It was an instant hit online and has been doing the rounds since. If you haven't read it already, I urge you, do!
It was taken from Neil Gaiman's lecture for the Reading Agency last week explaining why using our imaginations, and providing for others to use theirs, is an obligation for all citizens. For anyone who doesn't know, Neil Gaiman is a popular fantasy/sci-fi/genre-bending writer of notable works such as The Graveyard Book and noted for providing much commentary to the discourse on the importance of literature in our lives. In this article, he surpasses himself though. He states his aim as the beginning:
'I'm going to suggest that reading fiction,
that reading for pleasure, is one of the most important things one can
do. I'm going to make an impassioned plea for people to understand what
libraries and librarians are, and to preserve both of these things.'
And goes on to elaborate the importance of literacy, literature and imagination in our lives, arguing the very relevant importance of language:
'...words are more important than they ever were: we navigate the world with
words, and as the world slips onto the web, we need to follow, to
communicate and to comprehend what we are reading. People who cannot
understand each other cannot exchange ideas, cannot communicate, and
translation programs only go so far.'
'You're also finding out something as you read vitally important for making your way in the world. And it's this:The world doesn't have to be like this. Things can be different.
Fiction can show you a different world. It can take you somewhere you've
never been. Once you've visited other worlds, like those who ate fairy
fruit, you can never be entirely content with the world that you grew up
in. Discontent is a good thing: discontented people can modify and
improve their worlds, leave them better, leave them different.'
The piece is a singing homage to the imagination and flourishers of the imagination - language, literature, reading, writing. He ends with a rousing declaration stating an obligation to daydream:
'We all – adults and children, writers and readers – have an obligation
to daydream. We have an obligation to imagine. It is easy to pretend
that nobody can change anything, that we are in a world in which society
is huge and the individual is less than nothing: an atom in a wall, a
grain of rice in a rice field. But the truth is, individuals change
their world over and over, individuals make the future, and they do it
by imagining that things can be different.'
An obligation to daydream? Imagine that! How many times have we been told to get our heads out of the clouds, stop staring into space, stop fantasising? Now, here is a writer and an accomplished man of letters making a public plea NOT to listen to this. To daydream on defiantly. Blessed are the daydreamers; they maketh the world. To imagine to infinity (and beyond). And by doing so, to make the world a better place.
Read it!
~ Siobhán
'Imagination is more important than knowledge; knowledge will get you from A-Z, imagination encircles the worl.' ~ Albert Einstein
Autumn... the year's last loveliest smile...' ~William Cullen Bryant
A month ago I wrote about how hard it was to adapt to the seasonal shift. Now, well on our way into autumn, I am adjusting.
Even though my favourite season is spring, I have made a pledge to myself to see the beauty in the other seasons too. Especially autumn. Hence this post. As Keats says in perhaps the most famous of all autumn poems, 'To Autumn', 'Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?/Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,' - I am thinking not of the songs of spring, but instead, trying to appreciate autumn's music. (*Read the poem below)
So, under the influence of writers and poets galore (autumn is a grand muse for so many of them, as Jane Austen says - 'that season which has drawn from every poet,
worthy of being read, some attempt at description, or some lines of
feeling') and other bloggers too, I've ordered myself to pay attention to the season instead of hiding away from it. So I've been watching closely the past few weeks the trees changing colour, the leaves falling and fading, the palette of nature ripening to a rich Renaissance colour scheme.
And I must admit, Autumn of 2013 is winning me over with all its bright sunshine and brilliant colours so far. Here's the proof:
(*Now I don't claim to be a photographer, but when I see a nice image, I capture it! On a pretty average camera by a pretty amateur hand. But look, no effects needed, nature has already photo-shopped the landscape!) -
Autumn is the eternal corrective. It is ripeness and color and a time of
maturity; but it is also breadth, and depth, and distance. ~ Hal Borland
Autumn is the mellower season, and what we lose in flowers we more than gain in fruits. ~Samuel Butler
Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower. ~Albert Camus
In autumn, don't go to jewelers to see gold; go to the parks! ~Mehmet Murat ildan
'There is a harmony
In autumn, and a luster in its sky...'
~Percy Bysshe Shelley
Over
everything connected with autumn there lingers some golden spell—some
unseen influence that penetrates the soul with its mysterious power. ~Northern Advocate
'Every leaf speaks bliss to me,
Fluttering from the autumn tree...'
