(half sonnet for imaginary rivers)
though he can’t, the man with the mechanical
pencil traces that quarter of an inch of
no-man’s strand where it flashes at water’s edge.
what we chase has too soft a line for
a mapmaker to catch in any perfection -
still we treasure any faint sketch to point the way
to the confluence of truth and imagination.
KB
Mapping unseen territory...
to map the conjunction of imagination and possibility
.. i must suspend... disbelief, scepticism and the cynics' mind
wars begin where imagination ends, despair at the end of possibility
.. for that which binds us is both unseen and intangible
ahhh... and truth is that which provides a handrail...
.. for those who demand justice, a slippery slope indeed
how desperately i cling to the need to define the unseen
.. with a line, a definition, a category or box
this river strews wrack, flotsam and debris on the strand
.. and I wait, for a visiting wave to provide a clean slate
--r.anderson
searching for visions
..in a landscape of moral imagination
where geologies are fluid
.. climactic shifts are too slow for the short-lived
which stories to carry
..with fluid consciousnesses and perspectives
while so many demand
.. the stasis of immovable, immutable objectivity
each dawn emerges
..quietly simple and profoundly complex
stones breathe together
..as i inhale possibilities while living the dream
--r.anderson
Cultivating a moral imagination...
narratives of our pasts are constantly unraveling
..revealing warp and weft and room for vast embroideries
these contexts keep my curiosities engaged
..for they live as tales themselves and shift with their times
we continue to live our narratives of time and place
.. of rural wolves lost, restored and fought over
narratives of wilds and wildernesses met and subdued,
.. re-imagined, re-valued, re-stored and re-membered
narratives of identities of self, of communities and service
.. identities yielded to anonymity, becalmed and bemoaned
individually and in concert we continue to write with our lives
.. our imagined narratives sometimes consciously, sometimes not
it is how i choose, today, in this time that marks my life
.. as a life well lived or not, whether quietly or otherwise
--r.anderson
the map is wrong
(the end of the road)
"The end," intones the ocean in
imaginary solemnity. "And now
what I want to know is, what is
a "dig-nation" and who are all
these people wallowing in it?
Well, let them have their
dignity. Meanwhile, you can
plant a seed, and see how
that grows. Perhaps you'll
let bygones be, or even better.
There are many ways to
fertilize or forgive the wrongs.
You get to choose just how
to go about it: the prescription is
how you see fit, or if you do.
Kathy Bowman, Joseph, Oregon
