The Intricate Art of Weaving
Interfaces, relationships. Seeking common bonds, weaving cords across the division. My torn intercostal muscles have to knit, with just enough exercise, not too much, steady, listening for hurt, and heeding, easing off for a while, then resuming.
So too, with relationships. Exercise, keep trying, weave common bonds, don’t overdo it but don’t coddle either. Listen, find just the right push. Then repeat it all again on the morrow. Until the knit is complete.
And too, with humans and nature. Many have learned not to trample, to respect, to form bonds with the natural world, but we are ever learning how we unknowingly do damage. We keep trying to build a web from us to them, but must constantly repair the breaks in that web.
And there will always remain a small sensitive place, where the heal will never be complete.
Interfaces, relationships. Seeking common bonds, weaving cords across the division. My torn intercostal muscles have to knit, with just enough exercise, not too much, steady, listening for hurt, and heeding, easing off for a while, then resuming.
So too, with relationships. Exercise, keep trying, weave common bonds, don’t overdo it but don’t coddle either. Listen, find just the right push. Then repeat it all again on the morrow. Until the knit is complete.
And too, with humans and nature. Many have learned not to trample, to respect, to form bonds with the natural world, but we are ever learning how we unknowingly do damage. We keep trying to build a web from us to them, but must constantly repair the breaks in that web.
And there will always remain a small sensitive place, where the heal will never be complete.
 Cannon Beach, Oregon Cannon Beach After a night in luxurious bed, All amenities provided, Well-partied wedding guests Sleep it off late. I descend steep wooden stairs To the sandy beach. People, coffee cup in hand, Walk their dogs. I head for the ocean, Focus on the waves' steady roar. Cold water laps at my bare feet, I can see to the horizon. Focus on the seaweed, Washed ashore, the crab shells, A half sand dollar, jellies, Waiting for the next big wave. The dogs are well-behaved, The people quiet and unobtrusive, But I can’t help noticing how The birds fly when they come. How the people are focused On themselves, their companions, Better, I think, than on their phones, But do they notice? do they see? And I walk farther, to the end, To an isolated sandbar, covered With gulls secure from dogs, Where the people are scarce. One young gull is on my side, Apathetic, it lets me walk Right by, take a photo or two, But flies when a dog arrives. And the gulls on the other side All scatter when a dog and its people Cross the shallow water To the previously isolated sandbar. I sit at the edge of the stream That runs into the ocean, Silently commune with a heron, That sedately watches, wades. And I wonder, to whom Does the beach belong? To the animals or the people, To all-- or to none? I walk back along the beach, Leaving footprints in the sand, Which, when the tide is high, The ocean’s waves will erase.  Heron at Cannon Beach Larkspur Landing Leave the trendy doughnut shop, The people, friendly. somehow grate on me, The road, where cars sedately snake along, Stuck in their metal-asphalt world. Climb down the dirt path to the lagoon, Feel my senses change. Near silence, broken By bird song. Whiff of salty sea air. Soft, cool Ocean breeze, beckoning. Look up to the East to see fancy Houses perched on the hill, To the West, six lanes of black asphalt, Cut into the steep wooded hillside. Trail ends, can’t walk along the water, Ferry landing on one end, Prison fence on the other. So I return to my car. But stop to talk to a gruff man, Scottish accent, taken aback but friendly, He tells me all about the trails he hikes. I see Mt. Tam serenely watching us. -MW |  Solitary gull at Cannon Beach Symbiosis Symbiotic ties are ubiquities And can be good or bad, Of advantage to one but not the other, And best when needs and purposes Of both parts are fairly served. The unbalanced former is all too common, The balanced latter, sporadic occurrence. Let Us Be Humans! Different though we are, Let us appreciate one another, Let us respect one another, Let us help one another, Let us be humans! Many though we are There's room for all of us, A place for each of us, Food for all of us, Let us be humans! Anguished though we are, Suspicion, hatred and strife, With which the world is rife, Only diminish life. Let us be humans! -JM Pithy Thoughts Every hurt leaves a scar, however invisible. -MW Our world's civilizations will in due time perish, Scarred Nature will then heal and flourish. -JM  I am the uniter, sitting on the sofa between my two masters, reminding them that we are an inseparable family.  Bin die See, du das Land, Deutlich unterschiedlich. Aber an dem heissen Strand, Land und Wasser treffen sich. I'm the sea, you the land, Different as can be. But on the hot, summer strand, Land and water meet. And then there is a space Where the sand is wet, Footsteps remain in place Until they are wave-swept. -MW  The rower is close to the water. She greets the dolphins at their level, plays hide and seek with the young seal, rides each wave, goes with the wind and the currents, and leaves little wake. The kayaker is even closer and the tule boat the closest. For the tule boat is built with natural materials from the Bay itself, will compost into the shore when it gets old, the paddler gets his food from the Bay, unpackaged, unprocessed. The tule boat glides silently among the rushes, one big bird among many. Just one strand in Nature's web. |
A fugue is the musical version of weaving. Several voices running alongside each other, meeting in harmony, then veering off again, and ending in a final harmonic whole. The Toccata and Fugue by Johann Sebastian Bach is a master of this form.
Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor, Hannes Kästner organist, Thomaskirche, Leipzig, Germany. Posted on Youtube by MovieMongerH2 in 2010, in public domain.