Mythos

Mythos

Santa Claus -
Easter Bunny -
God -
Love -
Honor -
Dignity.

I'm beginning
to fear
that when I get to -
Death -
That'll turn out
to be bullshit,
too.

Doug Palmer March 2008
4 short days after his birthday.

Tribal Welcoming

Growing up on a concrete island like Manhattan, Alex then spent many years along the California beaches, learning to love the sea, swapping the Pacific for the Atlantic; finding inspiration in driftwood, kelp, and tide pools. When she moved to San Juan Island, she got the best of both worlds, surrounded by the sea, a return to the island, and the alure and comfort of a small town; getting a microcosm of Americana married to the song of the sea.

Tribal Welcoming

Independence
is sometimes contextual;
like these shore pines,
one can stand
alone
and still be bolstered
and protected
by others nearby.

When a strong wind blows,
surrounding neighbors keep
the damage
to a minimum.
Without them,
a lone tree
could easily topple.

Such is my growing,
happy experience
on this little island
in the foremost
upper left hand corner
of the United States.

Lots of independent thinkers
here;
lots of folks
with open minds
who choose not to tell others
how to live
and prefer not
to be instructed
on that
themselves.

Yet the palpable sense
of interconnectivity
is everywhere.
Living on an island,
just about
every person you meet
is framed
by a musical repeat sign:
you will see them again,
somewhere,
and often
in a different milieu
than where you last met.

That’s
the jazz version;
different harmonizations
second
and third times
around!.

It is a far more
tribal level
of awareness
than one would ever find
in a city;
and it is a fascinating
lesson
in the simultaneous truths
of independence
and interdependence.

Alex Shapiro July 2007

The Meaning of Home

Last June, after having only lived in the San Juans for a couple months, Alex took one of her many trips to NYC. Returning to her island home filled her with insight and contentment.

The Meaning of Home

Words do little
to describe
how glad I am
to be back
from Manhattan.

A volcano,
a boat,
and an archipelago are
to my senses,
a vast improvement
on a skyscraper,
a subway,
and a few
siren and soot-filled boroughs
called
New York City.

But that is just me,
now.
When I was growing up,
I was
A quintessential
New Yorker,
who couldn’t have imagined
living anywhere
else.

I mean,
what else could there
possibly be
to do
and see
and experience
that wasn’t in
the greatest city
in the world?
Why leave?

And then at 21,
I left,
and my world
expanded.

I still love
New York,
the way
one still loves
difficult relatives;
but my heart
lives here.

Alex Shapiro June 2007

Whale Watch

Most of this poem was written as poetry by Alex. What a nice surprise to unearth it.

Whale Watch

We waited.
We watched;
two mourning doves,
three tiny lizards,
four adorable squirrels;
no whales.

Where did they go?
Did the Union
give them
a lunch break,
and no one
informed us?

Are they striking,
in protest
of the commercial squid boats
whose flood lights lure
the cephalopods,
and deplete
the whale’s food source?

Or maybe they knew
I had my camera
poised
to capture their grace,
and like the Amish,
didn’t want their souls
stolen.

Alex Shapiro March 28, 2007

Family

Family

Long fingers move
methodically,
and Piano takes
the lead,
as Clarinet grasps
its busy hands, both
happy to welcome
Flute,
who breathlessly joins
the venture--
the joyous search
to discover
the tattered tales
of each individual
piece of driftwood,
while swaying
to the log rhythms.

Driftwood,
together now,
were once solitary
strangers
rooted on distant shores,
before each journeyed
to this spot,
to become something more;
a community,
an integral part
of a Poseidon sculpture,
bleaching together
into one great White;
all there,
still wearing the sand
they picked up
rolling across the welcoming
beach after
riding the tall waves
like war canoes;
adrift yet resolute,
as they searched
in their way
for sanctuary;
feeling compelled
to mingle,
to tangle,
to add themselves,
to become part
of their very own
sea wall.

Glenn Buttkus March 2008

Grounded

I know, I know--it seems like Alex Shapiro has started up yet another blog site; but actually that is not entirely true. She contributes to this one effortlessly by just posting comments on NOTES FROM THE KELP, and then I, in my way, take her prose, her comments, and tweek them, and reprocess them. She has the eye of a poet although she has never fully realized it. It is important to understand that for her, composing music is a total body and total spiritual process, and her writing, her sketching, her photography, all contribute to the music that pours out from within her, that magnificent magma that scortches us all, searing its message within our aura.

Grounded

A signature
of this island
is the impressive amount
of driftwood
that wanders
to its shores.

Not just
small branches
flung by a few gusts afar
to become suddenly afloat,
but entire trees
blown over and out
to sea
from violent storms;
and very large logs
that tumble
from barges while en route
to a less sandy substrate.

Our beaches
are a repository
for the thousands
of stories
those wooden immigrants
might tell.

I’ve arrived
to these shores,
right alongside
of the driftwood—
all of us
no longer
at sea,
no longer
adrift.
Home.

Alex Shapiro March 2008

My Vista

My Vista

A few footsteps
up the path
from our house
leads you to the edge
of the bluffs,
from which
you can face
up the coast,
or spin
on your heels
and look down
the coast.

I think
days like this
are the most exhilarating
of all;
the air is charged,
and there is
the anticipation
of not knowing
which patio chair
may go flying
in which direction.

There is nothing
between us
and the Pacific.
It feels exciting,
and great
and alive
and intriguing
and dangerous
and thrilling
and real.

The sky is at
its most compelling,
with constantly shifting
balances
of dark and light,
which double their efforts
in the colors
reflected in the ocean.


I will never get over
just how stunning
this expanse
of sky and water
is,
and how in turn
it opens
the expanse of something
unspeakable
within me.

Alex Shapiro March 2006