the year of the book. So far, so good.).
It was good. I don't want to hyperbolize in saying that it was amazing or incredible or ground-breaking, earth-shattering, mind-blowing, but life-changing might be apt.


I have a longstanding love affair going with a man.


His name is Wendell.
This latest book, Sex, Economy, Freedom and Community is tempting to eclipse my first love, The Unsettling of America. In some ways, it's the same story re-told 20 years later. In other ways, it's refined stewardship, refined love. Refinements are nice.

I think a big factor in why I love W. Berry so much is that he makes me feel like I am at home. He helps me remember that earth is a sacred place, and that there is love in abundance. Lately, I have been feeling rather home-less. I have a roof over my head, but a roof that I can't afford any longer, and a home that feels like it has been invaded and changed. It's a strange feeling, one with which I am not well acquainted, and which I am having a hard time coping. Berry is a steward of the earth, and his words beg common sense, not political partying and raucous silliness.  He talks about sex as a communion, and as a integral part of communities. His words are clearsighted and beautiful.
I should stop raving about him and just encourage you to read his books.

And then I will tell you how it has changed me.

I read that the Bible is a a hypaethral book, one that is to be read open to the skies. Like so many ancient temples. I will let Berry do the rest of the explaining:  It (the Bible) is best read and understood outdoors, and the farther outdoors the better. Or that has been my experience of it. Passages that within walls seem improbable or incredible, outdoors seem merely natural. That is because outdoors we are confronted everywhere with wonders; we see that the miraculous is not extraordinary, but the common mode of existence. It is our daily bread. Whoever really has considered the lilies of the field or the birds of the air, and pondered the improbability of their existence in this warm world within the cold and empty stellar distances, will hardly balk at the turning of water into wine--which was, after all, a very small miracle. We forget the greater and still continuing miracle by which water (with soil and sunlight) is turned into grapes.
What the Bible might mean, or how it could mean anything, in a closed, air-conditioned building, I do not know. I know that holiness cannot be confined. When you think you have captured it, it has already escaped; only its poor, pale ashes are left. It is after this foolish capture and the inevitable escape that you get translations of the Bible that read like a newspaper. Holiness is everywhere in Creation, it is as common as raindrops and leaves and blades of grass, but it does not sound like a newspaper. 
(As a side note, my baby brother wrote me from Germany, encouraging me to consider the lilies of the field, saying, "You don't have to run around frantically trying to find yourself and what you should do when all you've got to do is calm down and look to your father in heaven for guidance." What a great human being, B. Harris.) 

 

zinnia babies sprouted this week!

It makes me yearn for spring so much. It makes me wish for our garden and to community we built there. In some ways I hate that community, and the ways that it became so all-encompassing and so engaging of my life.  I maybe need a new community. Maybe I need to go home to help my dad build a house. And then again, that community is one of the major reasons I am still in Provo. Basically this all brings me to feeling rootless and ill at ease, unsure of my convictions and my decision to stay.
So I plant zinnias and rosemary and put them on the windowsill above the kitchen sink. I bake whole wheat bread and I pray for direction as to where I can put some roots into the soil so that again, I can open up that book and open my heart to the sky.

ps. If anyone wants to give me another reason to stay (or better yet, BE my reason to stay), I am open to suggestions. The only thing keeping me here now is my signature on a contract and the vague promises of summer.

december: a review, etc.

Phew! December was B.U.S.Y.
so a few MAJOR things happened December 2010.

I graduated from BYU with a BA in Art History and Curatorial Studies. Want to hire me?
I went to the temple to be endowed. It was incredible and beautiful and overwhelming and great. So great. BFF Kara came with me- the perfect choice.
My dad moved to Mexico.
My dad's BFF died tragically of a heart-attack while mountain biking (SUPER awful).
My baby Brother landed in and began his mission in Germany. He is in Bamburg currently.
I became unemployed.

that's basically it. I guess it's sort of a lot for one month. Oh yeah- add that to Christmas and New Years with all the hubub that entails. New Years was A.W.E.S.O.M.E. this year (usually one of my LEAST favorite holidays) because it was rather low key, and somehow really incredible and fun. You should find an excuse to have a dance party in the street sometime. It's great.

This new year is going to be full of adventure. I'm feeling a little apprehensive about things as I write this and come to the realization that a lot of things in my life depend on other people's acceptance of me as a person:

+I am applying to 5 graduate schools. So many people will be judging the paper representatives of me in the coming months.

+I given pressure for the first time EVER over Christmas festivities about not dating anyone/being wed. The prospect of dating someone is intimately tied with another person's acceptance and love of me.

+My house has taken a dramatic shift; the end of an era, some have called it. Three new random housemates incur a great deal of stress in the notion that they might hate us and our house's culture.
   -one of them flirts with every male-type who has entered our house thus far- 
   -one of them I have never seen-

In the meantime, I am working at the Central Utah Arts Center. It is Awesome. You should probably check it out.
I write press releases for their shows, and sometimes do other stuff. I'll post the latest.

Break.

Thanksgiving break begins in five minutes.
I haven't really thoroughly decided yet how I feel about that  fact. Mostly I feel unprepared for it.
I also feel like it will not really be a break at all. Hopefully I will be able to let you know about my projects throughout the week. There are a lot of them, and SOME of them are actually sort of exciting. Sort of.

Anyways, Here is the question:
Do I
a. Spend Thanksgiving at home with the 3/8 of the Brown siblingdom
b. Go up to Ogden to be fought over by adoring fans, or
c. Go to Heber with dear friend Jeff to have sup with his family.

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Any one of the options might be immeasurably awkward. I guess it all depends on what I wear.

Tonight is one of those nights...

 

 ...that I know I will miss someday in the not-that-distant future. 

 The lights on the porch are shining into my bedroom, casting their soft friendliness onto my bed and inviting me to bask here. I can hear laughter and quiet chatter from people that I love.  People in the delicious community which I have helped to build and the circle of people who are rooted in a love for one another- true fiends.

I hate getting sentimental before I have to.

But my heart feels like fall. It's beautiful now, but I can feel winter coming on. The future is unwritten, and I know that the decisions forthcoming will challenge my current conditions in unprecedented ways.