Soil Science Journal Club : poetry

Occasional poetry No.4

Andrew.Rate — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 06:26:00 GMT

Pillars of Salt (excerpt)

We always look back,
attracted by that feeling
of having been there before – the roads
sinking, the soil weeping (scab on scab
lifted), fences sunk to gullies
catching the garbage of paddocks,
strainers blocked by stubble
and machinery and the rungs
of collapsed rainwater tanks / and maybe
the chimney and fireplace
of a corroded farmhouse, once
the guts of the storm, now
a salty trinket.

© 2003, John Kinsella
From: Peripheral Light: Selected and New Poems
Publisher: Fremantle Arts Centre Press, Fremantle, 2003
ISBN: 1 86368362 3

Read the entire poem at http://australia.poetryinternationalweb.org/

Image from www.agric.wa.gov.au

time for a little poetry

Andrew.Rate — Mon, 18 May 2009 03:21:00 GMT

FAREWELL TO THE EARTH

Christopher James

We buried him with a potato in each hand
on New Year’s Day when the ground was hard as luck,
wearing just cotton, his dancing shoes plus
a half bottle of pear cider to stave off the thirst.

In his *** pocket we left a taxi number
and a packet of sunflower seeds; at his feet was
the cricket bat he used to notch up a century
against the Fenstanton eleven.

We dropped in his trowel and a shower of rosettes
then let the lid fall on his willow casket.
The sky was hard as enamel; there was
a callus of frost on the face of the fields.

Dust to dust; but this was no ordinary muck.
The burial plot was by his allotment, where
the water butt brimmed with algae and the shed door
swung and slammed as we shook back the soil.

During the service, my mother asked
the funeral director to leave; take away some hair
and the resemblance was too close; and yet
my father never looked so smart.

I kept expecting him to walk in, his brow
steaming with rain, soil under his fingernails
smelling of hot ashes and compost;
looking for fresh tea in the pot.

One of an occasional series of poems (this is No. 3) selected simply because they mention the word 'soil'.

In this poem soil helps to signify death, most likely drawing from the biblical creation story:

"By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return." (Genesis 3:19)

The second mention of soil perhaps tells us about the character of the dead man; earthy, with few pretensions.

But never mind the references to soil, and biblical allusion - it's a beautiful poem.

Les Murray on geology and soils

Andrew.Rate — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 05:32:00 GMT

I heard Les Murray read some of his poetry and speak at the end of March, in the wonderful venue that is the chapel at Christ Church Grammar School, looking out onto Freshwater Bay as the sun set. Like Arthur Boyd, Les Murray has a highly aware view of Australia's landscape, expressed in language rather than paint.

He didn't read any of his "earth science" poetry at Christ Church chapel, but I had been dipping into my copy of "Collected Poems" for a few weeks earlier and it occured to me that Les Murray also has a keen sense of the poetry in rocks, soils, water and the land in general; inspiring stuff for earth scientists who may be occasionally dissatisfied with simple rationality.

Here's a few brief excerpts (any more words from each poem and I'll be outside fair copying limits, I think):

"...pleated water shaking out its bedding soil, increasing its scale, beginning the headlong...
...a squeeze-play through a cracked basalt bar, maintaining a foam roofed two-sided overhang of breakneck riesling..."

(from Bent Water in the Tasmanian Highlands, originally published in 'The People's Otherworld', 1983)

"...men dial Barrier Reefs long enfolded beneath the geology... There are many wrong numbers on the geophone, but it's brought us some distance..."

(from Machine Portraits With Pendant Spaceman, originally published in 'The People's Otherworld', 1983)

"He knows the map of Earth's fertile soils, and can draw it freehand...
...His favourite country was the Ukraine: it is nearly all deep fertile soil."

(from It Allows A Portrait in Line Scan at Fifteen, originally published in 'Subhuman Redneck Poems', 1996)

I'll keep reading. Finding beauty like this keeps me, for one, interested in my discipline and its value to humans.

