Thursday, October 18, 2007
leaves of glass on chicagoist.com
A couple of weeks ago a features writer for chicagoist.com approached me about a new weekly item they'll be doing on local Etsy artists. We did an email interview, and they posted it on the blog today, so with great pride I announce: Leaves of Glass on Chicagoist! Thanks for the opportunity to represent both my home city and Etsy. Keep an eye out in the coming weeks for interviews with other Chicago Etsians. Long live DIY...
Monday, October 15, 2007
weekly poem: happy birthday, kerry!
I shall keep singing!
Birds will pass me
On their way to Yellower Climes--
Each--with a Robin's expectation--
I--with my Redbreast--
And my Rhymes--
Late--when I take my place in summer--
But--I shall bring a fuller tune--
Vespers--are sweeter than Matins--Signor--
Morning--only the seed of Noon--
by Emily Dickinson
Birds will pass me
On their way to Yellower Climes--
Each--with a Robin's expectation--
I--with my Redbreast--
And my Rhymes--
Late--when I take my place in summer--
But--I shall bring a fuller tune--
Vespers--are sweeter than Matins--Signor--
Morning--only the seed of Noon--
by Emily Dickinson
Friday, October 12, 2007
weekly poem
I've been reading The Professor and the Madman, so I have dictionaries on my mind and was reminded of this exquisite poem I first heard when I was in college.
Supernatural Love
My father at the dictionary stand
Touches the page to fully understand
The lamplit answer, tilting in his hand
His slowly scanning magnifying lens,
A blurry, glistening circle he suspends
Above the word 'Carnation'. Then he bends
So near his eyes are magnified and blurred,
One finger on the miniature word,
As if he touched a single key and heard
A distant, plucked, infinitesimal string,
"The obligation due to every thing
That' s smaller than the universe." I bring
My sewing needle close enough that I
Can watch my father through the needle's eye,
As through a lens ground for a butterfly
Who peers down flower-hallways toward a room
Shadowed and fathomed as this study's gloom
Where, as a scholar bends above a tomb
To read what's buried there, he bends to pore
Over the Latin blossom. I am four,
I spill my pins and needles on the floor
Trying to stitch "Beloved" X by X.
My dangerous, bright needle's point connects
Myself illiterate to this perfect text
I cannot read. My father puzzles why
It is my habit to identify
Carnations as "Christ's flowers," knowing I
Can give no explanation but "Because."
Word-roots blossom in speechless messages
The way the thread behind my sampler does
Where following each X, I awkward move
My needle through the word whose root is love.
He reads, "A pink variety of Clove,
Carnatio, the Latin, meaning flesh."
As if the bud's essential oils brush
Christ's fragrance through the room, the iron-fresh
Odor carnations have floats up to me,
A drifted, secret, bitter ecstasy,
The stems squeak in my scissors, Child, it's me,
He turns the page to "Clove" and reads aloud:
"The clove, a spice, dried from a flower-bud."
Then twice, as if he hasn't understood,
He reads, "From French, for clou, meaning a nail."
He gazes, motionless,"Meaning a nail."
The incarnation blossoms, flesh and nail,
I twist my threads like stems into a knot
And smooth "Beloved", but my needle caught
Within the threads, Thy blood so dearly bought,
The needle strikes my finger to the bone.
I lift my hand, it is myself I've sewn,
The flesh laid bare, the threads of blood my own,
I lift my hand in startled agony
And call upon his name, "Daddy Daddy" -
My father's hand touches the injury
As lightly as he touched the page before,
Where incarnation bloomed from roots that bore
The flowers I called Christ's when I was four.
by Gjertrud Schnackenberg (from her book Supernatural Love : Poems 1976-1992)
Supernatural Love
My father at the dictionary stand
Touches the page to fully understand
The lamplit answer, tilting in his hand
His slowly scanning magnifying lens,
A blurry, glistening circle he suspends
Above the word 'Carnation'. Then he bends
So near his eyes are magnified and blurred,
One finger on the miniature word,
As if he touched a single key and heard
A distant, plucked, infinitesimal string,
"The obligation due to every thing
That' s smaller than the universe." I bring
My sewing needle close enough that I
Can watch my father through the needle's eye,
As through a lens ground for a butterfly
Who peers down flower-hallways toward a room
Shadowed and fathomed as this study's gloom
Where, as a scholar bends above a tomb
To read what's buried there, he bends to pore
Over the Latin blossom. I am four,
I spill my pins and needles on the floor
Trying to stitch "Beloved" X by X.