~ Emily Brontë
Autumn carries more gold in its pocket than all the other seasons ~ John Bishop
So many writers there singing the praises of the season. Enough to sway you to the season isn't it? Look what George Eliot has to say:
'Is
not this a true autumn day? Just the still melancholy that I love —
that makes life and nature harmonize. The birds are consulting about
their migrations, the trees are putting on the hectic or the pallid hues
of decay, and begin to strew the ground, that one's very footsteps may
not disturb the repose of earth and air, while they give us a scent that
is a pefect anodyne to the restless spirit. Delicious autumn! My very
soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth
seeking the successive autumns.'
Well, at least, they make you appreciate it. I'll never be an autumn aficionado, but I've learned to appreciate it, admire it even, through both the lens of these musings and that of the camera.
And I like the idea of the seasons corresponding to human states; Keats says in his 'Human Seasons' poem that autumn lends us 'Havens of repose'. A chance to pause and reflect after the exuberance of summer, before moving on to the hardship of winter, the promise of spring. A necessary season, in other words. Perfect time to take account of things. Not mere decay, but the essential beginnings of growth, the clearing away. Wonderful, colourful endings to make for brilliant new beginnings. See, I say to myself, nothing to be sad about. Just a temporary melancholy that makes for real beauty and substance. Perhaps Samuel Butler is right - 'What we lose in flowers, we more than gain in fruit' in this season of wisdom.
How about you? What are your favourite quotes on autumn? Your favourite things about it?
I'll leave you with the most famous poem on the season by Keats. (If you want to read more autumnal poems, check out my Poem a Day blog where I've been posting lots of seasonal masterpieces.)
Seasonal salutations,
~ Siobhán
Ode To Autumn - John Keats Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness! Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun; Conspiring with him how to load and bless With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run; To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees, And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core; To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells With a sweet kernel; to set budding more, And still more, later flowers for the bees, Until they think warm days will never cease, For Summer has o'erbrimmed their clammy cells.
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store? Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find Thee sitting careless on a granary floor, Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind; Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep, Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers; And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep Steady thy laden head across a brook; Or by a cider-press, with patient look, Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.
Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they? Think not of them, thou hast thy music too, - While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue; Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn Among the river sallows, borne aloft Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies; And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn; Hedge-crickets sing, and now with treble soft The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft; And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.
Quelle surprise! Starting out, I never thought this day would come (at 3 or 4 hits a day - now it's circa 150!) 50,000 big ones. It's a hell of a lot. And I would like to say thank you to all my followers, readers, and random passers-by. Thank you for stopping by and having a read! You are the stadium crowd behind the tally number, cheering me on.
Flaubert once said that to be a real writer you shouldn't care about who reads your work. You write for yourself first and foremost, you write for the love of writing. Which I do. But having an audience is something I am grateful for. And feedback, especially so.
Just to write
something and put it out here, knowing it exists in a tangible shape, words gathering into a constellation of a kind, is a very powerful thing. It's so great to know that there are those of you out there who have been moved in some way by what I've written to go to the bother of leaving a comment. I am especially thankful for that. Seeing since in real life, it's not so easy to get people to comment on writing! But here, is a haven. Here is a home.
Thank you for reading. Here's to the big, the biggest, 100,000 views. Onwards!
Influenced by Carrie's columns from Sex and the City, it tackles the theme of the singleton stereotype slapped on people who are currently-without-partner. Or as I like to call it 'too fabulous to settle just yet.'
Here's the promo:
*Confessions & Digressions of a Disillusioned Single Gal:
Sick of the pity tag stereotype that goes with being 'single' & the
pressure to conform to coupling. Also exploring the many hoop-las of
dating. (From a romantic & rebellious & feminist viewpoint.
Warning: May contain riotous and/or offensive rants.)*
Important to say - this is not the self-indulgent rantings of a bitter singleton, but rather the realistic presentation of facts as I see them, the observations of human behaviour as interpreted by a sensitive romantic and feisty individual such as myself!
It's a space of speaking out and talking back against the labelling and judging that goes with being single. I am just sick and tired of it! I thought of doing some posts here, but there's just too much to say! It needs a space all of its own! I also look at relationships in the modern day and how I see them. With a pinch of wit and humour (and maybe offense - but what's anything without controversy?) But mainly, I set out to debunk the myth that love-life status should act as the sole defining force of a life. On the contrary.
So if you're single, or even not, male or female, disillusioned, romantic, realist or cynic, drop on over and have a look and a say if you so feel! I'd love to hear from you and have a bit of solid support in this ever-demanding solo stance I embark on by choice, not lack of choices.
