“I said that if it doesn’t involve any work, I’ll do it.” ~ Robert Bly, on being named Minnesota’s first Poet Laureate

“Blossoms in a Vase” (nd)
by Igor Shipilin

                    

“It is my heart that’s late,
it is my song that’s flown.” ~ Stanley Kunitz, from “Touch Me”

I promise that I have not abandoned this blog. We’re in the crunch time with the bathroom renovation. It’s coming along well, but as it’s just the two of us, and I have to work, shall we say, not speedily, it’s taking an inordinate amount of time. The good thing is that not being here is really making me ache to get back to writing.

Thanks for sticking with me. Soon . . .

Brahms

It must be that my early friendship with defeat
Has given me affection for the month of August.
The potato fields belong to early night.

So many times as a boy I sat in the dirt
Among dry cornstalks that gave assurances
Every hour that Francis has his ear to the night.

Columbus’s letters tell us that we will receive
The gifts that mariners all receive at the end—
Memories of gold and a grave in the sand.

The shadow of a friend’s hand gives us
Promises similar to those we received from
The light under the door as our mother came near.

Each of us is a Jacob weeping for Joseph.
We are the sparrow that flies through the warrior’s
Hall and back out into the falling snow.

I don’t know why these images should please me
So much; an angel said: “In the last moment before night
Brahms will show you how loyal the notes are.”

~ Robert Bly

                    

Music by Johannes Brahms, Waltz in A Flat Major, Opus 39, #15, performed by pianist Pablo Cintron

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• piano: Daniel Barenboim violin:Pinchas Zukerman The Violin Sonata No. 1 in G major, Op. 78, for violin and piano was composed by Johannes Brahms during the summers of 1878 and 1879 in Pörtschach am Wörthersee. It was first performed on 8 November 1879 in (euzicasa.wordpress.com)

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