Welcome to my ekphrastic gallery! MLB
“Ekphrasis” or “ecphrasis” is the verbal description, often dramatic, of a visual work of art. In ancient times it referred to a description of any thing, person, or experience. The word comes from the Greek ‘ek’ and ‘phrasis’, ‘out’ and ‘speak’ respectively . . . .” Wikipedia
Therefore “ekphrastic” poetry (or writing, drama, etc.) is that which describes another art form, for example a poem about a painting or photograph. The art on this page will be my own, as will be most of the poetry. But occasionally I will include favorite selections by other poets, to “illustrate” my paintings or photos in words.
And then how about exphrastic art—created from the inspiration of a poem? Sometimes I may take the liberty to extend ekphrasis to work both ways! Artistic license! 🙂 MB
Tatters of Time
Old books leather-bound, creased with age
evoking slower days . . . china chipped and crazed—
Wedgwood, Staffordshire, Minton, Royal Doulton,
flow blue platters mingled with a thread-bare bunny
clutched and cherished long ago by a devoted child.
Portraits in sepia, wrapped in weathered frames,
ancestors enshrined in memory ever-green
by legend and imagination . . . a sofa, brocaded relic
recalling nights of reading with dog-entangled feet
and drowsy kittens—furry divas dominating laps.
Hence we celebrate Today—camouflaging
appliances, electric cords behind old pottery and art,
draping computer screen in fringed, fragmented silk,
with faded lavender and rose of timeworn flowers . . .
bold anachronisms, savoring our final hours.
© Margaret L. Been, 2014
Deep quiet moment
jungle broken in the storm
with silent knowing . . .
Deep quiet moment
eschewing and forgetting
inane thrusted chin . . .
Deep quiet moment
breathing life beyond the din
of monkey jabber . . .
Art and poetry — ©Margaret Longenecker Been
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A favorite summer pastime of mine is reclining on our patio and watching clouds over the park outside our door. Sometimes I photograph the clouds, and there are no two photos alike as the subject changes momentarily. Every cloud is one of a kind. Cloud watching is a meditative pastime, causing fragments of poetry to flow.
Poise
Quiet dignity
never assuming to know
even when one does . . .
(Poem and digitally enhanced photo , ©Margaret Longenecker Been.)
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I will sweep my rooms,
tend my cloistered garden, brew my tea . . .
and one who mocked my dreams will never know
the heart of me.
© Margaret Longenecker Been
Published in MORNING IN MY EYES . . . poems of the meadows, rivers, woodlands, and seasons of life, by Margaret Longenecker Been.
Note: A few years ago my musically gifted granddaughter, Nicole, set the words to a four-part madrigal which she composed specifically for the poem. That is the greatest honor I’ve ever received in connection with my poetry! MLB
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It is quite evident, from recent posts, that I have WATER ON MY MIND! 🙂
April Canoe
We love this day, the ducks and I,
When branches drip their jewels from the sky,
And swollen streams
dispatch their winter burdens to the sea.
Waterproofed in down, we greet the spring.
The ducks and I delight in wandering!
©Margaret L. Been
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For several days I’ve been straining at the brain to write a poem about a painting, but nothing significant has resulted. On the other hand, the paintings keep flowing from my brushes. I can’t stop the flow!
Meanwhile, words from beloved poems surge through my head on a regular basis. Lately it has been John Masefield’s Sea Fever. Oh how I love that poem! It literally rocks me to sleep some nights! So last night I created the above ↑ painting to go with this wonderful classic ↓:
Sea Fever
I must down to the seas again to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking,
And a gray mist on the sea’s face and a gray dawn breaking.
I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.
I must down to the seas again to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the wind’s like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.
John Masefield
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Land of Courte Oreilles Ojibwa ↑ ↓
Edge of wildness . . .
northern banks of pickerel weed,
swamp buttercups, golden hedge-hyssop,
cobalt water rimmed and pressed
beneath the sky.
Fallen trees grope water-wise
from wild bank—perspective framed
in gnarled branches, Oriental clusters
of three, five, seven.
Double crested cormorants
nest high among blue-black ribbons
of primal shore where ancient pines
hid centuries of moccasin-worn paths,
then fell beneath the ax and died
to live again in denser, thicker brush.
Flowage waters sigh, singing stories
ancients told around their winter fires . . .
forgotten stories, lost in time,
while shadows spread, remembering—
painting colors of Eternity,
God’s landscape in watercolor.
