(This week's image suggested by Jess Hager, who apparently has many doppelgangers in England.)
When I see your face, I still see my own. A distance of saltwater shakes my reflection like a breaking mirror. I know I am the fault that strikes deep into the earth at your feet.
When I look at my own face, I still see yours. Your eyes speak my words back to me in a new tone, revealing the semantic importance of a single piece--
(I've asked people to send in pictures for me to write about. This picture was sent by the lovely Crystal.)
(noun)-–
the weight of a body on your back, staring in a direction in which you failed to move
mother’s voice and father’s voice
how did you come this far without noticing
the stranger following behind, his arachnid legs click-clicking as he drags himself over scarred pavement after you?
(Notes: It's funny that Crystal should send me this image to work with, for two reasons: 1) I've been dealing with some feelings of regret and guilt over some weird stuff lately, and 2) I've, completely coincidentally, become addicted to Florence + the Machine's new single, "Shake It Out," which addresses such feelings. It's an awesome song, much better than the poem I just produced on the subject. Go listen to it: )
if I take into my mouth all the red universe will I speak something perfect?
will I make you a gift of words, let slip between my teeth some holy psalm?
be honest for a minute there you thought I was going to say something sexual didn’t you?
(This week's image was sent to me by my beautiful friend Shelly, whose name is too perfect for this blog. It depicts the five minutes in which a sulcata tortoise is actually smaller than something.)
My computer has returned from the shop, meaning that I now have regular internet access again, and I've made some progress on my doctoral thingy, so The Shelled Life resumes this week.
(Quick note: this poem had three inspirations: a news report, a picture, and the song "Everything" by Helen Jane Long. Feel free to listen to the song as you read, since I was listening to it on repeat while I wrote this.)
because you looked for me in Eden I went to the mangrove where I took a lover and fed on the moon itself
thirty years later I still have a belly full of salt
Let me whisper the new religion to you in the language of photosynthesis
so deep into your ear, my love, that you still
feel the warmth of my voice flooding your insides
as the roots close around you.
(Inspired by the weekend's news that the hawksbill turtle has, while appearing to be extinct from the East Pacific shores, actually adapted to live in the salty estuaries of the East Pacific coast. Reports can be read at the Huffington Post (with pictures!) and on the BBC.
The move is particularly surprising because these turtles have previously inhabited rocky, coral-laden waters. Their newfound habitat is quite the opposite of what biologists and conservationists have known for their species. For the past three decades, these turtles have been feeding, mating, laying eggs, and thriving by the roots of the mangroves. According to this weekend's reports, biologists will now seek to learn the exact adaptations these hawksbills have undergone, and conservationists renew their call to protect the mangroves from human destruction.
Image from this photoreport of an East Pacific trip. Note: That looks more like a green turtle than a hawksbill, but the image was nonetheless appropriate.)
Two things have conspired to make my updates less frequent these past couple of weeks: 1) I caught a really awesomely awful cold and have barely wanted to move from the sofa, and 2) My laptop's power button stopped working, meaning I've had very, very limited access to the internet. In addition, I've been getting more stuff together for my PhD project, and I'd severely underestimated the amount of time and effort that would take.
Turtle poems will resume this week. I might actually post two instead of one.
(Sorry for being late; I've been busy with university stuff this week.)
I
am quite the pointed
thing
sharp
and well-armied
rock
and rook
stretching forward
to entice
I
speak in
dulcet silver
telling
you what you want
to hear
I
open for you
as I
prepare to close
come closer, sweetheart
sweetheart, come inside.
(Title and poem based on the peculiar "hunting" method of the alligator snapping turtle. Despite the turtle's infamous aggressive nature and powerful bite, they're quite lazy hunters, sitting in the bottom of the water with their mouths open. Their tongues look like little worms, which lure fish right into their mouths. Here's a video displaying maximum turtle effort:
Despite the copyright on the image, I can't actually find who the picture belongs to, and all my efforts to find the actual owner (including a TinEye search) haven't led to them.)
the jaw hinge spreading wide to enfold like a lover
red my favorite flavor hotcold spicysweet my pointed tongue laps each bite like Eve in the garden with her apple
Is this wisdom I give you? The wisdom of the gods? No. It's only red.
(Taking a break from the sacred turtle poems this week. I actually had a request to write a piece for this picture a few weeks ago. I don't know how to credit this image, as it's all over the internet. I found it here on WeHeartIt. If anyone owns it, let me know and you'll receive your proper credit.)
lady of the lake ---------your light ---------still blinds me most days.
