We're All Sick

It started with Miss M, then we all started coughing, and now it's developed into full-blown colds. So, we're watching a lot of movies and Lassie re-runs. I started back on my healthy diet plan a couple weeks ago - two green smoothies without fruit, and a healthy diet with no gluten/dairy/sugar besides that. And, in spite of the cold, I've done very well with that, and have even been on the elliptical for twenty minutes a day. It doesn't seem to be helping the cold. I hoped that eating this well would mean I would never be sick again. Vain dreams, I guess.

I'm spending the down time by looking through etexts at mainlesson.com, looking for books I might use with Miss M this year, and maybe even find some to add to AO. I found one about Abraham Lincoln, and I'm looking at a biography of scientists.

I'm also watching the latest news about the CPSIA lead ruling, mostly by keeping up with The Common Room's blog.

Poetic Knowledge chapter 1

Let me see if I can clarify what the term "poetic knowledge" means.

It's the difference between knowing about a person - his name, address, phone number, where he works, what his favorite color is, where he spends his saturdays - without ever actually meeting the person. But poetic knowledge is like being that person's close friend.

With poetic knowledge, a child discovers that he loves books and wants to read because he enjoys having his stories read to him. But our tendency is to drill him in letter sounds and make him sit through phonics rules until he begins to get the idea that reading is a chore.

In a CM context, it might be the difference between reading facts about local plants, where they germinate, when they flower, how they're pollinated, etc - and going outside and just absorbing the delight of the outdoors and becoming acquainted with plant life first-hand.

Poetic Knowledge

I've started reading Poetic Knowledge by James S. Taylor (no, not that James Taylor!) with Katie - she's already posted on chapter 1; meanwhile, I still haven't gotten through the introduction. This isn't any reflection on the book; I just can't get my mind into gear lately. I've been focused on computer issues - I upgraded to a new computer with Linux Ubuntu installed, and installed Xubuntu (Ubuntu Lite) on the old one to make it run faster and prepared that one for dh. And I've been spending a lot of time figuring out what MBTI types everyone is since I read fellow INTJ Merry K's blog post about the INTJ type. So, I've just been too preoccupied to focus my mind on any serious reading. Even my Parents' Review proofreading project has suffered.

After numerous attempts, I've decided to abandon hope about ever finishing the introduction and just jump into chapter 1.

A few weeks ago, when I first got the book and was all excited about reading it and sharing it, I tried to explain to a friend what I thought was meant by the term Poetic Knowledge. I knew it wasn't knowledge about poetry, but I figured it was a sense of the big picture, including all the big questions everyone wonders about - why are we here, what is happiness, what meaning is there to life, etc. I thought it might be tied in with philosophy.

Here's the definition Mr. Taylor gives in chapter 1:

"First of all, poetic knowledge is not necessarily a knowledge of poetry but rather a poetic (a sensory-emotional) experience of reality. . . What must be at the beginning of this understanding is the phenomenon of poetic experience. Poetic experience indicates an encounter with reality that is nonanalytical, something that is perceived as beautiful, awful (awefull), spontaneous, mysterious. It is true that poetic experience has that same surprise of metaphor found in poetry, but also found in common experience, when the mind, through the senses and emotions, sees in delight, or even in terror, the significance of what is really there."

I think I might have been on the right track, but I'll know more when I read farther. And, when I'm clearer about what Poetic Knowledge is, I'll see if I can put it into words I understand.

birdwatching

write every day just
to stay familiar with words
and learn their ways
                                    like
the pianist who plays each note
a thousand times until
he knows its place by touch.

or is it more like birdwatching?

at the park I saw a man
who fed the birds: he filled his hands
with seed and held them out.
he didn't move. he whistled
and they landed in his hands.
he'd been coming every day for weeks (maybe months)
just to sit
            to watch them
                        wait for them
so they knew him.

people are like birds sometimes.

wouldn't it be nice if
            words came for the asking
faith was instantaneous
            people didn't need to trust?

            but perhaps
it's better this way.

The Pilgrim's Song

My blessing fall on this fair world,
On mountain, valley, forest, ocean,
The clarion winds in ceaseless motion,
And heaven's blue banner high unfurled.

And bless the staff that hither bore me,
And alms that helped me on my way,
The boundless plain that lies before me
The glowing morn, the evening grey.

The very path by which I wander
Shows glorious, golden, bathed in light.
No blade of grass that glistens yonder
But seems a star in heaven's height.

O might I in my exultation
To all the world this joy impart,
Would I might clasp the whole creation,
Lovers or strangers, foes or brothers,
Would I might clasp them, the whole creation,
In fervent rapture to my heart.

- Alexey Tolstoy, with an unknown translator

Tchaikovsky composed a lovely setting for this poem, which I learned for voice lessons a couple of years ago. It's not a song that hangs around my mind a lot, but it came to me strongly today. YouTube has a beautiful recording of it in the original Russian. The best English version I can find is this one by Jerome Hines.