Pastan's "Ethics"

This story is a perfect example of how we are as humans. It is said we think we know everything when we are young adults, but the truth is we don’t know anything. I think half of that statement is usually true for most of us, and the other half is not as true as it seems. We really don’t know much, but we also know that. Sometimes we try to cover it up with fancy language or making a bold decision, but the fact of the matter is, we are just bluffing; we are just doing whatever it takes to get by. In this poem the main character is faced with a question of whether to save an old lady or a “sacred” painting. Every year the students have to decide something, but most of the time it isn’t a heartfelt, thought out decision. This is true not only in this ethics class, but in most decisions in a young person’s life. We don’t think about how things might affect us in the future, or even more importantly, how it affects others.

We also see how the perspective changes as we get older. All the situations we have been asked about suddenly become more than just hypothetical and we have to make a decision that will carry weight. All of the things we thought would never affect us are things we begin looking in the eye. The character probably never thought she would see the day when there might actually be an old lady looking at that painting, let alone have it be her.

I love when a poem speaks to the reader in such a tangible way. As literature students, we don’t necessarily think the things we are reading in our classes are going to have a significant impact on us. And while some of them may not, there will be those that (forgive the cliché) change our lives whether we see it now or not.

Art Museum

I went to the Polk Museum of Art for this assignment, and I stayed there for at least 40 minutes.

It was great to walk around the art museum this weekend. I have always known it was there, but I never really took the time to go inside it (which is ironic/sad because I am a huge art fanatic).
It seems crazy to think that so much art is all stored in one place like that, just waiting to be discovered. And it is in such a remote location that I can’t imagine it sees too many new faces very often.
While I was there I noticed a middle-aged couple who were perusing the gallery as well. In the ceramic section I sat down and just watched them for a little bit. I know they weren’t an exhibit, and they may have even just been tourists, but in a way they were still part of the art there. It was inspiring to see the man take such interest and fascination in something that seemed more like the woman’s hobby than his own. And the way she looked at each piece as though it were one of the greatest things, as if somehow each piece were better than the previous. There was nothing particularly memorable about these people, not to demean them in any way, but they stood out to me.
There was a piece outside that I thought was particularly hilarious; it was titled Still Life and Pears (or something similar to that effect, I don’t remember exactly), and it had a house-like structure sitting next to some pears. I know it sound ridiculous but I couldn’t help but burst out laughing. :D
I really enjoyed a lot of the works in the student gallery too. It is crazy for me to think that these people are my age or younger and they have produced works that earned enough merit to be in a museum, no matter how small of one.



The Truth Is…

Just a few faces shining back at me
Like some sort of house of mirrors

Some are smiling, frowning, sober
Others shy, prideful, smug

Some live abundantly and are the envy of their neighbors
The rest are the neighbors, envying even just clean water

It is humbling when you step into the empty home
Realizing they are still happy; even they can be happy.



Labor

Calloused hands run over the page of designs
What will be the next hit is the question
Maybe blossoms, but it is summer so maybe waves
Maybe they will want to get ready for the soon approaching cool season
So maybe maple leaves

Carefully picking out the spindles so as not to rough the material
The calloused hands begin to set up the loom
These threads will form fabric
And this fabric will feed a family
From one artist to another


Laughable

They will see this and not understand
Nevertheless, I continue

Reading for Transformation... by Francis X. McAloon (SJ)

“The encounter described here [in Sandra Schneiders’ The Revelatory Text] goes beyond the accumulation of new data or the enjoyment of aesthetic experience, to focus attention upon the reader’s reappropriation of self.”

This quote from the reading strikes me particularly because of the way it challenges the reader. So often today it is difficult to find a person who even merely reads for pleasure, let alone reading something that they choose to grow from. I say “choose” because that is exactly what it is; we have the choice whether or not to let something affect us.

This text particularly focuses on the practice known as lectio divina. This is a method was originally used by monks to study scripture, but it is now widely practiced for a variety of texts. The purpose is to better understand the message that is being conveyed; not just cognitively, but spiritually, emotionally, and even socially.

Schneider stresses the impact on more than just cognitive gain. Personally I think this is because we don’t think about things in that way; instead we let it impact us in ways that alter how we interact with life. Does this mean we remember the text necessarily? No, but the point of the text is not to remember page numbers or lines; the primary goal is more than that.

Reading for pleasure or mere knowledge (I say mere knowledge in the sense that it is only knowledge, I do not intend to belittle the gain of knowledge, nor do I think this is the goal of the author) is great, but if we invested the same amount of zeal in applying this text to ourselves and use it to “reappropriate” our internal self there would be an explosion of effects. We would be changed which would affect those around us who would affect those around them and thus forth.

Lectio divina is more than just a spiritual practice and can be used habitually in everyday life, even that novel sitting next to your pillow.

"Darkness, Questions, Poetry, and Spiritual Hope" by Paul T. Corrigan

Sometimes we read things and think nothing more of them than just casual words to pass the time. Other times we read things at a time that it seems eerily prophetic. Maybe all literature should be more than just a brief encounter, but in this world it simply isn’t true—I am getting off topic. This particular essay struck me when I read it because very similar thoughts have been turning through my mind these past few weeks. While I am not facing a mortal death sentence, I am facing one in a sense. I am not coming back to college this fall, and that is a very scary thing for me. But I have noticed I am not “shaking in my boots” about this fact. Over the past year of have overcome many personal difficulties that I won’t go into detail about, but they led me down some very dark paths. Not to say that I was succumbed entirely to them, but I was definitely not in a good place. One of the biggest involved me nearly losing my faith. But it was in this that my faith was really grounded.

We have to go through the darkness in order to understand it. It is not the same as watching somebody else go through it, or trying to help a friend through a tight spot; each individual who wishes to help another through a trial irrefutably must have gone through one themselves.