©Margaret Longenecker Been
↑ In the Cleft of the Rock — watercolor on Yupo Paper inspired by a favorite hymn, “He Hideth My Soul in the Cleft of the Rock” by George Bennard
TO LIVE AGAIN
Summer night . . .
stillness hovers over barren sky.
Dare I remember yesternight —
rejoicing under a million stars
while rippling water accompanied
the clacking of frogs in the cattails?
Rivers rush in, rivers of memory
flooding our dying, promising Life!
Margaret Longenecker Been ©2011 ____________________________________________________________________________
And now the darkling days . . .
when maples shed their burdens–
torn and sodden–to the earth,
and tawny corn
breaks beneath the reaper’s blade.
Demise of daylight
turns us inward to our dens,
burrows we’ve designed,
hollows carved in ancient oak,
cabins hewn from fallen pine.
These are the darkling days . . .
when keening west wind yields
to saber rattling from the north,
bringing time devoid of sound
while life pulsates underground.
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August . . .
. . . rejoicing in gleaming paint pots of paisleys,
morning glories tripping ankles, riotous color circles
cascading from berry-stained arms, ruby dollops
dripping from dangling gold, cheekbones blushing mauve,
stormy drapes valancing her languid summer eyes.
Behold her richly tangled gardens,
randomly nurtured with whimsical panache,
where cicadas thrum and chipmunks scurry,
where dynasties of rabbits glean chamomile and mint
from shards of clay—and crackled china plates
line hidden treasure paths unearthed by robins
and hidden again in snaggles of sage intermingled
with poignant lavender’s bouquet.
Behold her star-embroidered nights,
throbbing with song of wind and owl
and coyotes calling out the moon—praising
the Author of beauty, recalling yesterday,
remembering a long-forgotten dream.
© Margaret Longenecker Been
Published in A TIME UNDER HEAVEN . . . seasonal reflections and poems,
by Margaret Longenecker Been
Elk River Press, 2005
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May Night
Star-shot . . .
resonant with wind, whippoorwill,
and threnody of distant loon,
and coyotes
calling out the moon.
©1999, Margaret Longenecker Been
Published in the 2001 WISCONSIN Poets’ Calendar, published by Wisconsin Fellowship of Poets, and in A TIME UNDER HEAVEN . . . seasonal reflections and poems . . . by Margaret Longenecker Been, ©2005, ELK RIVER PRESS.
Note: The above illustration is not a painting, but rather a painterly photo enhanced on my Photo Suite program. It is a shot of our beloved Big Elk River, at our northern home. MLB
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What is a Poem?
Only those who truly read can know
The soil in which a poem must grow!
A poem is more than prose strung out in line;
A poem is imagery in musical design.
Regardless of how painterly they be,
Words simply are not poems, sans melody!
If a “poet” chooses not to rhyme,
Alliteration must prevail to set the clime . . .
Or else a cadence must enhance each phrase,
For readers to remember all their days!
How tragic that our language legacy
Is dimmed by current mediocrity!
©2010, Margaret Longenecker Been
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ANOTHER WALDEN
Eaves sagging, spidered shingles veiling squirrel-hewn beams . . .
A one-hinged door sashays and scrapes the splintered floor
where fieldmice scamper with their seedy stores.
Three chairs are here for you and me and company,
and caffeinated brew for toasting joy of mislaid schemes—
here among the shards of dusty dreams.
Margaret Longenecker Been—All Rights Reserved
“Another Walden” was published in WOMEN’S WRITES—a gathering of poetry by Wisconsin writers, and in A TIME UNDER HEAVEN . . . seasonal reflections and poems by Margaret Longenecker Been.
Author’s Note: Henry David Thoreau is one of my most-beloved people who ever lived. I love Thoreau for his nature observations, his wonderfully whimsical social satire, his beautiful writing, and his unquenchable YANKEE spirit—even while he suffered from tuberculosis in the final years of his all-too-short life. What an American!
In Walden, Thoreau wrote: “I had three chairs in my house; one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society.”
My husband and I cherish that quote because it sums up our shared love for solitude. And I love picturesque cabins, which I can’t resist photographing and sometimes painting.
The sight of a small, isolated cabin always reminds me of Henry David Thoreau. The above cabin was spotted in Washington State’s Cascade Mountains. After returning home from the trip, I rendered the cabin in watercolors. MLB
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fanned shells, rosettes,
fleur de lis
warmed and blended
in a gnarled hand.
Hand-clutched stickiness,
fleeting sweetness on the tongue . . .
maple-scented remnants of those years
when nights were clear,
and sap ran joyously in lusty March.