I shield my eyes but your shell bears down on me ---------your beak pries my eyelids apart
you force me to my knees at the gates of your temple.
Viviane will you still accept my humble gratitude if I look upon the faces of other gods ---------Western bearded men ---------whose love ---------seals my place ---------in glory?
You will forgive me in my old age though a woman's forgiveness is never guaranteed
You will plant your sword in my breast and restore me to my Avalon.
(Image of the sacred turtle basking on her little island in the lake from this website. This week's poem, as previously promised, was inspired by the similarities between the Vietnamese legend of Kim Quy and the Lady of the Lake (Viviane) of Arthurian legend. I think of it as a play on Arthur's ultimate rejection of Avalon as he takes up Roman religion. I'm sure some of you can guess what my favorite interpretation of Arthurian legend is. A couple of formatting elements in the original draft won't work on Blogger for some reason; a few lines are supposed to be spaced over a bit, so I've tried to do it by placing dashes and changing their color to blend in with the background. I'm sorry if this throws anyone off.)
Hi, all! It seems I've picked up some new readers.
I've just started my PhD, so I've been incredibly busy with that. However, I intend to keep a disciplined schedule here, so I'm actually going to impose an update schedule on myself. Hereafter, I'll try to post a new piece every Wednesday, which means the next poem will be up tomorrow.
In the meantime, have a couple of pictures of one of my turtles, Guildenstern, when he was a baby. (Forewarning: yes, I'm aware that there are a couple of problems on his shell which might be visible in these pics. He was adopted out of a filthy, negligent, abusive, and illegal petstore by a friend of mine, who then passed him and his companion on to me and my best friend. These pictures were taken during his "recovery." He's now a happy turtle and will be five years old this fall.)
The faithless come at night to make their offerings of piss, aiming clumsily at the emerald water
plastic bottles dot the water’s surface like candles in their wake.
In the day the sun calls the old people and tourists who line the steep banks they wait through the heat they watch through the heat they watch—
the old god surfaces blowing green water from her porcine nostrils
like a Marian apparition, she parts the water and displays her scarred, gleaming shell
This is my body, which I have maintained for you, though the city has poisoned me This is my blood, pooling on the green, shed for you This is the sword and the arrow
distracted from her servants’ reverence, the old god opens her mouth and begins to dine on a dead cat.
(First image of a crowd gathered to watch the turtle from this website; the second one, depicting the turtle gnawing on some garbage that was thrown in the lake, comes from this website. The reference to the turtle eating a dead cat comes from this YouTube video (previously linked in another post). The video not only shows how polluted the lake has become, but also a few glimpses of the turtle eating the corpse of a cat that had somehow gotten into the water with it. I anticipate someone wondering why I've chosen to identify the turtle, now known to be female, as a god rather than a goddess. I'm sure most will agree that, unfortunately, the two words have different connotations in Western society, and I'd prefer to acknowledge the turtle's mythological origin as a warlike deity who defeated whole armies, which, again unfortunately, is an attribute rarely accorded to female deities.)
who says a god must be beautiful like Botticelli's Venus or any other long-haired Caucasian deity who shares a name with some aspect of astronomy?
you, Rafetus leloii, are just as beautiful as any naked foam-riding goddess though you remain
a grotesque thing scarred and soft a reminder that the history of all, like godhood, can be quite an ugly affair
(Note: As I understand it (though some people debate the topic), Rafetus leloii is the same as Rafetus swinehoei. However, I've chosen to go with the former to acknowledge the mythology behind the sacred turtle.)
(Getting kind of a late start with this part of the project due to personal circumstances (moving formally to a different country, starting PhD, the ridiculous psychological effects the extended sunlight hours of England are having on me, a general lack of creativity), but here begins some work involving the sacred turtle of Vietnam, the object of my current fascination. Recent reports say that the turtle has not only recovered but has also been discovered to be female, so, yes, a Lady of the Lake/Arthurian legend comparison will be forthcoming.)
Introductory note: This poem concerns the origin of the sacred turtle's legend, as I wanted to begin with that as a context. According to the legend, the Golden Turtle God, Kim Quy, appeared to assist the country in times of war, providing magical arrows to An Dương Vương all the way back in the third century BCE and again to Lê Lợi in the 15th century. Kim Quy gave the future king a golden sword that imbued him with supernatural power, allowing him to defeat Chinese invaders. After Lê Lợi's victory, Kim Quy appeared again to take back his sword. The lake at Hanoi where the present day sacred turtle resides was named for this legendary event.
