Vogeline LYNX XXII:1, February, 2007


TABLE OF CONTENTS XXII:1 February, 2007					LYNX A Journal for Linking Poets



					VOGELINE Silva Ley drawings by Jeanne Wesselius Table of Contents Vogeline The seasons Walking Small happenings Country life The moment CV’s VOGELINE A child in white After a long run high on the top of a dune, she climbs the hill, forms a trumpet of her hands, listens to little sounds around calls distant birds. as she learned early. a path of shells far sounds of birds winding away from the village long uu’s of redshanks suddenly… the sea piews of oyster catchers a grey harrier a grass sparrow skims along the edge twitters again and again the marram moves through the roaring sea a blue tent the empty beach glimmers in the dunes three surfers flap their wings as if sailing away in a blue distance After a roll from Suddenly the last delightful slope she’s eager to play, she takes off her shoes, fight with sand and water, plods through the sand push back the borders, to the edge of the water. make them new. waves fall back a child digs trenches into themselves again between waving weeds time fades away full, empty, full again pieces of driftwood little boys scream wash ashore, stolen again of angry pleasure when the sea through the thundering sea destroys their sandcastles the flood line sparkles at the foamy edge in the silver morning of a wild sea changing, called sea a red kite tumbles Then she wants to swing her arms, Hunting for a treasure throw herself yelling she hopes to find into wind and space, some mussel shells run to the next beach post the shiny mother–of–pearl. at the tideline a colourful shell a gull washes its feet one of millions, the sea waves come rolling over doesn’t make a choice wind all around a ‘kokkel’ in her hand gulls link sea and land who will ever pick up in their cross flight the other half? even the smallest shell gulls sleep on the breakers forms a tiny sandhill their eyelids as white on the wide Wadden Sea as their white breasts Light changes once again she claps in the late afternoon, the birds away, feet and hands become then she skips along the path sore by salt, back to the village, time to go home. she hears her mother call: ‘Vogeline of the island!’ Between two clouds a bridle path a rim of summer moon twisting away in the gorse the white dune rose a frightened rabbit a hovering gull our footsteps two pink legs stretched out in the wet sand, already under his tail-helm as from strangers the reed-border on the terrace brushed by wind behind glass, people watch bird’s nests sway gently a movie of the sea THE SEASONS A backyard with two lime trees, sun in the leaves, pin-tail caterpillars in the privet hedge, that’s enough to learn in childhood the bliss of being outside. Later on, taken along for walks, through woods and moors in the quiet pace of roe deer. Every season an intensive experience of listening, watching, smelling, tasting, until the greenness of the earth becomes the colour of your soul, the scenery of your dreams. SPRING Away from the wind side the birch leaves tremble sheltered by the wood in the April breeze a doe calf is moaning or is it the quivering light? willows at the ditch every day a stroll with delicate catkins through the kitchen garden a wood saw yammers to count the sprouts looking for lesser celandine fifty flying hours I overlook the fields by twenty bees of anemones one drop of honey SUMMER buzzing heat a bumble bee lands a lizard darts on the clover, across the sandbank bends to the ground in the thistle field the trees lay down a moving spot of sand their long late shadows ants – their honeymoon a balloon goes up a border of marguerites summer evening marks the garden a sudden breeze lifts a bee a path to my love from the hemlock AUTUMN leaves are lashed in the last dahlia’s a storm is raging an earwig creeps away the market stall sells roses autumn silvers the webs chillness of October from the last rose lime leaves hold on a bee falls in my hand with just one fiber warms up and flies off men with machines not the falling leaves blow the leaves on heaps touch me in November wilder than the storm no, the new buds WINTER The frosty woods next to the cuneiform the crystal branches of blackbirds in the snow each footstep crackles our clumsy footprints snow in the morning in front of a snow shower more than ever a wavering a cloud of starlings for the first step in rhythmic waves ice on the loam pit the stone girl a crow cleaves fiercely in the city garden a dead fish snow in her cold lap GOING FOR A WALK ‘Searching for authenticity one will always come closer to nature’ W. Vander Walle Crossed the moorland stormy skies a wagtail hopping a godwit dives on its nest in front of my feet sun climbs out of a cloud peewits in the field chirping in the firs those tufts in the wind a flock of goldcrests as if the grass is blooming at the border of sound ducks, floating the motorway nearby in the sparkling sun a thrush sings over eye-coats closed the drone on the steps a couple of grebes of the country house dive into the river a kestrel’s feather rise