Margaret Longenecker Been—All Rights Reserved
This poem won 3rd place in the WISCONSIN REGIONAL WRITERS ASSOCIATION annual Jade Ring Contest, September 2003—and it was published in TIME UNDER HEAVEN, by Margaret Longenecker Been.
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River music . . .
rising, swirling, pulsing
in my soul.
River music . . .
old beyond recall, younger
than tomorrow.
River music . . .
ancient song, enthralling strains . . .
burgeoning life.
When River freezes
I close my eyes and dream
of April thaw.
When River freezes,
still I navigate upstream
in currents of dreams.
Margaret Longenecker Been—All Rights Reserved
Published in BRUSH STROKES, by Margaret Longenecker Been
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A POET RECALLS CREATION
I had a voice! Where did it go?
A lyrical voice, exiled in shame,
labeled “Anachronism”, my voice became
muted, muffled, unable to flow.
I had a voice, but I moved away
to words without music, lines sans form,
beauty obscured by nihilistic storm
of tone deaf script with little to say.
Hours may pass without mourning the loss . . .
then fragments of Yeats, Masefield, Millay,
Dylan Thomas or Dickinson haunt my day,
and I know I’ve abandoned gold for dross.
Through Mediocrity’s fog, memories seep.
I bury my head in my hands, and I weep!
To Our High Priest
We’ve not resisted unto blood . . .
No massive death, Royal Requiem,
But only little death—
A quiet lacrymosa to our Lord.
Yet He in all points touched
Suffered our infirmity . . .
This tiny splinter of a Larger Cross.
He knew the thorny sadness of our pain
And bore the aching nailprints of our loss.
Margaret Longenecker Been–All Rights Reserved
Published in MORNING IN MY EYES–poems of the meadows, rivers, woodlands, and seasons of life–by Margaret Longenecker Been.
Reprinted in Time of Singing.
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Winter Feet
Blanched and frozen
are the country ways
where Pentacostal flames
of dogwood blaze . . .
and upland to the wood
an owl’s retreat
of lonely echoing.
Ice worn and near despair,
these winter feet . . .
this heart that pleads
“but give me one more Spring!”
Margaret Longenecker Been–All Rights Reserved
Published in MORNING IN MY EYES, by Margaret Longenecker Been
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Dreaming of Junking
For countless days of questing,
tracking county roads and off-beat trails,
seeking “gold” in worn enameled pots,
dented copper bowls and rusted pails . . .
For afternoons of sheer delight
in treasure flaked and faded over time . . .
clouded bottles, china chipped and crazed,
to cherish for a quarter or a dime . . .
For serendipity of junk acquired,
and troves of memories the years unfold,
I lift my coffee mug of battered tin
and toast the ecstasy of all things old!
Margaret Longenecker Been–All Rights Reserved
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The Real World
Come to our kingdom in the wood
where years scurry backwards daylong,
like acrobatic squirrels climbing, scampering,
inhaling wild-honey secrets, finding treasure cache . . .
whitetail hair at rutting ground and double acorn–
hats intact, earth-fragrant lichen, peach umbrellas–
“taste not” beauties of the wood. Scurry backwards
with the years meadow-wise, from forest snares,
fleeing from phantom gypsies who would steal
old changeling children and pack them off forever
on wild ponies in the fiddling wind.
Rush backwards night-long with the years,
nights of Hearts, Charades, sweet cider nights
ladled inexorably beside flickering lamps and thrum
of Celtic harp . . . nights of whispering
when games are through and slipping softly
into the dark beneath stars that glint like pistols
in a black holster, soundlessly pouring out
into midnight of the whip-poor-will
and coyotes carousing in their cups.
Come!
Margaret Longenecker Been–All Rights Reserved
Published in MORNING IN MY EYES, by Margaret Longenecker Been
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Winter Promise
Cold descends to hug our home–
while sheltered from the sting
of wind’s embrace spewing ice
on my scarfed face,
I find the shed swathed in snow,
seeming bleak as winter without end.
And yet inside, a woolly warmth promising!
The lambs are due. A shepherd’s winter glows
with germ of spring.
Margaret Longenecker Been–All Rights Reserved
First published as “February Storm”, in MORNING IN MY EYES, by Margaret Longenecker Been.
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A Poet’s Place
A poet’s place . . .
where every aspen branch drips metaphors
like Dali’s clocks, and alliteration
echoes angelica-anemone
in primordial solitude
against the onomatopoeic thrum
of frogs.
