WORKING WITH DAD

Mentally, Dad was vanishing fast. Incipient Alzheimer's. Sandy and I were there on a visit. I think he still knew us, but you couldn't be sure. After breakfast, he wanted to cut back some tree branches from the eaves. He showed me where the long-handled pruner was. At the side of the house, I did the cutting and he did the directing.

Working from the ground, trimming the branches back was hard and uncomfortable. I knew I could do it better from the roof. So I got the ladder and climbed up. From there, I made rapid progress. "You should come down," he said. "Why?" I asked. "Because it's dangerous."

Back on the ground, I helped him to cut the branches into small pieces, filling a 32-gallon trash can. As we neared the end of the job, I remarked that it was almost done. "All good things come to an end," he said.

21 December 2016

Some of my readers have mentioned that there does not seem to be any way provided to follow my poetry blog. So far as I can see, the only way Google has given us is to follow me (Don Traxler) on Google Plus. That will work, as long as I share every new entry on Google+, and I will try to do this, as appropriate. So, add me to your G+ circles. It won't notify you of every post, but you will get 90% of them. Other social media will also work, and some, such as Twitter, will work even better.

RED WING

1959, sold some "ham" gear to buy them. Red Wing boots, tan, split leather, size 10. I was 17, feet still growing. Needed them for long hikes in Hollenbeck Canyon with Dave and Mike, encounters with rattlesnakes, .22 rifles, male bonding.

That was then, and this is now. Brought another pair with me from the US. Black, leather not split, couple sizes bigger. Six thousand miles and more than half a century away, when I slip my feet into them, I'm back in Hollenbeck Canyon. Funny how things go in circles. No rifle, more likely a dog leash in my hand. But when the hot, December sun bakes the eucalyptus leaves and the pine needles are fragrant, I'm there.

The tag inside says "Made in USA Red Wing Shoes since 1905." They still have the original, overbuilt heels and soles, too. Quality that's a thing of the past. But then, I'm a thing of the past. Don't reckon I'll be needing another pair, but I can wear these boots when I can't wear anything else. Ha! There's an image for you!

20 December 2016

TESTAMENTOS DO INFERNO

II.
O portón se abrirá pa dentro
y se feshará pa fora.
O país "do meio" otrora
É agora mui longe do centro.

The Gate will open toward the inside
and will be closed without.
The country that was once "of the middle"
is now very far out.

19 dezembro 2016

ॐ नमः शिवाय ॐ

JK/NKK 119
Who sleeps, and who is awake?
The water seeps from what lake?
What should be offered to Shiva in worship?
What supreme state may we reach?

JK/NKK 120
The mind sleeps and the higher Self is awake.
Water always seeps from Five Senses Lake.
We offer the water of Self-meditation.

Shiva-consciousness is the state to be reached.

I had already included these two vakhs in blog entries of 6 October 2016. Unfortunately, they were in separate entries, and in reverse order.

Lalla is here teaching us by asking riddles and then giving us the answers. My translations are quite accurate, so I'll let Lalla's words speak for themselves, even in translation. It is Lalla who is the teacher, not me.

A few words of explanation about this project are in order. First of all, the JK/NKK numbers refer to the numbering of Jayalal Kaul, who applied an interesting set of criteria to several hundred supposed "lalvakhs," in an effort to determine which were likely to have actually been written by her. In this way, he came up with a collection of 138 vakhs that he thought were probably genuine.

Jayalal Kaul's collection, with its numbering, was in turn adopted by Nil Kanth Kotru, in his 1989 book LAL DED, Her Life and Sayings. It was this book that convinced me that the current project was actually feasible. One of Kotru's innovations was to present Lalla's original texts in a modified system of Devanagari, which allowed him to represent all of Kashmiri's many vowels. Neither standard Devanagari nor the standard Perso-Arabic script can do this (nor can the Sharada script, in spite of some claims).

At any rate, I transliterated NKK's modified Devanagari (in which the diacritical marks were written in by hand) into a special romanization, which also represented all the vowels, but could be typed on a computer keyboard. When I publish my complete collection of translations of Lalla's vakhs, that romanized text will be included with each poem. The collection that I publish will likely include about 150 vakhs, since there are some from other sources that I accept as genuine. Typographical errors in NKK's Kashmiri text will also be corrected, so far as I am able to do that.

Lalla wrote in an old form of Kashmiri, which for speakers of modern English would be analogous to Chaucer's Middle English. She included a lot of Sanskrit words, which actually helps. Lalla's poems are the oldest surviving Kashmiri literature. So far as I know, there are no books to teach one how to understand Lalla's old form of Kashmiri. Lalla herself has been my teacher, through her poems. I always work from a Kashmiri text, also consulting other translators whose translations I have found to be literal enough to be of use. My finished translation is thus a kind of consensus as to the meaning of Lalla's Kashmiri, expressed in suitable English by a native speaker.

While I owe huge debts of gratitude to many people in the Kashmiri Pundit community, my most important help and teacher has been Lalla herself, and it is she that now drives the work forward.

ॐ नमः शिवाय ॐ

LALLA

It was your nudity
that first caused me
to notice you.
Now I see you
clothed, but your
soul cannot
be hidden.

We are children of
the same Father
and Mother,
speaking different
languages, yet
sister and brother.

We meet in dream
and we meet in mantra,
we meet in OM,
and in "namah Shivaya."

14 December 2016
ॐ नमः शिवाय ॐ

MEDITATION ON 11

MEDITATION ON 11

In what do I take refuge,
with so much doubt?
How can you say to me.
"bird, hill"
without explaining?
Am I to fly like a bird
to the mountain,
or fly like a mountain bird?
Or fly to my own hill?

When the foundations
have been thrown over,
what can the just do?

For the foundations
are destroyed--
what has the Righteous
One done?

If the foundations are destroyed
what has the righteous man accomplished?

quoniam quae perfecisti, destruxerunt

Because what you fashioned,
they destroyed,
but what did the righteous do?

If the foundations are destroyed,
what can the righteous do?

Quando fundamenta evertuntur,
justus quid facere valet?

For the laws are dissipated,
what has the just man done?

leges dissipatae sunt

There is so much doubt--
how is it to be
dissipated,
overturned,
destroyed?

The foundations
are a monument
to uncertainty.

December 12 2015, revised December 12 2016