I can't sleep…
Every leaf that falls
never stops falling. I once
thought that leaves were leaves.
Now I think they are feeling,
in search of a place—
someone’s hair, a park bench, a
finger. Isn’t that
like us, going from place to
place, looking to be alive?
— Victoria Chang, “Passage” in The Trees Witness Everything (Copper Canyon Press, 2022)
Notes:
It’s late morning, yesterday. I’m catching up on the morning papers, eyes growing heavy…I doze off. What’s better than a late morning nap on a long weekend…in an absolutely silent house.
45 minutes later, my sleep is broken with wet kisses. The puppies are back from their walk with Susan. Sully settles himself on my chest, drops his head and sleeps. Wally watches from the caboose position, not sure what to make of his Brother on his Dad’s chest in his rightful spot.
I watch both of them, and think of the movie Cavalry, loved it btw. Father James shows more grief for the death of his dog than for humans subject to abuse he has witnessed. The punchline of the movie, injects a pause into the routine of the long weekend.
The next thought, and what a leap it was — to this day, Memorial Day — where my wiring somehow, some way connected this sacred day, to those humans that reached out to Yiyun Li after her second son committed suicide. She spoke of the clichés: “I know how you feel.” “It will get easier.” “This too will pass.” Some were certainly most well intentioned. Many, however, were clueless at the level of despair and loss, and the abyss that Li finds herself as her new lifelong habitat. “Life is stubborn. So am I. I have conceded to make this abyss my habitat, every single day, for the rest of my life. But I shall live in this abyss only on my terms.”
I look back at the dogs, both resting now, and their unconditional love, and I flutter back to Yiyun Li.
“There is a gracefulness, when people know what it means to do things that work. A few days after James’s death, my husband and I met Christiane for lunch, and later went to tea at Bonnie’s house. Do things that work meant that we knew they were precisely the people who had the clarity to meet us where we were: they were not there to console us or to fix our problem; only, to spend a moment with us.”
I can’t comprehend the courage that the men and women who died in their Service for this country. Or, the courage of those who Serve our country today. Nor, could I begin to understand the loss that families of the fallen live with every day.
No. I have no consoling words.
I sit. I sit quietly, in their honor, in this moment, and on this day, thinking of their ultimate sacrifice, and my gratitude.
Transcription for a letter by Helen Keller to the New York Symphony Orchestra
THE AURICLE
Published monthly by the Jersey City League for Hard of Hearing, Inc.
Vol. II March 1924 No. 6
In a recent number of the “Symphony Society Bulletin” appeared a remarkable letter written by Miss Keller, who is handicapped by deafness and blindness, and it was so full of inspiration, and suggestion, that our Editor obtained permission of Miss Keller to use the letter in our paper. We feel sure that you will all appreciate it, and join in thanking Miss Keller for this privilege and pleasure, and also for her cordial greetings and good wishes conveyed to us in a letter from her secretary.
New York Symphony Orchestra,
New York City.
Dear Friends:
I have the joy of being able to tell you that, though deaf and blind, I spent a glorious hour last night listening over the radio to Beethoven’s “Ninth Symphony.” I do not mean to say that I “heard” the music in the sense that other people heard it; and I do not know whether I can make you understand how it was possible for me to derive pleasure from the symphony. It was a great surprise to myself. I had been reading in my magazine for the blind of the happiness that the radio was bringing to the sightless everywhere. I was delighted to know that the blind had gained a new source of enjoyment; but I did not dream that I could have any part in their joy. Last night, when the family was listening to your wonderful rendering of the immortal symphony someone suggested that I put my hand on the receiver and see if I could get any of the vibrations. He unscrewed the cap, and I lightly touched the sensitive diaphragm. What was my amazement to discover that I could feel, not only the vibration, but also the impassioned rhythm, the throb and the urge of the music! The intertwined and interwingling vibrations from different instruments enchanted me. I could actually distinguish the cornets, the roil of the drums, deeptoned violas and violins singing in exquisite unison. How the lovely speech of the violins flowed and plowed over the deepest tones of the other instruments! When the human voices leaped up thrilling from the surge of harmony, I recognized them instantly as voices. I felt the chorus grow more exultant, more ecstatic, upcurving swift and flamelike, until my heart almost stood still. The women’s voices seemed an embodiment of all the angelic voices rushing in a harmonious flood of beautiful and inspiring sound. The great chorous [sic.] throbbed against my fingers with poignant pause and flow. Then all the instruments and voices together burst forth-an ocean of heavenly vibration–and died away like winds when the atom is spent, ending in a delicate shower of sweet notes.
Of course this was not “hearing,” but I do know that the tones and harmonies conveyed to me moods of great beauty and majesty. I also sensed, or thought I did, the tender sounds of nature that sing into my hand-swaying reeds and winds and the murmur of streams. I have never been so enraptured before by a multitude of tone-vibrations.
As I listened, with darkness and melody, shadow and sound filling all the room, I could not help remembering that the great composer who poured forth such a flood of sweetness into the world was deaf like myself. I marvelled at the power of his quenchless spirit by which out of his pain he wrought such joy for others—and there I sat, feeling with my hand the magnificent symphony which broke like a sea upon the silent shores of his soul and mine.
— Hellen Keller, The Auricle, Vol. II, No. 6, March 1924. American Foundation for the Blind, Helen Keller Archives.
Notes:
Morning of buttered toast;
of coffee, sweetened with milk.
Out of the window,
snow-spruces step from their cobwebs.
Flurry of chickadees, feeding then gone.
A single cardinal stipples an empty branch-
one maple leaf lifted back.
I turn my blessings like photographs into the light;
over my shoulder the god of Not-Yet looks on:
Not-yet-dead, not-yet-lost, not-yet-taken.
Not-yet-shattered, not-yet-sectioned,
not-yet-strewn.
Ample litany, sparing nothing I hate or love,
not-yet-silenced, not-yet-fractured, not-yet-
Not-yet-not.
I move my ear a little closer to that humming figure,
I ask him only to stay.
— Jane Hirshfield, “Not Yet” in “Come, Thief: Poems“. (HarperCollins, April 5, 2011)
Notes: Photo of Red Northern Cardinal on January 1, 2025 by DK at noon in backyard. Poem via having a poem with you.
The particulars of place lodged in me… how I learned the way the sun laid its palm over the side window in the morning, heavy light, how I’ll never be held in that hand again.
— Minnie Bruce Pratt, from “Temporary Job” in “Inside the Money Machine” (Carolina Wren Press, 2011)
Notes: