February 15th, 2013
by Michael Palmer
The voice, because of its austerity, will often cause dust to rise.
The voice, because of its austerity, will sometimes attempt the representation of dust.
Someone will say, I can’t breathe—as if choking on dust.
The voice ages with the body.
It will say, I was shaped by light escaping from a keyhole.
Or, I am the shape of that light.
It will say, For the body to breathe, a layer must be peeled away.
It will say, What follows is a picture of how things are for me now.
It will say, The rose is red, twice two is four—as if another were present.
The dust rises in spirals.
It will say, The distance from Cairo to anywhere is not that great.
As if one had altered the adjustment of a microscope.
Or examined its working parts.
Possibly an instrument covered with dust and forgotten on a shelf.
Beside a hatbox and a pair of weathered boots.
The voice will expand to fill a given space.
As if to say, This space is not immeasurable.
This space is not immeasurable.
When held before your eyes.
And which voice is it says (or claims to say), Last night I dreamt of walls and courses of brick, last night I dreamt of limbs.
As you dream—always unwillingly—of a writing not visible and voices muffled by walls.
As if the question: lovers, prisoners, visitors.
The voice, as an act of discipline or play, will imitate other voices.
This is what I am doing now.
This is what I’m doing now.
The clock behind my back, its Fusée mechanism.
Voice one recognizes from years before.
Beneath water, hidden by a spark.
Here at the heart of winter, or let’s say spring.
Voice with a history before its eyes.
With a blue dot before its eyes.
History of dust before its eyes.
It will say, as if remembering, The letter S stands for a slow match burning.
On the table before me.
No numbers on this watch.
And I live in a red house that once was brown.
A paper house, sort of falling down.
Such is the history of this house.
It looks like this.
Looks just like this.
We think to say in some language.
February 15th, 2013
by Adrienne Rich
i.
Burnt by lightning nevertheless
she’ll walk this terra infinita
lashes singed on her third eye
searching definite shadows for an indefinite future
Old shed-boards beaten silvery hang
askew as sheltering
some delicate indefensible existence
Long grasses shiver in a vanished doorway’s draft
a place of origins as yet unclosured and unclaimed
Writing cursive instructions on abounding air
If you arrive with ripe pears, bring a sharpened knife
Bring cyanide with the honeycomb
call before you come
ii.
Let the face of the bay be violet black the tumbled torn
kelp necklaces strewn alongshore
Stealthily over time arrives the chokehold
stifling ocean’s guttural chorales
a tangle
of tattered plastic rags
iii.
In a physical world the great poverty would be
to live insensate shuttered against the fresh
slash of urine on a wall
low-tidal rumor of a river’s yellowed mouth
a tumor-ridden face asleep on a subway train
What would it mean to not possess
a permeable skin
explicit veil to wander in
iv.
A cracked shell crumbles.
Sun moon and salt dissect the faint
last grains
An electrical impulse zings
out ricochets
in meta-galactic orbits
a streak of nervous energy rejoins the crucible
where origins and endings meld
There was this honey-laden question mark
this thread extracted from the open
throat of existence—Lick it clean!
—let it evaporate—
February 5th, 2013
Read Emily’s latest sermon, “Estuary,” on her blog, Sit and Eat. It’s about the woman who washes Jesus’ feet with her tears and dies them with her hair, which back then was a pretty sexy thing to do.
February 3rd, 2013
We will be back underground this Ash Wednesday, Feburary 13 from 5:30 PM-7:30 PM to distribute ashes to commuters. We’ll meet in the same passage near the 4th Avenue/Pacific street entrance, between the R/N and 2/3, 4/5 lines. Charlotte will be playing the fiddle, and Emily and interested Lydians will be dispensing ashes to anyone who asks for them. All are welcome to come and join in this yearly ritual marking the beginning of lent.
January 31st, 2013
by Wendy Videlock
Change is the new,
improved,
word for god,
lovely enough
to raise a song
or implicate
a sea of wrongs,
mighty enough,
like other gods,
to shelter,
bring together,
and estrange us.
Please, god,
we seem to say,
change us.
–Read at St. Lydia’s on January 27, 2013
January 25th, 2013
We weren’t able to get enough black eyed peas in time this Sunday, so we made it with a mixture of beans — black-eyed peas, soybeans, pinto beans, Great Northern beans, maybe one or two others — which actually turned out great. You can make it with any similar beans. If you make it with only black-eyed peas and serve over rice, it’s the classic Southern dish “hoppin’ John.” If you serve it with cornbread, as we did, it’s a traditional lucky New Year’s meal with the black-eyed peas for luck and the (gold) cornbread for money. –Phil
Simple black-eyed peas
Serves 4
olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
1/2 red bell pepper, chopped
1/2 green bell pepper, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
2 15-oz. cans black eyed peas or other beans, rinsed and drained
1/4 cup stock (vegetable or chicken)
Salt and pepper
1 T chopped parsley
2 green onions, chopped
1 large tomato, seeded and diced
1. Chop onions, bell peppers, celery and garlic.
2. Heat olive oil over medium-high heat.
3. Add onion, bell pepper, celery and garlic to oil.
4. Saute until vegetables are tender and onion is translucent.
5. Add the black eyed peas, stock, salt and pepper. Cook for approximately 10 minutes.
7. Chop green onions and tomatoes and set aside for garnish.
6. Chop parsley.
8. Stir parsley into beans and remove from heat.
Serve over rice or with cornbread or both.
Garnish with chopped green onions and tomato.
—Prepared with our help by Phil at St. Lydia’s on January 6, 2012
January 22nd, 2013
Read Emily’s latest sermon, “I’m Not Here to be Pure,” on her blog, Sit and Eat. There may be a Downton Abbey reference, but promise, there are no spoilers.
January 21st, 2013
Read Emily’s latest sermon, “Gulf,” on her blog, Sit and Eat. The text is Luke 4:14-30, the story of Jesus returning home to Nazareth.
January 15th, 2013
by W. H. Auden
Perhaps I always knew what they were saying:
Even the early messengers who walked
Into my life from books where they were staying.
Those beautiful mahines that never talked
But let the small boy worship and learn
All their long names whose hardness make him proud,
Love was the word they never said aloud
As something that a picture can’t return.
And later when I hunted the Good Place,
Abandoned lead-mines let themselves be caught;
There was no pity in the adit’s face,
The rusty winding-engine never taught
One abviously too apt, to say Too Late:
Their lack of shyness was a way of praising
Just what I didn’t know, why was I gazing,
While all their lack of answer whispered ‘Wait’,
And taught me gradually without coercion,
And all the landscape round them pointed to
The calm with which they took complete desertion
As proof that you existed.
It was true.
For now I have the answer from the face
That never will go back into a book
But asks for all my life, and is the Place
Where all I touch is moved to an embrace,
And there is no such a thing as a vain look.
–Read at St. Lydia’s on January 13 , 2013
January 14th, 2013
A delicious Czech garlic soup, introduced to St. Lydia’s by Aaron and Shamika!
6 cloves garlic
2 Tbsp butter (optional)
1/2 onion (any kind)
6 cups broth (any kind)
2 potatoes
2 eggs (optional)
paprika and fresh marjoram
parmesan or some other sharp cheese for garnish (optional)
Rye croutons
Sautee minced garlic and chopped onions in butter. Put into pot with broth, cubed potatoes, paprika, and majoram until potatoes are cooked through and flavors begin to mingle. If using eggs whip the and pour into pot while stirring. Serve with croutons and cheese. Serves 4.
-Prepared with our help by Aaron and Shamika on January 13, 2012