together chased by a heron ducks plump down a flock of nunducks, black foamy collars enclose between fen and sun their white necks the cuckoo coos this wood absorbs look, the ragged robin (cuckoo’s flower) two brooks, hides them pink in the fringe lets them free under dark trees first raindrops people walk silently after a thunder stroke secretly heat grows to smell snow day after day stubs in the march people wipe each other’s traces a heron floats on the wind soundless black is the water dragonflies dung on the horse track resting on gale stems madly pregnant flies a frog jumps up lay their future butterfly water scorpions landing on the sun-warm stone fry of caddish fly of a megalithic tomb just turning a stone two black horses reading poems on the hillside, trotting in the pasture, on a wall on strings off light along a village- road SMALL HAPPENINGS ‘Life seams just a moment, but that’s why in that very moment it should be fixed on the disc of retina and eardrum.’ W. Vande Walle the tap of an acorn a leaf on my hand a ground-beetle runs I carry it away from its stone till hail blows it off a shot in the wood a train rushes along a squirrel startles a crested lark hops on goes on gnawing a nut between the rails smell carefully a leaf of wild mint this little black ant quickly consumed has the scent of soap with beetle and all rest harrow on the path a gamma moth leads us to the stables lands on the nose of a cow and the watchdog she grazes on on empty spots a hoverfly slips in the vegetable garden in the white arum-lily wood-violet grows to its honey-death after retirement the cry of redwings he serves tea and stories and fieldfares, high under the ginkgo above the Shell reservoir a long twilight a folk of ants in the copse the song swarms under an empty of a nightingale fertilizer bag at the edge of the wood tiny in the grass a big hare, ears up next to a thundering brook who ‘s afraid of who? the wild strawberry COUNTRY LIFE Long lanes of poplars a stately farmhouse bending with the lines on the village green of the old land between hall and kiosk rough walls a flaked off front a free uneveness but those red geraniums of roofs and crossbeams on the windowsills a tented kettle crumpled appletrees catches morning-rain the shade of branches the stable-door open moves on the windows a crooked well socked hens a frowned façade run around, the cock as if life is simple jumps on a chopping block blue larkspur leads tot the silent doors of the Sunday noon THINGS AS THEY ARE ‘Basho says: "We should come to insight and return to common life, because natural things are poetical when you are able to unify with them".’ W.Vande Walle in the Zoo the giraffe shivering with sandlice makes a révérence holy ibis for one leaf of salad elephants people tarry on a sandy isle, pushing in front of empty cages each others for years reread the names steaming horses a gardener puts name tags race over the barriers in the rose-beds pain, sweat, money nameless they smell a group of painters a mighty cedar at the riverside, which moment in front of the prison will they record ? but a blind wall the ferryboat ashore old gold and marble nobody on the terrace in the baroque church of tavern ‘Comfort’ worn out words meditation the sculptor dreams in the Buddha temple his hands caress the stone the stomachs growl then – let’s get cracking planetarium a youthful dressing - we watch Orion’s haze grandmother’s eyes in an easy chair from under the brim almost ninety now at the last ‘salute’ squabbling every day in the mortuary about their old children without a watch to peel potatoes still half in her game many shapes of roundness - wings of silver-paper - through my hands fairy at the dish jokes twinkle bedtime between forks and knives changes over to the night the taste of words go from dream to dream weeping in the chair a little girl she looses her milk tooth leaves the labyrinth before the dentist pulls much faster than her father lively eyes passed the exam in the museum many years ago children look at fossils now life offers the paper the ship Uhuru behind the boat a man hangs up the laundry a sudden splash a woman at the wheel doggy is launched a gate of golden clouds not his oeuvre above the polders not the poet’s photographs the bus rattles on his old fountain pen THE MOMENT Not the thunder stroke of sensation really changes the world but from minute to minute what’s hardly perceptible. A frightened rabbit Solar spots appear runs away, it takes on the slide-projector; the seed of ground star ‘our sun will also die one day’ under its feet the child nearest to me to another track seizes my hand in the dark. His spade glides The train takes off, through the sandy soil, people find shelter behind glass shovel after toiling shovel; and morning papers. he takes a moment’s rest I’m sitting next to you, contemplates his hands. want to travel to your heart. Lunchtime, A lightshow of clouds suddenly the sun reflects above the dunes, in a window beyond. far to the sea. Our room takes it over, Why am I searching the beach we pass dishes and light. bent as a