June 2009 was its last borrower. The book, illustrated, instructive, bringing to Western eyes a floral artistry, exalted on Japanese altars, aeons ago. Protected in plastic and withdrawn from Dewey’s coded placement amongst the ‘Decorative Arts’; the outdated stamp giving it the aura of a cellophaned bouquet left at a memorial. But now this preowned tome makes one rung on my ladder of hardbacks, piled close to hand on the small side table, Slipping between Fletcher's edition of paintings dipped in the poetry of Hughes, and Calder, balancing the art of sculpture. "Ikebana" encompasses both, simply by bringing flowers to life in a minimalist theatre of poised, colour arrangements. And for such, we must handpick leaf and sheath, pine stem. petiole and plum petal, releasing them to intersect the circle of perfection drawn in space. Posed by invisible fingers, fastened with formality, straight to the upright abode of deities. Cuts, angled and precise, press into a sword mountain base, nestling amongst shallows. From a symbolic rock tumbles a cascade, and to the left, the merest hint of curvature, breaching the horizontal so that like a humming bird, the eye never settles, never completely withdraws. There is a tinted hint of Autumn in these mornings now and the page has opened on a basket of anemones and foliage burnished by briefer days. All so splendidly rendered that my unskilled replication could only ever be the poorest form of flattery. Perhaps I'll close the book for another day, and another day, until it will lie in the dust of perpetuity, with all those things I planned to do before there is no time left to do them.
Book References:
“Ikebana”, Norman and Cornell, 2002.
“Life Force: A painter’s response to the nature poetry of Ted Hughes” Louise Fletcher. 2021
“Alexander Calder: Performing Sculpture” Coxon & Taylor 2015
Today is “Buy a Book day” and so for my MTB prompt: Book a Prose Poem we are writing 200-300 words about the last book we read/purchased, using prose interlaced with poetry devices.
PoetryPix 