The road I build

Through it all, please,
after every stone is lifted
and every grade leveled,
after every tear is wept
and everything put in its place,
let me sing not of discipline
(as weighty as that is)
but of something lighter,
as light as it can be,
and broader and louder,
from the deep heart, sung
from far me to nearer Thee.
There, see? A prayer.

‘Abdu’l-Bahá, the son of the Founder of the Baháʼí Faith, was tasked with building the Shrine of the Báb on the slopes of Mount Carmel in Haifa, Israel. This so exposed Him to the attacks of His enemies, and the project was so fraught with such difficulty, that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá later said of the process that He wept every stone of it all into place. What a magnificent example of love and strength He was and is to us!

Thank you for reading The road I build. I sincerely hope you have enjoyed it and humbly appreciate your visiting the Book of Pain. As always, I look forward to your comments.

The photo is of a piece of art created by my dear friend Pier Gustafson, a wonderful artist and calligrapher resident in Boston, Massachusetts. Pier is one of those amazing people with the ability to see art in everything and to produce amazing, delightful, imaginative and moving works from all of it. (Pier is also my vintage fountain pen dealer. But that’s another story.) The photo of the work is also his.

To see my photography blog, please visit the Book of Bokeh.

j.

Poem, and notes © John Etheridge; all rights reserved. The poem and accompanying notes are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Work 3.0 Unported License. This applies to all original written work found on this site unless noted otherwise. The attribution claimed under the license is © John Etheridge, https://bookofpain.wordpress.com. The photo is © Pier Gustafson and is not licensed for use in any way without the expressed consent of its creator.

All that it took to get here

I grew up when and where everyone knew you, so you
couldn’t get away with much, although not for the trying.
It was a world of mom-cooked meals, raucous card games,
nightly novenas, and mass every Sunday. The Pope himself
was my shepherd; who was I to want more?

My parents grew up on the same street, she Protestant, he Catholic,
but they weren’t allowed to converse until they were adults.
When they were married they did so in the vestibule because
she wasn’t good enough for “The Church” proper. Such was their sin,
unoriginal as it was, some of mom’s brothers wouldn’t speak to her for years.
(Not to worry; eventually, they needed something, so that was that.)

It’s all bygones now, but still, they were them then and
I am me now, and I hear that song still sung in my blood.
So thank you for that, and—well—sorry for all the rest.
If it’s any comfort, you only ever guessed the half.

I grew up in Grand Falls (now Grand Falls-Windsor), Newfoundland, the easternmost province of Canada. Largely settled by Irish and English immigrants, old-world religious tensions and prejudices still existed there when I was a child. The story told of my parents marriage in this poem is completely true. Thankfully such foolishness is set aside now.

Thank you for reading All that it took to get here. I sincerely hope you have enjoyed it and humbly appreciate your visiting the Book of Pain. As always, I look forward to your comments.

To see my photography blog, please visit the Book of Bokeh.

j.

Poem, and notes © John Etheridge; all rights reserved. The poem and accompanying notes are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Work 3.0 Unported License. This applies to all original written work found on this site unless noted otherwise. The attribution claimed under the license is © John Etheridge, https://bookofpain.wordpress.com.

Sailing to Skellig Michael

The sea, the sea, the sovereign sea,
wind and water, tide and wave—
it’s a dangerous thing we do
to go down to the darksome sea.

There are edges to be found and
guarded there, depths to be fallen into.
Deep things are to be found in the fathomless sea,
deeper things to be found within you:
are you sincere enough to drown here?
I said it, it’s true: it’s a dangerous thing we do
to go down to that sovereign Sea.

Skellig Michael is an island off the coast of County Kerry in Ireland. A UNESCO designated World Heritage Site, it was made wildly popular after being used in several Star Wars films. Rugged, barren, isolated, and barely habitable, it is still, yet, beautiful and soul-stirring.

Named after the Archangel Michael (the head of the angels and the prince guardian in Judeo-Christian mythology) the hermit monks resident at Skellig Michael from the 6th to the 12th century saw themselves as guardians living at the edge of the then known world.

As we powered out to the island in a fast motorboat, my heart went out to those remarkable souls who braved that long open sea voyage in small rowboats made of leather stretched over thin wooden lathes. The first stanza of this poem was written at that time in their memory and honor. The poem was completed on its broader theme during the flight back to the United States.

Thank you for reading Sailing to Skellig Michael. I sincerely hope you have enjoyed it and humbly appreciate your visiting the Book of Pain. As always, I look forward to your comments.

The photograph was taken looking out to sea from the Kerry Cliffs in County Kerry, Ireland. Skellig Michael is the island to the right. The smaller Little Skellig (being closer it appears larger in this perspective) is to the left. To see my photography blog, please visit the Book of Bokeh.

j.

