Spinozablue: An Eclectic Journal of the Arts

Posted on: December 14, 2010

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Miranda  —  The Tempest. 1916. By John William Waterhouse

We have new poetry from Ann Applegarth below.

The ocean, the strand, the inter­ac­tion between self and sea, between our Being in the world ver­sus our Seeing in the world …

Humanity long ago left the realm of an easy one­ness with Nature, but a par­al­lel belief held on, at least through the Romantic period: women were nat­u­rally still with Her. Nature itself was fem­i­nine. Men had lost the link, but not women, and men could retain that link indi­rectly through women.

Women no doubt view this male con­struct some­what dif­fer­ently. Perhaps rad­i­cally so. Some may find it offen­sive, sad, silly, amus­ing, and a host of other things. But it is with us still, in our poetry and art, our music, per­haps our sub­con­scious minds. If Jung is cor­rect, it is a uni­ver­sal arche­type we can not escape.…

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Posted on: December 6, 2010

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LANDLUBBER IN LOVE

I smelled the sea today!

The aroma of salt-​​​​crusted roses,
of mother-​​​​of-​​​​pearl, of adven­ture,
shared its romance
unwill­ingly
with
one who is
no part of it.

YOU KNOW THEM AS WELL AS I DO

I never was a woman who could
fling a hank of lus­trous hair over her right
shoul­der to punc­tu­ate declar­a­tive
sen­tences, or one who appears frag­ile
and small when crying.

Those glossy women have the edge
in life, while the rest of us strug­gle
against the odds, grop­ing for words
to fling, words that sel­dom have the
tex­ture of silk or the imme­di­acy of a
grace­fully exe­cuted fem­i­nine gesture.

And when we cry
oh, when we cry, our bod­ies grow
steel-​​​​like and huge, our blotched faces
con­tort, and our dis­cor­dant sobs
rever­ber­ate even unto three generations.

– by Ann Applegarth

Copyright ©2010 by Ann Applegarth. All Rights Reserved.

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Ann Applegarth was awarded an Academy of American Poets prize at the University of New Mexico in 1980, and her work has appeared in pub­li­ca­tions such as West Wind Review, Bellowing Ark, Sin Fron teras, The Cresset, St.…

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Posted on: November 2, 2010

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Guest Blogger: Robert Mueller

It is tempt­ing to admire poets whose poetry rewards the lov­ing atten­tion of repeated read­ing.  Barbara Guest pro­vides that expe­ri­ence, and some read­ers may draw away from her results sim­ply as if she were just try­ing, just try­ing to be dif­fi­cult.  It is true, the writ­ing has a dis­tinctly pre­pos­sess­ing char­ac­ter.  Everything asso­ci­ated with the poetry, includ­ing the image, the style, the state­ment, the bril­liant and tran­quil charm of her spec­tac­u­lar, or hum­ble, or both, words, or both in the same blizzard-​​​​cutting phrase, speaks nobil­ity.  If they step proud, if they step serene, they invei­gle the rush­ing blame, put it fondly to rest.

That is how I see it.  But what of all this delight, appar­ent only for the reader who likes to assume a scholar’s robe?  What can you really make of tasty bits of hid­den sig­nif­i­cance, these pearls of cool or stream­lined and then pierc­ing astuteness?…

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Posted on: October 7, 2010

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Ondine. Directed by Neil Jordan. 2010

A down on his luck fish­er­man looks in his net one day and finds a woman. The down on his luck fish­er­man has an adorable and pre­co­cious daugh­ter who con­vinces him the catch may be a selkie, a half woman, half seal from the depths of Irish myth and legend.

We watch as Ondine, the beau­ti­ful selkie played by Alicja Bachleda, devel­ops a close rela­tion­ship with the fish­er­man and his daugh­ter. We wait to find out if she really is a crea­ture from the deep. Hints along the way point us in the direc­tion of our sus­pen­sion of dis­be­lief. Ondine sings, and the fish­er­man catches more fish than ever before. His luck turns. He receives his boon, which is the gift of the hero from the otherworld.

The sus­pense comes from sur­pris­ing direc­tions. Ondine is hunted by a man who may be her hus­band from the deep.…

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