plover? Creeping in the garden White foam to put peas in small pits, under the bridge against cruel pictures in the dirty river; of war in the papers, yet, becoming pure tanks on burning fields. is her destiny, as mine. Fallen trees Dinner together, are left in the woods candlelight wipes merciful years after the storm. the wrinkles of time. Slower than beetles We sip from each others glasses, we digest our old grieves. our thoughts and years. CV’s Silva Ley, born in Tilburg 1927, is the author’s name of Johanna van Aelst-Versteden. Silva means wood and the Ley is a small stream through her birthplace. As a pupil at the Teacher’s Training School she showed her writings to the poet Jacques Schreurs. He compared her work with green prunes, likely on the way to ripen. As a teacher in the Primary School, she practiced poems and plays for children and collected them, edited by her father. Around 1960 she joined a (still existing) circle of poets who also published, with the name ‘Opwenteling’ - Eindhoven. Four collections of her poems appeared. Till 1990 she was co-editor of anthologies which offered a first chance to young talent. After her retirement as a teacher she started three books (poetical prose) to give a voice to women of the Bible. Her own experience came later on in Woodpecker’s Way, Go on growing and Moonmother, the desire to our source. Silva likes to meditate and seeks to live in harmony with nature, people around and herself. ‘We’ve got no mastery over the earth, we may use her as a part of herself. She is holy and good in itself. About ‘small happening’ ( klein gebeuren) she says: ’People want sensation. They soon say: nothing happens. They wait for accidents, scandals, disasters. But life continuously changes in the tiniest, subtle way. In the Dutch etymologic dictionary we can read the nice origin of this word: gebeuren, from beuren = to lift. As it were: something is lifted up to show itself in the surrounding reality. This is haiku pre-eminently. Silva joined a regional haiku circle when this started in 1986. Members of the society ‘Brabants Landschap’ (preservation of nature) know her already for more than 20 years from impressions (most haiku) on the cover of their periodical. Country life is taken from ‘The line of a roof’ written for 2003, the year of the landscape. Her work is to be found in www.libralink.nl , click authors: Ley Silva. Jeanne Wesselius ( born in Leiden 1931) paints already for 30 years and is a member of a union of artists, named ‘The Independent’ at Amsterdam. Her studio is located in the River quarter of this town. Jeanne prefers to portray animals, especially birds. She is often to be found in the zoo of Artis, where she can quietly observe the animals. She also likes to paint landscapes and musicians on canvas, in different techniques. Jeanne is not only skilled in visual arts, she is a poet as well In 2000 she received the Pipistrellus-price for her poems from the publishing house The Bat at Roermond. In 2002 she got the Plantage Poetry price (Amsterdam). Her poems are (among others) published in the collection about cats: Oh die Poes published also by A3 Books 2004. Website: www.jeannewesselius.nl A selection of Jeanne Wesselius's poetry: slumbering snail . . . if only yesterday had waited i saw you standing in line this afternoon at the post office . . . winter came too fast! waiting for me with yesterday, a snail blowing words i talk to you night after night catfish . . . and still this gentle tugging i too sleep alone in winter, brother cricket i stir the the new year in a cup of coffee, plucking words from clumps of cloud returning dawn to the moon . . . cherry, blossoms! to be a butterfly again . . . wintering in dreams, waiting to unveil myself your sandals, moon, sewn of cloud clouds swim upstream into autumn's mouth, leaving me to reinvent what could have been sunrise . . . a deer bowing to blossoms alone in his shell to dream, what will snail write when the clouds form words made of leaf? include me in your dream, marmot . . . i'm lonely the haiku you'll write, snail, when words inside you burst into stars in the morning, dew drops scented with you new year's eve a middle aged man sketching spain on the bathroom wall with miles davis new year's eve . . . an old man painting thoughts on his window celebrating the new year on my back reading kijo's haiku in a whisper reeds in winter . . . a heron listening to herself breathe in his loneliness, the bay mocks him with giggles of light even darkness can't discolor the clouds . . . a long winter even in darkness, the clouds misbehave new year's morning . . . my shadow beats me to the restroom! the walls, this evening, spray painted with winter your seed, this morning tree, in a damp tomorrow



					Originally published in Dutch by A3 Books in 2006, the book Vogeline Copyright © Silva Ley - Johanna van Aelst-Versteden, 2006. This English Version of Vogeline was translated by the author and is Copyright © 2007. Illustrations Copyright © Jeanne Wesselius, 2006. English translation first published as supplement to Lynx XXII:1, February, 2007.