Poem, and notes © John Etheridge; all rights reserved. The poem and accompanying notes are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Work 3.0 Unported License. This applies to all original written work found on this site unless noted otherwise. The attribution claimed under the license is © John Etheridge, https://bookofpain.wordpress.com. The photograph is not licensed for use in any way without the expressed consent of its creator.

In Éirinn

Yes, they are here, the little ones, the lost ones,
the spirits who own this place, beach, sod, and sky.
They are here and shout in the bleat of every sheep;
they are here and roar in the surge of every tide;
they are here and wept full into every pot
of Earl Grey served hot. (‘…tis grand so!)
But there is no due for them now, no fire,
just the dull roll of history, place after time anew.
In the end, I suppose, that’s enough.
And if not, well, that is all that they shall have,
the short shrift. Surely they’re used to it by now.

In Éirinn is Irish Gaelic for In Ireland. As a Newfoundlander, much of my heritage is Irish and I have always felt a kinship with the land. Visiting Ireland, you cannot help but be struck by its long and tragic history. The real Irish story is not the cute, cleaned up Disney-like one of “Top ‘a tha marnin to ya!” (which by the way, no one Irish ever says); it is a darker narrative of darker themes of loss, love, and cruelty. But who hears their tales now? Or the same tale as it told over and over around the world?

Thank you for reading In Éirinn. I sincerely hope you have enjoyed it and humbly appreciate your visiting the Book of Pain. As always, I look forward to your comments.

The photograph was taken on a recent trip to the Aran Island of Inis Mór, off the west coast of Ireland. To see my photography blog, please visit the Book of Bokeh.

j.

Poem, and notes © John Etheridge; all rights reserved. The poem and accompanying notes are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Work 3.0 Unported License. This applies to all original written work found on this site unless noted otherwise. The attribution claimed under the license is © John Etheridge, https://bookofpain.wordpress.com. The photograph is not licensed for use in any way without the expressed consent of its creator.

Vahids

The first is out of love,
the second to hear Your voice.

The third is in submission,
the next in worship to Your First,
the fifth to call You hence.

And then the silent sixth;
how can I let You go?

Vahid is a Persian name meaning “the one” and by inference, “oneness” or “unity.” In the Abjad numerology system (which assigns a numeric value to each letter) the value of the word is 19.

Baháʼís are enjoined, each day, to repeat the Greatest Name of God, “Alláh-u-Abhá” 95 times—that is, 5 vahids. This devotional act is the root of this poem.

Thank you for reading Vahids. I sincerely hope you have enjoyed it and humbly appreciate your visiting the Book of Pain. As always, I look forward to your comments.

The photograph was taken on a recent trip to Haifa, Israel and is a detail of the Shrine of the Báb. To see my photography blog, please visit the Book of Bokeh.

j.

Poem, and notes © John Etheridge; all rights reserved. The poem and accompanying notes are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Work 3.0 Unported License. This applies to all original written work found on this site unless noted otherwise. The attribution claimed under the license is © John Etheridge, https://bookofpain.wordpress.com. The photograph is not licensed for use in any way without the expressed consent of its creator.

Root cellar

(It is the conceit of the old
to tell the young
what is neither requested
nor heeded, so)

let us delve deep down into the loam
and there preserve the produce of want
and the fruits of self-satisfaction.
Line it with stone, bolster it with oak,
and bolt it with iron locks, but be careful;
for in that room (in that gloom)
where our hopes lie deep
and our treasures heap,
you may not be able to draw breath.

What we too often build is a tomb.

Root cellars, a means of preserving root vegetables and storable fruit, are relics of the past. As a child, I remember some rural friends still having one. Now they make a great metaphor.

The photograph is a copyright-free photo of two root cellars from Elliston, Newfoundland (my Canadian birth province). It has somewhat self-congratulatoryily awarded itself the title of Root Cellar Capitol of the World because so many are preserved there. The truth is every place everywhere was once dotted with them, but proof, as they say in Newfoundland is in the pudding. In Elliston, you can still see some of the puddings (so to speak) dug into the hillsides.

Thank you for reading Root cellar. I sincerely hope you have enjoyed it and humbly appreciate your visiting the Book of Pain. As always, I look forward to your comments.

To see my photography blog, please visit the Book of Bokeh.

j.

Poem, and notes © John Etheridge; all rights reserved. The poem and accompanying notes are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Work 3.0 Unported License. This applies to all original written work found on this site unless noted otherwise. The attribution claimed under the license is © John Etheridge,  https://bookofpain.wordpress.com.

Just like the last time

After the d’Orsay (tired, but happy)
we walk along le Rue de Lille and then de Poitiers
to lunch at the boulangerie
where the Rue de Bac meets the Rue de Verneuil.
After, we have dessert next door
at the Artisan Chocolatier.
Nowhere beats our Paris, does it?

Oh, my darling! I haven’t seen you smile like that
in such a long time. But wait, dear heart!
I wept to get you here
and weep to keep you here…
Why go?