“Unless we face darkness, we have nothing to offer those who are hurting and we have no resources for ourselves when we get our own turn at pain—except our cheap religious clichés.” --Paul T. Corrigan ‘Darkness, Questions, Poetry, and Spiritual Hope’

Darkness is something we should become familiar with. I don’t mean just as Christians, but all of humanity, if just for the sake of humanity.

I went to Lake Bonny Park for this assignment, and I stayed there for at least 40 minutes

As Christians, we have an obligation to take care of the earth. Read a poem like Robert Hass’ makes me sad to think that we have let the world come down to such a low state. At the same time, in his poem we can see how there is still beauty all around us.

One of my favorite lines from the poem says,
“What is to be done with our species? Because we know we’re going to die, to be submitted to that tingling dance of atoms once again, it’s easy for us to feel that our lives are a dream—as this is, in a way, a dream: the flailing rain, the birds, the soaked red backpack of the child, tendrils of wet hair, the windshield wipers, this voice trying to speak across the centuries between us, even the long story of the earth, Boreal forests, mangrove swamps, Tiberian wheatfields in the summer heat on hillsides south of Rome—all of it a dream, and we alive somewhere, somehow outside it, watching.”

Sitting in the park after the rain and just feeling the wind blow and the sun dry up the water reminded me very much of these lines. There was a hat that must have been forgotten by somebody and a broken bottle on side of the path right before the boardwalk. It made me think how we all leave some sort of footprint behind that is going to affect somebody else.

When it was time to do the quiet time I sat out on the end of the boardwalk. I couldn’t help but notice the earth has a sort of rhythm to it. Not to say that there is a deity commonly known as “Mother Earth” but everything still has a flow. You can see how God works just in the way the fish swim in the lake below or how the alligator sitting near the shore on the other side waits for his next meal. There is so much to be found in the beauty of the earth, and it all reflects our beautiful God.

Still?
There is a brisk wind blowing at my back
Making my hair blow into my face;
My feet dangle precariously over the rail;
This place is teeming with life
Even in the middle of this suburbia.

The wind is stilled as I catch my breath,
Looking down I admire the fish swimming below me;
Though the weather is mildly warm
I know the water below me is frigid;
Even still I would like to go for a swim.

The sun is starting to lower in the sky
And thoughts enter my mind about leaving,
But it is so hard to do when I am surrounded
With the very breath of life itself
How could anyone look around and not give praise

The wind picks up again, this time with more authority
I hop off the rail and lay on the wooden planks to look up
At first, with lids closed, I listen to the secret language
Between the water and the waves.
I smirk as I realize the affair I am witnessing.

A few mosquitoes have decided to have an early dinner
So I reluctantly stand to my feet and stretch
I realize there is never a single moment of silence
There is never a time when the world just stops
Be still and watch what you are missing

State of the Planet by Robert Hass

This poem is, on a shallow description, the story of a little girl who is waiting to cross a street on a rainy day. She has a book in here bag called Getting to Know Your Planet and the poem goes on to say what the book describes inside. Hass goes beyond that though and explains what should be in the book too.
It is clear throughout the poem that the author is addressing environmental issues, but it was in an unexpected format, at least for me. It doesn’t seem like he is talking to the reader, but to an outsider, a visitor to Earth; I do not mean in a weird “Area 51 alien” sort of way either. There was very much a tone of melancholy throughout the poem that is infective. Hass seems to be mourning over the treatment of the planet (which he has every right to do so) and over the ignorance of the inhabitants. We are doing things that destroy our planet and we know they do (cars), but we also have things that not everybody realizes cause harm, so it is considered accidental (refrigerators). We selfishly exploit this beautiful gift not realizing the beauty it already possesses.
I like how he adds the part in about everything seeming like a dream. It doesn’t seem like it is real, like the earth cannot be going to this sort of state. If it gets too bad surely we will wake up. Sadly this is the view of a lot of people; some of them may not even realize it. People think the things they do don’t affect them, so why should they care? This poem sends a reality check out to everyone: it is easy to just tell ourselves what we want to hear to make everything have a happy ending, but the truth is it still does not change reality; actions do have consequences.

"This Blessed House" by Jhumpa Lahiri

In this story we see two people, Sanjeev and Twinkle, who seem very different. Sanjeev seems like the kind of guy who is very straightforward about doing things. He seems like he tries to play the “tough guy” sometimes, but he really is a nice guy. He works hard for what he has and would like to live a simple, uncomplicated life. His wife, Twinkle, seems like a free-spirited woman. She has also worked for what she has, but she seems more like the party girl. She likes adventure and doesn’t fancy the traditional role of being a housewife to stay home and cook all day. These two seem like an unlikely couple: they were married after only knowing each other for a few months. Sanjeev even talks in the story about how Twinkle used to have such good taste and he wonders what has changed. They don’t seem to have known each other very well. Nonetheless, I think they have a unique relationship that has a key in it that other relationships today seem to be lacking: respect. Not to say they don’t have arguments or anything of that nature, the point is even after these things, they see what really matters. Sanjeev really would have taken that yard ornament to the dump if he had no respect for his wife’s feelings. Even Twinkle, although rebellious and still much like an adolescent in some ways, tries to respect her husband on some level; she cooks him dinner one night that he is thoroughly impressed with.

I think what makes these characters so real is that they are not perfect. They don’t have that classic fairy tale ending, they don’t have to have the perfect marriage or social skills, and there are so many other reasons that make them imperfect. The fact that they have so many flaws, I think, comforts the reader not because it makes the reader feel superior, but that it lets them know they are not alone. It is almost essential to have a character that has a flaw or they won’t seem real; if they aren’t real, chances are the reader won’t connect with the characters.