Tonight of course, is the Harvest Moon. For anyone who hasn't heard of it, it's simply the name given to the moon nearest to the autumnal equinox (Sept 21) and like other the moons, takes its name from the activities of the natural world at this time, which would be the harvest.
The harvest moon is the biggest of all the moons. This is due to the moon rising early and on the horizon at this time of year. It appears orange as we look at it through the earth's atmosphere, a gilded gold. (for the science, you can read here) I'll never forget the first time I saw a harvest moon - absolutely huge! The size of Jupiter I'd reckon if it happened to float by us. Massive. Compared to other moons. And low down on the horizon, pure gold in colour. It was a stunning sight. A bit like this reaction: "I
was walking with a friend one hot August... As we rounded a corner we
were both halted mid-stride by what lay before us. Looking out across
the ocean we saw what appeared to be the lights of a great ship
approaching, glowing orange across the water... As we watched, we realized our eyes had been playing tricks
on us. What we were seeing was the rim of the harvest moon emerging from
the sea, a monstrous, swollen apparition, its shape distorted by the
atmospheric conditions; glowing and pulsing like an ember, craters and
canyons were clearly visible on its surface like purple veins. We stood
for a few minutes before hurrying back along the path to the house where
we were staying and calling our friends outside to toast the moon as it
wobbled up into the sky. Later that night I was woken by the mournful
bellow of a foghorn. Going to the window I saw that the moon had changed
colour from tangerine to silver and was casting a blade of light over
the perfectly still sea, across which a solid wall of fog was advancing
towards the shore. On this night at least, in this distant corner of our
crowded, congested archipelago, the moon still reigned supreme." - from 'Nocturne: A Journey in Search of Moonlight' ~ by James Attlee Or this poem from Carl Sandburg, that describes the magic of it, the mystery it seems to embody,
Under the Harvest Moon - Carl Sandburg
Under the harvest moon, When the soft silver Drips shimmering Over the garden nights, Death, the gray mocker, Comes and whispers to you As a beautiful friend Who remembers.
Under the summer roses When the flagrant crimson Lurks in the dusk Of the wild red leaves, Love, with little hands, Comes and touches you With a thousand memories, And asks you Beautiful, unanswerable questions. Then there's Ted Hughes descriptive take on it that neatly sums it up, 'the flame-red moon,' 'like a gold doubloon' on the horizon, 'booming softly through heaven like a bassoon':
The Harvest Moon - Ted Hughes
The flame-red moon, the harvest moon,
Rolls along the hills, gently bouncing,
A vast balloon,
Till it takes off, and sinks upward
To lie on the bottom of the sky, like a gold doubloon.
The harvest moon has come,
Booming softly through heaven, like a bassoon.
And the earth replies all night, like a deep drum.
So people can't sleep,
So they go out where elms and oak trees keep
A kneeling vigil, in a religious hush.
The harvest moon has come!
And all the moonlit cows and all the sheep
Stare up at her petrified, while she swells
Filling heaven, as if red hot, and sailing
Closer and closer like the end of the world.
Till the gold fields of stiff wheat
Cry `We are ripe, reap us!' and the rivers
Sweat from the melting hills. Then, there's this lovely meditation on just what it is the moon can mean: Moon
in Virgo - James Lee Jobe You
are not beaten. The simple music rises up,
children's voices in the air, sound floating out
across the land and on to the river beyond,
over the valley's floor. No, you cannot go back
for those things you lost, the parts of yourself
that were taken, often by force. Like an animal
in the forest you must weep it all away at once,
violently, and then simply live on. The music here
is Bach, Vivaldi; a chorale of children, a piano,
a violin. Together, they have a certain spirit
that is light, that lets in light, joyful, ecstatic.
"Forgive," said The Christ, and why not? Every day
that you still breathe has all the joy
and
murderous possibilities of your bravest dream.
Forgive. Breathe. Live. The moon has entered Virgo,
the wind shifts, blows up from the Delta, cools this valley,
and you are not beaten; the children sing, it is Bach,
and you are brave, alive, and human. And what it means in cosmic terms? Well, astrologer Jonathan Cainer outlines it clearly today: ...We often feel a need, at Full Moon, to let
out more of our true selves, to reject boundaries and barriers that
normally keep us in check and to feel more aware of hidden magic. All
Full Moons are powerful but when a Full Moon falls quite so close to the
equinox, there's a strong celestial suggestion of 'recalibration'.
