Discouraged by the extreme rhetoric of mainstream Republicans as well as those I know who are on the far right, I haven't been writing much on my blog lately. Other bloggers address the ridiculous claims of the far-right better than I do, and I don't just want to repeat what I read. Also, I have returned to Facebook, having deleted the "friend" who had the most vile posts about Barack Obama and refusing to admit any new "friends" who admit to far-right views. I have enough of those friends already, family members who compare Barack Obama to Hugo Chavez, who think Obama is some kind of far-leftist and who claim they want the government totally out of their lives (no Medicare or Medicaid, no public schools, etc.), yet who had nothing to say when the Bush Administration increased presidential power, suspended habeas corpus for terrorist suspects (even American citizens), and provided unprecedented power to the NSA to eavesdrop on American citizens.
To maintain my peace of mind, I've decided to write at least one haiku every day that emerges from something I experienced or observed during the day. This is what I post to my Facebook status. Several years ago, I studied haiku in conjunction with teaching world literature classes at a university in Georgia and as a consequence, also, of having read and thoroughly enjoyed the travel sketches of Japan's most famous haiku poet: Matsuo Basho. I've been amazed by how writing haiku has influenced my perspective. Committed to writing one haiku a day, of condensing a mood or image or experience into seventeen syllables (I'm sticking to that traditional syllabic limitation although I don't believe it's a requirement), I pay more attention to small details, especially details of nature. As R. H. Blyth writes in his classic book on haiku,
Haiku is concerned with the ordinary, the everyday. It has nothing to do with exceptional things, evenings of extraordinary magnificence and splendour. It turns inwards, toward the infinitely small and subtle, not to the vast and sublime.
To pay attention and to recognize the significance of these subtle details of life twenty-four hours a day is "the Way of Haiku," says Blyth. Well, I can't claim to be totally awake to the "real nature of things" all day long, but I am paying more attention. And so, when I first saw a caterpillar on the parsley in my Victory Garden, I began looking closer and found several other caterpillars in various instar stages, the stages between molts--of the beautiful black swallowtail butterfly.
There on the parsley
a black swallowtail larva
becoming itself.
a black swallowtail larva
becoming itself.
And then I began looking closer at other plants and discovered orange and black caterpillars--again, different instars--of Gulf Fritillaries, eating the leaves of the passion vine on our mailbox. Being aware and open to the small details of nature puts into perspective the pettiness of politics and the unreasonableness of those who demonize others with views (or ethnicity or lifestyle) different from their own.
1 comment:
Whenever we see "others" as so different from ourselves, whenever we set up a dichotomy of US versus THEM, whenever we are able to feel so RIGHT and accuse them as being so WRONG, we become alienated, adding height to the barriers between us. How do we communicate with those with whom we differ so greatly? Is it to focus on our commonality? A little bit of knowledge is, indeed, a dangerous thing. Some folks take their soundbites and want to rule the world, huh.
I think people who say they "want the government totally out of their lives" are people who have ENOUGH money, food, water, shelter. They forget about others who may not be getting along as well as they, including nonhuman others---forests, animals----and seem to have some ideal country in mind that doesn't even resemble ours, nor has it ever.
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