Les Murray photograph from http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/226

Value in scarcity

Andrew.Rate — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 07:22:00 GMT

A recent serendipitous find:

"A single file of women and children was walking through the village, their faces drawn and tired. They had walked a very long way. In their hands they carried small satchels, filled with earth and manure, clasping the precious burden tightly, like a golden treasure. They had collected it in far-away villages, giving in exchange sheep, silver coins and handwoven lengths of material. Now they were going to spread the dearly bought earth on the bleak rocks, so the poor acres could bear corn to feed the people. The fields hung on a slant over the abyss. Strapped on a chain, men slid down on to the little platforms, and carefully crumbled the new earth over the rocky ground. A rough wall was put up over the future field, to protect it from wind and landslides. These acres, three paces long, four paces wide, were the mountain people's most treasured possession. Early in the morning the men went out to the fields. They said a long prayer, and only then bent over the good earth. When the wind was strong the women brought their blankets to cover the dear land. They caressed the seeds with slender brown fingers and later cut the few blades with little scythes. They ground the grains and baked long flat loaves. Into the first loaf a coin was put, the people's thanksgiving for the miracle of the seed."

From "Ali and Nino", by Kurban Said, translated by Jenia Graman. First published in 1937, translated into English in 1970; Vintage/Random House, 2000.

Image from http://www.gateway.az/

Occasional poetry No. 2

Andrew.Rate — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 07:32:00 GMT

Hiking the Summit

by Simmons B. Buntin

from Riverfall (Salmon Poetry, 2005) http://salmonpoetry.com/riverfall.html

Reprinted in Salmon: A Journey in Poetry 1981 - 2007(http://www.salmonpoetry.com/anthology.html)

_______________________________________________________________________

Hiking the Summit

Thirteen miles have passed beneath
these broken boots, though I
have been lost since the first step.
I cannot see snow-crowned
peaks or a canyon gone crazy
upon itself, but only my breath, thick
as frost on the evening ridge. As
the trail grows twisted, I lose level
ground and fall into a rushing spring,
the water drowning my call
with the taste of panic,
sweetness. I work the current
like a cutter through ice, reach
the bank to dream of sleep,
and fall upon the hardened earth.
As the moon slides across the frozen
sky, distant wolves hurl their calls
against my camp. Waking, I spur
simmering coals and return
the howls, watching as my fire
grows. When the flames
form a ladder, a straight line
of smoke opens the night. I climb in, and the trail is gone.

______________________________________________________________________

About the poet

_______________________________________________________________________

Simmons B. Buntin is the founding editor of Terrain.org: A Journal of the Built & Natural Environments. With a master's degree in urban and regional planning, he is-logically-a web program manager for the University of Arizona in Tucson, Arizona. He has published in Canadian Bulletin of Medical History, Sou'wester, Southern Humanities Review, The Manhattan Review, and elsewhere and is a recipient of the Colorado Artist's Fellowship for Poetry.

Journal club Christmas

Andrew.Rate — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 04:25:00 GMT

Two quotes from Bruce Cockburn appropriate to the Christmas season (and the mood it gets me in):

"This bluegreen ball in black space
Filled with beauty even now
battered and abused and lovely"

from the song "Planet of the Clowns" on the album The Trouble With Normal (1983)

This was written in the early 1980s, and there seems little doubt that the "bluegreen ball" has suffered more battery and abuse since then.

In an article "US consumerism poses global recession threat" on the ABC news website, Richard Vietor (Professor of Environmental Management at the Harvard Business School) warns that unbridled (American) consumerism may lead to "catastrophic recession". Easy to point the finger at the USA; there are lots of Americans, but other western countries should not feel too righteous either. I have pessimistic moments when I worry a lot about humanity's impact on our planet. I had one cycling to work this morning in fact, dodging traffic until the sanctuary of the cycle path through the King's Park bushland, prompting me to include Cockburn's bittersweet lyrics above. What will become of Earth? -- the weary Terra may shrug her scarred but resilient skin yet, and rid herself of parasites...

...but Christmas is still a time for hope, as an older Cockburn observes:

"Like a stone on the surface of a still river
Driving the ripples on forever
Redemption rips through the surface of time
In the cry of a tiny babe"

from the song "Cry of a Tiny Babe" on the album Nothing But A Burning Light (1991)

Images from www.cockburnproject.net

Occasional poetry No.1

Andrew.Rate — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 03:13:00 GMT

1958

that spring, there was a terrible drought
no one could stop
the earth from cracking open
and spilling its shrivelled guts

mice jumped out of rice jars
not a single grain was harvested
but so as not to make the higher-ups lose hope
our considerate village headman

sent people out night after night
first to paint the ground grass-green
then to paint it gold

SONG XIAOXIAN
Translated by Simon Patton

Poem of the week:
http://china.poetryinternationalweb.org/piw_cms/cms/cms_module/index.php?obj_id=973&x=1