This poem and the three that preceded it were all first drafted on a solo trip to London and Paris that I undertook last October. It was the first travel I had undertaken after my darling wife’s passing eight months previously, and obviously, her passing was (and is) much on my mind and in my heart.

Lyn and I had never traveled to London together so that leg of the trip was easier, as I was able to keep busy during the day. The Paris leg was, in retrospect, ill-fated, as I naturally fell into revisiting many of the spots that she and I had visited only a few years earlier. Still, even within that loss, there was a poem to be found.

Thank you for reading Just like the last time. I sincerely hope you have enjoyed it and I humbly appreciate your visiting the Book of Pain. As always, I look forward to your comments.

The photograph was taken on that most recent trip to Paris and is a detail of the Eiffel Tower. I like the sense of interconnectedness that it suggests; some parts illuminated and clear, others dark and hard to perceive, but nonetheless as strong. To see my photography blog, please visit the Book of Bokeh.

j.

Photograph, poem, and notes © John Etheridge; all rights reserved. The poem and accompanying notes are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Work 3.0 Unported License. This applies to all original written work found on this site unless noted otherwise. The attribution claimed under the license is © John Etheridge,  https://bookofpain.wordpress.com. The photograph is not licensed for use in any way without the expressed consent of its creator.

Rushing between flights

Through the bright yellow
the little bubbles gently swim up
to snuggle in the cloud above.
Why am I doing this? I wonder,
sliding by on the people-mover,
that isn’t me anymore.
(He continues to stare at
the beer in front of him,
certain there is some wisdom there.)
He’s right, I think, gliding away.
We’re never so lost
as when we desperately seek
where we want to go.

The third of a quattro of travel poems and a true story: a glimpse, a reflection, and what I saw…

Thank you for reading Rushing between flights. I sincerely hope you have enjoyed it and I humbly appreciate your visiting the Book of Pain. As always, I look forward to your comments.

The photograph was taken in my hometown of Putnam. To see my photography blog, please visit the Book of Bokeh.

john

Photograph, poem, and notes © John Etheridge; all rights reserved. The poem and accompanying notes are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Work 3.0 Unported License. This applies to all original written work found on this site unless noted otherwise. The attribution claimed under the license is © John Etheridge,  https://bookofpain.wordpress.com. The photograph is not licensed for use in any way without the expressed consent of its creator.

Thirty minutes out from the Gare de Nord

In France the windmills
all spin the wrong way,
no wonder I feel at home here.
But like so much else
my French is not what it used to be,
how do you say “whirl-a-gig”?
Is there enough left, je me demand,
for one more final joust?

French has no commonly-said direct equivalent to the English “I wonder.” The closest you can get is, Je me demand—I ask myself. The point, however, is not that there is no direct translation of the words, but that the French do not express themselves as do the English. In French, one just directly asks the question. C’est curieux, n’est-ce pas?

If you’ve never done the Eurostar train ride between London’s St. Pancras International and Paris’s Gare de Nord, which goes through the Chunnel, you are in for a treat. A little over two hours in duration, the ride is not only swift, it is also comfortable and quiet.

Thank you for reading Thirty minutes out from the Gare de Nord. I sincerely hope you have enjoyed it and I humbly appreciate your visiting the Book of Pain. As always, I look forward to your comments.

The photograph was taken, I believe, in Rhode Island. To see my photography blog, please visit the Book of Bokeh.

john

Photograph, poem, and notes © John Etheridge; all rights reserved. The poem and accompanying notes are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Work 3.0 Unported License. This applies to all original written work found on this site unless noted otherwise. The attribution claimed under the license is © John Etheridge,  https://bookofpain.wordpress.com. The photograph is not licensed for use in any way without the expressed consent of its creator.

Rag-tag relics on a rag-tag road

They say that if you can’t find it
at the Portobello Market
you don’t want it,
but the opposite seems true to me.
The antique lead soldiers intrigue me the most
and the affable Cockney sells them hard.
They are so beautiful, so darling,
I want to sing them a song—
a song of life so sweet and endearing
that their little lungs will swell and pump,
their tiny heads will look up and cry,
their hardened hearts swell with certain faith.

But I don’t, or can’t, or try and fail,
because they’re just not listening.
Sad to say, there are only gawkers,
not buyers, here in this place.

Thank you for reading Rag-tag relics on a rag-tag road. I sincerely hope you have enjoyed it and I humbly appreciate your visiting the Book of Pain. As always, I look forward to your comments.

The photograph was taken at the Portobello Market in London, England. To see my photography blog, please visit the Book of Bokeh.

john

Photograph, poem, and notes © John Etheridge; all rights reserved. The poem and accompanying notes are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Work 3.0 Unported License. This applies to all original written work found on this site unless noted otherwise. The attribution claimed under the license is © John Etheridge,  https://bookofpain.wordpress.com. The photograph is not licensed for use in any way without the expressed consent of its creator.