poemimage

The visual & the poetic.

Tag: sound

That Old Song

Remember that old song about a tomato,

You say: toe-MAH-toe

I say: toe-MAY-toe…

Except I didn’t say tomato at all.

I said frequencies come into view roaring like a whip-poor-will.

To within hearing range.

Within broadcasting range.

Within a marvelous & manifesting zone.

Except I didn’t say tone. I said zone.

Investigate the marvelous:

Track back to

a pulsing frequency

imagined as gossamer,

like that clear syrup you poured on pancakes,

in the air & not even sticky.

Except I didn’t say ode. I said code.

Remember that old song about a tomato,

You say: toe-MAH-toe

I say: toe-MAY-toe…

Except I didn’t say tomato at all.

I said alchemical frequencies.

Dialing landlines into clay.

Calibrate a fine-tuning.

I heard the eyelid open.

How does one hear from such a distance

if there is such a distance.

Track vibrations to their source

to evolving devolution

to devolving evolution.

Morphing into law or code.

Law or code tracked to a source

follow a firefly spiraling.

The source of the code fomenting sound.

A whip-poor-will swooping in a gyre, invisible to the bird of prey.

Remember that old song about a tomato,

You say: toe-MAH-toe

I say: toe-MAY-toe...

Except I didn’t say tomato at all.

I said thrum:

Amber-golden honeybees

pollinate the sun.

I said hum:

Rapid eye-movement beep.

Divining rod-flicker beep.

Levitating hypnopompic sun-stone beep.

Translucent wing-sheath

humming.

I bought a boomerang.

Silence! Hush!

Let you and me (one of us the fool) embroider a spoon large as a tapestry.

To spoof high officials with mock Greek Tragedy: How to Spoonfeed Honey.

To perform the pagaentry with sardonic flourish and redeeming severity.

Except I didn’t say money. I said honey.

I practice hooking my wrist.

At the market, behind seven hanging skins, I bought a boomerang inscribed with carving.

Expect

OM.

Beep

OM.

Amber-golden sun-stream OM

beeping hum, beeping thrum...

I purchase drops of oil annointing the boomerang.

A tacked up handbill publicizes theatrical spectacle of the highest form.

To sound

OM

spanning divinity to infinity.

Eyelid ascending…

A whip-poor-will descending

glides into the window light,

scratches at the stone of night.

OM sounding gyres, OM sounding omphalos

infinitely divine.

Infinity sounding

OM,

One eyelid open,

fingertip

shiatsu beneath the soil.

A silence of soil

in divine science, divine omen

infinitely OM.

A thrumming bluebird, thrumming gnat, thrumming comet,

(infinitely divine)

thrumming the speed of sound tearing a hole in shrouded time.

I conceal the boomerang within the folds of my Turin robe: echo of the divine.

Echo of the divine – tear a hole in time,

hurling, aimed into the mission,

sailing to omniscient vision

& to return

& to return.

In Turin return to shrouded silence,

raise the eyelid,

visualize OM.

In absent space, in disintegration

visualize OM.

OM onward OM in hallucinations of the heart.

Investigate the manifesting:

Track back to

a pulsing frequency

imagined as gossamer,

like that clear syrup you poured on pancakes,

in the air & not even sticky.

Remember that old song about a tomato,

You say: toe-MAH-toe

I say: toe-MAY-toe…

Except I didn’t say tomato at all.

Beneath the eyelid all is silent.

Silent night.

Tomato, summer 2022
Photograph in Wikipedia I digitally rendered for purposes of non-commercial commentary.

Philip S. Callahan, Ph.D, influenced this poem, if I may call it a poem, with his unique research, discoveries, and ideas about sound & transmission related to the Irish round towers.

Wind

 

 

Lough Ree by Colin Carberry

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blu flame

A trout flares at dusk,
silver scales
in the heron’s ears.

blueish a

new blue

Colin Carberry is an Irish-Canadian poet and translator and the director of the Linares International Literary Festival (Mexico).

a.

I am struck, reading this haiku, by the heron hearing silver scales. I imagine sunset splashing chaotically on thin, reflective surfaces and the heron’s acute sensors turning and tuning. I remember summers (it seems long ago) driving cross-country, through the night, listening to the radio. Car radios were manually operated. With your free hand you would find the spot where there was no static, bringing in the station clearly. Adjusting the dial frequently to receive the perfect reception. Ambient static would slowly creep back in and you would fine tune again listening carefully. Though, unlike the heron, your aim was enjoyment not survival. Surely our ancestors knew the life and sounds of water, within and without, like a heron. The poet, crafting this poem, brings us to the edge of our deepest memories.

constance by Joanne Arnott

constance new

when i was pregnant, she told me

reaching back more than twenty years

for the memory

constance f

constance k

i put sunflower seeds on my belly

i used to read aloud to my son

so he could hear our bones

constance j

i love our voices, she said

constance b

chickadee & sparrow flutter down

lured by the seeds and undisturbed

by our voices

Untitled-2

i put your hand on my belly

i invite you to read this aloud

i want to listen to our bones

cons

& to love our voices, for a little while

glade

final hand

Joanne Arnott is a Metis poet living on Canada’s west coast.