Individually and collectively, we're growing aware of imbalances that
may need rectifying and complications that could be simplified with
surprising ease. (www.cainer.com) In other words - change, renewal, a reaping of what is done in our lives and a moving on to sow for future seasons, a simultaneous saying goodbye to the old ('No, you cannot go back/for those things you lost...') and welcoming the new. What's that feeling called I wonder? I'm sure it's something like this -
'Love, with little hands, /Comes and touches you /With a thousand memories, /And asks you /Beautiful, unanswerable questions.'
But there's nothing that can sum up the feeling the Harvest Moon engenders than this famous song of the same title by Neil Young:
'Because I'm still in love with you I want to see you dance again
on this Harvest Moon...'
There, I hope I've given you a glimpse into what the Harvest Moon means. To me personally, it will always be that evening in September, on the cusp of change, the yellow fields beneath, the blue sky above, and the huge harvest moon, poised like a tossed golden coin on the horizon, a harbinger of all good things to come.
I hope, wherever you are, you get the chance to see this year's Harvest Moon and if not, at least feel it.
Moon watching,
~Siobhán
It is the Harvest Moon! On gilded vanes And roofs of villages, on woodland crests And their aerial neighborhoods of nests Deserted, on the curtained window-panes Of rooms where children sleep, on country lanes And harvest-fields, its mystic splendor rests! Gone are the birds that were our summer guests, With the last sheaves return the laboring wains! All things are symbols: the external shows Of Nature have their image in the mind, As flowers and fruits and falling of the leaves; The song-birds leave us at the summer's close, Only the empty nests are left behind, And pipings of the quail among the sheaves. - See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20493#sthash.4PpT0dxH.dpuf
Words are addictive and pleasure-giving, stimulating, hallucinogenic, sedative, enlivening. They can heal or hurt, clarify or confuse, offer escapism, or offer truth. But most of all, we seek out words like nothing else to obtain a 'hit' of what we crave most in this life - meaning.
'You expected to be sad in the fall. Part of you
died each year when the leaves fell from the trees and their branches
were bare against the wind and the cold, wintery light.'
~ Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast
'And you would
accept the seasons of your heart just as you have always accepted that
seasons pass over your fields and you would watch with serenity through
the winters of your grief.' ~ Kahlil Gibran
It's September. The end of summer, the start of autumn. The month when nights start to overtake days. Back to school month, back to work, back to basics. The 'scythe' of the harvest coming to cut us down or sweep us onwards.
And I'm having a hard time adapting, a very hard time. Like a lot of people I suffer from SAD - Seasonal Affectional Disorder (self-diagnosed but not self-inflicted) and dread this time of year. It's like I 'rage, rage at the dying of the light', but to no avail. The darkness keeps on seeping in, evening after evening, and with it, the fading of all summer memories, those shiny evenings and days full of possibility. Now all that seems null and void somehow, a vague far-off memory. And I'm left miserable and moping, trying, but failing, to find my feet in a new season, a new interior and exterior landscape.
Everyone identifies with a season. My favourite is spring - the season of beginnings, when the earth is starting to awaken after a long winter's sleep and everywhere hope gleams in the brightening of the sky, the lengthening of days, the greening of our surrounds. If I could describe it in a few words it would be: hope, possibility, enthusiasm. And you're supposed to embody the attributes of the season you were born in. Autumn is the complete opposite to spring and so I find it incredibly difficult to set my inner bearings to. It is the opposite of everything I love inherently. 'Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness....' I think Keats forgot to mention 'melancholy' in there when he penned his famous 'Ode to Autumn.'
I know there are so many people who love Autumn, seeing it as the crowning jewel of the four seasons with all its colours and poetic licence. Next month, when we're almost knee-deep in leaves, I'll have adjusted just enough to learn to like the season, because of course I appreciate that every season has its merits, and as an artist, you can't but be open to them. But it still stings my soul a little, all the while.
The seasons of course have their reflections in life. The cyclical process of change and the different emotional landscapes we must go through are signalled by the earth's seasons.
And it's especially this year that I feel so keenly the stripping of the trees and the approach of the dark. I feel it because I have just lost someone - a light, a love, a muse, a possibility. And with that, the season creeps in as a spectre I suppose.
'Pathetic fallacy' - that technique in writing in which the weather mirrors the emotions of the characters - feels so true to form right now. The past month it's done nothing but rain. And the sky has greyed over with big steel clouds, suffocating, heavy, pressing down like a gag. And if that wasn't bad enough, now comes the turn in the season: the odd yellowing leaf in foliage, the chill in the air, the dark days, the long-lasting nights - the pre-cursors to the barreness and bleakness that is to come. Change, change, 'a terrible beauty' being born. Everything seems to underscore the emptiness and sadness I feel. In another season, maybe I could triumph over this personal loss, but in this one, I feel like I'm sinking into its sorrow.