A poet’s place
of imagery in river-clad forget-me-nots,
where figures of speech slide otterwise
from scruffy banks of sandy streams
on drowsy days, and symbols
pierce the lunar-nugget nights
in cadence with a Milky Way
of dreams.
Margaret Longenecker Been–All Rights Reserved
Published in A TIME UNDER HEAVEN, by Margaret Longenecker Been
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Spinning Wheel
Drawing raw wool through my fingers,
into the orifice, to a whirring bobbin,
I treadle to the Chieftains’ pipes and drums
while dreaming of garments that I’ll fashion
to the tempo of an old loom’s “whacks and thrums”.
Treadling in Autumn’s waning sunlight,
I recall my flock of Cotswolds–the fragrance
of lanolined locks, the ewes’ lowering cries
at lambing time, the joy of holding squirmy babes
with four long legs and plaintive eyes.
Then backwards through the orifice of time,
I draw those sights and sounds I never knew
except in fancy of imagination’s range–
a Celtic ancestor spinning on a wheel like mine,
a centuries-old design that doesn’t change.
Time spins on like a whirling bobbin
layering technologies, bringing more to learn.
My life would be a score of toneless sums
if measured by a twenty-first century beat
rather than the Chieftains’ pipes and drums.
Margaret Longenecker Been–All Rights Reserved
“Spinning Wheel” won 3rd place in the Time of Singing “Artifact Poem Contest, and was published in the Winter 07/08 issue of that magazine.
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as if the heart had ceased, no grace appears
beneath a starchy sky devoid of tears.
Wind could reconcile the harshness of these days
and sun would warm remaining hours–
but frozen earth allows no accolades,
receives no flowers.
Margaret Longenecker Been–All Rights Reserved
First published in MORNING IN MY EYES, by Margaret Longenecker Been
What a gorgeous gallery, Margaret.
I will return many times…
Hi, Ellen. Thank you so much for your encouragement.
We need lots of prayer here tonight. Our daughter Judy had a cardiac arrest today. Now her heart and blood pressure are stable, but she was without oxygen for nearly 10 minutes. She’s in ICU at the Waukesha Hospital–in an induced coma, so she can rest completely. After 24 hours, we’ll know more about how she will recover.
Judy is 52 years old, and is the chef for the Salvation Army facility in Waukesha. She seemed to have no warning of illness, but she’s the kind that never tells anyone when something is amiss.
Thank you for prayers!
Love,
Margaret
Dear Margaret,
I am so sorry to hear about Judy’s cardiac arrest. My love and prayers for her, you and Joe, and all of you. I am grateful you are close by.
Love, Ellen
some beautiful pieces here…. I see what you mean… thanks for the prayers and encouragement… I see Dr. tomorrow for results… will be in touch
The most recent poem listed here (a haiku) is the new one. I include other poets on this page as well, if I have art to go with the selection.
Thank you, and PRAYERS for you!
Awesome poems and images!
My prayers for you and your loved ones…
Peace and many blessings!
Cynthia
Thank you so much, Cynthia! Have a beautiful Easter!
Love your poems and paintings/pictures. I met you a few times at Lake Country BC and once at Perkins. Here is an attempt at one of mine written in Oklahoma to communicate to my unbelieving son who had left a note on his piano, and also my awe of the memory of having observed several albino squirrels in our Waukesha neighborhood. I remember feeling an urgency to try to express what I was feeling. .Your poems might inspire me to keep trying.
Waukesha Squirrel, sequel to a poem on the piano.
I found a poem on the piano, “losing faith that this game is fair,”
rightly so, because the game is not fair
and plays favorites.
Nevertheless, souls subsist and even thrive on sacrifice, as summer bows its head to fall,
and fall bravely sheds its coverings, allowing winter’s cold unhindered sway,
gall and vinegar turned away, braving ruthless blasts of cold
scouring branches clean and bare,
life driven to dormancy.
but a millisecond later
breezes cool, imperceptibly warming
awaken birds that fly away 2 by 2.
Big dad, little son, 4 hands, one pole, fishing hole,
morning mockingbirds plagiarizing attempts at self expression,
honking, waddling ducks,
light fades to frogs sunset singing to the stars and distant train whistles in the finality of blackness.
yet, yielding to light softly, quietly, lovers walking soul-talking, but wait, stop, look,
the albino squirrel came down from his tree. He sees us.
Cathy Engel
Norman, Oklahoma
March, 2007
Hi, Cathy. Thank you so much for you poem and encouragement. I regret it took me so long to find it. I definitely am not spending as much time blogging these days because I so love to be painting! Happy Autumn!