My dangerous, bright needle's point connects
Myself illiterate to this perfect text
I cannot read. My father puzzles why
It is my habit to identify
Carnations as "Christ's flowers," knowing I
Can give no explanation but "Because."
Word-roots blossom in speechless messages
The way the thread behind my sampler does
Where following each X, I awkward move
My needle through the word whose root is love.
He reads, "A pink variety of Clove,
Carnatio, the Latin, meaning flesh."
As if the bud's essential oils brush
Christ's fragrance through the room, the iron-fresh
Odor carnations have floats up to me,
A drifted, secret, bitter ecstasy,
The stems squeak in my scissors, Child, it's me,
He turns the page to "Clove" and reads aloud:
"The clove, a spice, dried from a flower-bud."
Then twice, as if he hasn't understood,
He reads, "From French, for clou, meaning a nail."
He gazes, motionless,"Meaning a nail."
The incarnation blossoms, flesh and nail,
I twist my threads like stems into a knot
And smooth "Beloved", but my needle caught
Within the threads, Thy blood so dearly bought,
The needle strikes my finger to the bone.
I lift my hand, it is myself I've sewn,
The flesh laid bare, the threads of blood my own,
I lift my hand in startled agony
And call upon his name, "Daddy Daddy" -
My father's hand touches the injury
As lightly as he touched the page before,
Where incarnation bloomed from roots that bore
The flowers I called Christ's when I was four.
by Gjertrud Schnackenberg (from her book Supernatural Love : Poems 1976-1992)
Thursday, October 11, 2007
i'm jealous of my own earrings
I got a wonderful gift this week. One of my customers lives in Paris, and when she got the order I sent her a couple of weeks ago, she promised me a surprise. A few days ago, she sent me these magical pictures of herself wearing my earrings for an evening out in this gorgeous city. What a lovely and touching surprise; thank you!
Photographs ©Jérémie Sonntag.
Photographs ©Jérémie Sonntag.
Friday, October 5, 2007
etsy urban hip, week ?!&#@: where's the coffee?
I've been absent from this project for so long that it's not even worth trying to explain. My many humble apologies to the talented sellers I try to promote in this space.
I was rudely awakened this morning by my building manager banging on the door - the property owners started doing quarterly sweeps with an exterminator to make sure there aren't any bugs in the apartments, and it was apparently my turn in the rotation. There never are any bugs, it's a lovely building; and I appreciate that they do this. However, I was not only not dressed, but not awake, not bathed, not toothbrushed and not equipped with contact lenses. So I lurched to the door, pulling on my jeans and mumbling like a zombie, and let in the very chipper, very chatty preemptive exterminator. She kept talking about how hot it was outside, and did I remember the winter of such and such, when it didn't snow at Christmas. I did not. She was gone in less than two minutes, but it took me some time to adjust after the abrupt start to my day.
And then I found I was out of coffee, which is just cruel. I'll have to settle for these lovely espresso-toned accessories. Enjoy, and may you never run out coffee.
Cappuccino Cowl by fringe, $56.00
I was rudely awakened this morning by my building manager banging on the door - the property owners started doing quarterly sweeps with an exterminator to make sure there aren't any bugs in the apartments, and it was apparently my turn in the rotation. There never are any bugs, it's a lovely building; and I appreciate that they do this. However, I was not only not dressed, but not awake, not bathed, not toothbrushed and not equipped with contact lenses. So I lurched to the door, pulling on my jeans and mumbling like a zombie, and let in the very chipper, very chatty preemptive exterminator. She kept talking about how hot it was outside, and did I remember the winter of such and such, when it didn't snow at Christmas. I did not. She was gone in less than two minutes, but it took me some time to adjust after the abrupt start to my day.
And then I found I was out of coffee, which is just cruel. I'll have to settle for these lovely espresso-toned accessories. Enjoy, and may you never run out coffee.
Cappuccino Cowl by fringe, $56.00
Brown Beret by Boring Sidney, $30.00
Coffee and Beignets 2 creamy lace and vintage cafe au lait leather cuff by bayousalvage, $18.00
No. 010b Beth by Talula, $26.00
Tobacco Earrings by leavesofglass, $19.00
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