I will give you the tools for surival but you must give them back
it's in my nature, after all, to require reimbursement, being older than the earth itself.
Your enemies will scatter before the gifts I bring you --
a golden sword a scale from a fish and an arrow.
Please excuse the beak-marks on them all. Old habits die hard.
( The image, which depicts Lê Lợi with Kim Quy, was found on this website; however, when I tried to find its source at the website it lists, I found that the site is no longer working.)
A few weeks ago I was made aware of the health concerns surrounding the sacred turtle of Ho Hoan Kiem, a lake in Hanoi, Vietnam. Believed to be one of only four or five of its species remaining, the turtle is revered by many Vietnamese people as a symbol of the legend of Kim Qui, the Golden Turtle God. While the exact age and gender of the Hoan Kiem turtle aren't known, for years people have flocked to the lake hoping to see it when it surfaces for air, or, in warmer weather, when it climbs out of the lake to bask.
This spring the sacred turtle was removed from the lake, however, after spectators and biologists noticed that it had several wounds all over its body. The wounds could have come from injuries (as people do fish from the lake), age, or from the amount of pollution that has accumulated in the lake. After the turtle's removal, people began cleaning the lake while veterinarians work to save the turtle. (In the picture above, a wound is somewhat visible on its mouth, and one can see how dirty the water is. For a more disturbing look at the water conditions, see this YouTube video.)
I find the sacred turtle fascinating for several reasons. Firstly, I love religious myths involving turtles, and, as stupid as I realize this sounds, I find them spiritually uplifting, the perfect animal to appear in some many myths the world over. Secondly, it's a very unusual-looking turtle. Its face is almost feline, and it looks almost like an otter with a shell. Thirdly, the feelings that Vietnamese people have for the turtle are just inspiring. I was particularly taken by a news article in which one woman says that, before visiting the lake, she prayed at a temple to see the turtle. It's not very often that we, especially in the West, encounter interactions with living religious objects; even the most religious people in the West can't go outside expecting to see a living, breathing embodiment of the sacred. The fact that this particular embodiment of divinity is a turtle, naturally, makes it a newfound subject of interest for me.
The sacred turtle also sheds light on our interactions with our environment. Despite being home to a revered animal, Ho Hoan Kiem is still a veritable dumping ground for humans. Images and video of the lake reveal shocking discolourations in the water from chemicals that have leeched into it, as well as islands of floating trash. While, as far as I know, the exact cause of the turtle's wounds hasn't been determined, a good look at some of the sludge in the lake makes it clear that pollution is definitely a suspect. Reports from Vietnam (which I've had to run through Google's translator, since I don't speak a word of Vietnamese) seem to confirm that pollutants played a major part in the turtle's illness.
According to reports from this week, the turtle has made a full recovery and the lake has been cleaned for its return.
In honor of the turtle's recovery and its legend, I've decided that the next few entries of The Shelled Life will take Cụ Rùa Hồ Gươm as their inspiration. I haven't decided whether or not the entries will make up one larger poem or a series of them, but that's the point of workshopping them. I'm heading back to England this weekend to start my PhD so updates might be spotty for a couple of weeks.
In the meantime, have a brief video of Cụ Rùa taking a swim:
I like to wear sweaters in summer even on the hottest days even when sitting out by the lake lazily holding a fishing pole swatting mosquitoes from my face and watching the still surface of the water hoping to see the old snapper raise her head for another breath as the fish scurry from her.
When asked I blame it on Britain but really I just don’t like people seeing my arms.
let an old woman cross though she has become obese and ugly with age
though you feel no attraction toward her though your thighs do not tense at the sight of her though you have no wish to touch her
she has borne the likes of you many times over her pregnant bulk shuffling one side to the other growing bigger and rounder even as her eyesight gets worse
she has borne the likes of you in clutches twenty and thirty deep pushing your careless ilk from her most sensitive parts with each egg feeling only the stony press
of the next one and the next one and the next one
she has borne the likes of you and she has abandoned you each time for her own safety
and for yours leading away the searching teeth that would gnaw your bones like sticks of sugar candy
in deep river mud she planted her flag decades ago she has grappled with fisherman's hook and dog's tooth and now struggles against the weight of her own age
forcing clawed foot forward scraping plastron over pavement pulling scarred algaed shell and ridged tail
away from her home
she comes now to bear you again.
(Image belongs to SomethingAwful.com poster Robo Olga. Used with permission.)
This will be my first public creative project since undergrad. Let's hope I can make it halfway decent.
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