There's no more euphoric sight in nature to me than trees in full bloom, thick and green. They represent new beginnings, possibilities and hope, in thick leafy abundance. When I see them lose these leaves in winter, I can't help but despair a little - that pathetic fallacy again, but vice-versa. Exactly as Hemingway said, it was like 'part of you died.' And now I feel it all the worse, because this time, it's the same with my personal situation. I know the change has to happen, I know emptiness will only lead the way to new growth, is actually necessary for it, but still, it doesn't lessen the pain of it.
'In this world of change, nothing which comes stays, and nothing which goes is lost.' I know everything is a part of the cyclical process, but is it ok sometimes, to step back and mourn some losses? I know people come and go from our lives, I know no one is permanent. But still, it's hard when you have to say goodbye to someone who has made such an infallible difference in your life. It's hard to let go. With all those memories of spring and summer, all those possibilities, lighting the mind, it's hard now to suddenly to let go and embrace the darkness of the oncoming unstoppable autumn/winter.
But resistance is futile. And letting go necessary. It is an act of love too. Letting people go to get on with their lives, to take paths more suitable to them, and in the long run, better. I know that.
Well, now I must say goodbye to not just a person, but a possibility. The grand gleam of a life gilded gold with his touch. Myth or not, his presence was a light in my life. A light that dispelled many darknesses. A golden thread to follow. An inspiration. A muse of the highest calibre, the sweetest disposition. Always, there was the golden possibility of finding treasure within ordinary days because he was there - underlying them, as a presence, an influence, an inspiration, a beacon, a motif of magic. Always, there was the possibility of so much more. Potential, like bottled gold light. Summer no matter what the season. Nothing could be brighter.
Now - to do without that.
The only thing I can compare it to is going rapidly from summer to winter. Loving the sun, and then learning to live without it. Like the displacement of SAD, or a kind of jetlag of the heart, a leaking and losing of light like blood. Now, I must learn to stand tall with bare branches and brace against the wind. With possibility gone, the bleakness of the season looms large. I wonder do the trees ever dread the winter, ever fear it?
So now as this person moves on into a different season of his life, I must too. Confront the season ahead - hunker down, wrap up, find new ways of lighting the dark - and stop dwelling in what might have been, in summer memories full of butterflies and sunlit amber evenings, nectar and giddy shine. Because summer doesn't last. No matter how much we wish it did. Life moves on. The great world spins on. And with it, I must too. As Tennyson put it,' forward, forward let us range, let the great world spin forever down the ringing grooves of change.'
I don't know if this post has any place here, but maybe it'll resonate with someone. I just needed to write it. To shed this deadening feeling that's been on me, like a deadbolt of chains, a stiffening of stone, since September has started. And to write something without acknowledging it, would seem a lie somehow.
As I sign off, I'll say I know there's gold in autumn too. The light, the leaves, the harvests that can be reaped. And that's where I'm trying to set my sights on now. And not endure the fate of Lot's wife, who turned to stone for looking back.
In the epigram to this post, I've quoted Hemingway. Though not the full quote. After those lines, he adds: 'But you knew there would always be the spring, as you knew the river would flow again after it was frozen.' Yes, I know it. Now just to believe in it. And to find that 'serenity' to watch through 'the winter of my grief' as Kahlil Gibran says so beautifully. That would be nice.
~ Siobhán
***
A poem to illustrate these thoughts:
Unloving – Carol Ann Duffy
Learn from the winter trees, the way
they kiss and throw away their leaves,
then hold their stricken faces in their hands
and turn to ice;
or from the
clocks,
looking away, unloving light, the short days
running out of things to say; a church
a ghost ship on a sea of dusk.
Learn from a stone, its heart-shape meaningless,
perfect with relentless cold; or from the bigger moon,
implacably dissolving in the sky, or from the stars,
lifeless as Latin verbs.
Learn from the river,
flowing always somewhere else, even its name,
change, change; learn from a rope
hung from a branch like a noose, a crow cursing,
a dead heron mourned by a congregation of flies.
Learn from the dumbstruck garden, summer’s grave,
where nothing grows, not a Beast’s rose;
from the torn veil of a web; from our daily bread:
perpetual rain, nothing like tears, unloving clouds;
language unloving love; even this stale air
unlovingall the spaces where you
were.
