Turtle Island deja vue

Following up on yesterday's posting, I'm very happy to report that today's southbound road trip on the township road yielded no sign of a squished Blanding's turtle. I assume that means that he or she is back in the nearby pond. Because so far this year I've seen few turtles and even fewer snakes on the neighborhood's roads, yesterday's sighting was a real treat.

Blanding's turtle sunning on township road

Photo by J. Harrington

For obvious reasons, it put me in mind of Gary Snyder's 1975 Pulitzer prize winning book of poetry and essays, Turtle Island. The location where this turtle was photographed happens to be near the border of the Dakota/Ojibwe land ceded in 1837. Looking at the domed shell made me think of the Native American Turtle Island creation story. Last, but far from least, although they don't show in the photo, the domed shell shell also contains what look like a number of teeth marks, making me wonder if this particular Blanding's has survived an encounter with a neighborhood dog or coyote. It was all enough to remind me of the turtle hunts I undertook in turtle haunts along stream banks in southeastern Massachusetts, when I was a youthful explorer of country as undomesticated as I could reach on my bike and return in time for supper.

The Dance

By Gary Snyder 

“Against its will, energy is doing something productive, like the devil in medieval history. The principle is that nature does something against its own will and, by self-entanglement, produces beauty.”

Otto Rössler 

Izanami

gave birth to rocks, trees, rivers, mountains, grass

and last, a blazing child

          so burned she died.

          In the land of darkness

          a mass of pollution.

          Ah wash her clear stream

          —skinny  little  girl   with   big ears

          we have passed through

                    passed through,     flesh out of flesh.

          ●

“Shining Heavens,” Goddess of the Sun,

         her brother flung

                   mud and shit and a half-skinned pony through

                   the palace,

so she entered a cave—shut it up with a rock—

         made the world dark.

        ●

Ame-no-uzume, “Outrageous Heavenly Woman,” wrapped

the numinous club-moss of Mr. Kagu round her hips, made

a headband from the leaves of nishikigi, bound bamboo

grass for her wristlets, and put a sounding-board down

before the cave where the Sun Goddess stayed.

     She danced and she stamped til it echoed around, she

danced like a goddess possessed, pulled out her nipples,

pushed her sash down til she showed herself down below,

and the Plain of High Heaven shook with the laughs and

the cheers and the whistles of thousands of gods who were

gathered to watch.

                                                                            Jean Herbert

         ●

         The whole river. Clear back to each creeklet

         rock-rimmed,

                  all one basin drawing in the threads

         pacing down dry riverbeds the dance,

               mai, stomping, stepping on the gravelly bar

         step, stop, stamp of the foot. Glide and turn,

                  headwaters, mountains,

                           breathing icy bliss

         diamond-glittered bitty snowcreek

         eating the inorganic granite down.

         Trees once cooled the air, and clouds, ah, ghost of

                   water

                   springs gone dry. Hills of Yugoslavia clearcut

                             for the Roman fleet

                   —don’t think all that topsoil’s gone

                           it only waits.

        

         —slept on river sidebars

                  drank from muddy streams

                  grains cooked in rock-flour glacier water,

                  —dirt left on boulders

                  for a sandy heap of years,

         and creeks meander                    just because they swing.

         Stamp of the masked dancer

                  pacing tangled channels

                           putting salt and gold dust in the sea.

         ●         

         Ame-no-uzume-no-mikoto bound up her sleeves with

         a cord of heavenly hi-kage vine, tied around her head a

         head-band of the heavenly ma-saki vine, bound to-

         gether bundles of sasa leaves to hold in her hands, and

         overturning a bucket before the heavenly rock-cave

         door, stamped resoundingly upon it. Then she became

         divinely possessed, exposed her breasts, and pushed

         her skirt-band down to her genitals.

                                                                             Allan Grapard

         ●

         Laughter roared like thunder

                  through the plains of heaven

         and the hidden

                  Goddess of the Sun,

                  Amaterasu,

                  peeked out round the rock.

                  All the little faces of the gods gleamed

                           white                                        in the light!

                                                                                 omoshiri.

         ●

                                       Herbert                    Grapard

Around her head:           nishikigi leaves        masaki vines

In her hands:                                                   sasa

As wristlets:                   bamboo grass

sleeves tied w/:                                                hi-kage vine

around her hips:             club moss

         ●

         Ame no uzume.

         What did she wear?

                  What leaves in her hair?

         How far did she push her skirt down?

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