Monday, December 14, 2009

BlAckBirDs



Chintan, Thank you for sharing this poem by Wallace Stevens and making the birds in my painting come alive for me:

Thirteen Ways to Look at a Blackbird

I Among twenty snowy mountains, The only moving thing Was the eye of the blackbird.


II I was of three minds, Like a tree In which there are three blackbirds.


III The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds. It was a small part of the pantomime.


IV A man and a woman Are one. A man and a woman and a blackbird Are one.

V I do not know which to prefer, The beauty of inflections Or the beauty of innuendoes, The blackbird whistling Or just after.


VI Icicles filled the long window With barbaric glass. The shadow of the blackbird Crossed it, to and fro. The mood Traced in the shadow An indecipherable cause.


VII O thin men of Haddam, Why do you imagine golden birds? Do you not see how the blackbird Walks around the feet Of the women about you?


VIII I know noble accents And lucid, inescapable rhythms; But I know, too, That the blackbird is involved In what I know.


IX When the blackbird flew out of sight, It marked the edge Of one of many circles.


X At the sight of blackbirds Flying in a green light, Even the bawds of euphony Would cry out sharply.


XI He rode over Connecticut In a glass coach. Once, a fear pierced him, In that he mistook The shadow of his equipage For blackbirds.


XII The river is moving. The blackbird must be flying.


XIII It was evening all afternoon. It was snowing And it was going to snow. The blackbird sat In the cedar-limbs

This painting has 11 blackbirds...........
Two are forever flying in circles and sometimes far and wide....lost in finding themselves.
Even if they were to come and settle here, there is not any place on the wire...they are meant to fly........

2 comments:

Chintan said...

Jamuna, see this!
http://www.yesmagazine.org/multimedia/yes-video/birds-on-wires?utm_source=eddec09&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=51_Birds

Excerpts here:
While reading a newspaper, Jarbas Agnelli was struck by a photograph of birds on an electric wire. Their positioning on several wires made him think of a musical staff. He cut out the photograph and decided to make a song, using the bird's exact locations to determine which notes to play.

"I knew it wasn't the most original idea in the universe," Agnelli says in an explanation on his website. "I was just curious to hear what melody the birds were creating."

He sent his newly composed melody to the photographer, Paulo Pinto. The photographer told a reporter, and his story ended up in the same newspaper that inspired him.

J said...

Chintan, thank you :) From me getting inspired by a painting, and then doing my own, to sharing it with you, to you sharing that poem, to me blogging, and then you sharing this excerpt....i love the way life happens :) this is how....