L'aura del Campo

Maybe on May day?

SPRING: 4 Jamál (1 May)

         Eleventh Day of Ridvan          

Weather where I am: 57º this morning and sunny.

Weather where Partyof5 is in Missoula, MT: 33º, but warming later.

Weather in San Sebastian, Spain: 59º this afternoon.

Meeting Spaniards

Last night I met a Basque from San Sebastian. We spoke about Euskera. He received his education in his home tongue. He said the situation for the Basques in France however is not so rosy. They are poorer and there is more pressure to give up their language.

A link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_language

An interesting note about the language:

10 = hamar
20 = hogei
30 = hogeita hamar (20+10)
40 = berrogei (2x20)
50 = berrogeita hamar (2x20+10)

Anyone who knows French should recognize the pattern. As in 99 = quatre-vingt dix-neuf (4x20+10+9)

María has interesting friends from everywhere in Spain ... and the world, for that matter. Another friend has an Italian ethnic Cuba born father, but she speaks Spanish with a Galician accent because she hangs around with María. ¡Ay, el mundo de María!

SENSED

My head lifts in an unexpected gaze:
orange poppies and the red rose Blaze.

Seen: white-pink-redpurple dianthus; comfrey in bloom; waist-high lilies; knee-high grass; swifts overhead; rabbit; blue flax; blue jay pecking at bread; sea-green Vespa; Colombian (StFe Bogotá) license plate; '69 Saskatchewan license plate; man on porch smoking a pipe; green dappled shade; big can of Foster's; pink fleabane; ratbox; hundreds of staples stuck in a telephone pole.

Smelled: perfume; scent of iris.

Heard: cardinal song up in the oak; the sound of keyboards.

Noticed: relative quiet of a morning campus; diversity of vines (ivy, virginia creeper, trumpet vine, poison ivy, privet); unkempt properties versus sterile properties.

≈ Names of Places ≈

Los Angeles: originally from the already shortened Nuestra Señora de la Reina de los Angeles.

Bogotá: changed to Santa Fé de Bogotá, D.C., shortened
to Bogotá D.C. (distrito capitál).

México: the short version of Estados Unidos Mexicanos.

Oslo: changed to Christiania, Kristiania, changed back to Oslo in 1925.

A pic: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Oslo_from_holmenkollen.jpg

Malmö: Malmhaug (sandpile) to Elbogen (elbow) to Malmö stad.

A pic of the odd residential tower:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Turning_Torso_och_Bo01_2.jpg

And last for today, but certainly not least:

Rhode Island: officially The State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.

Sketched on the 28th while looking at old postcards:

Postcards from Iowa, 1909

Their post marks stamp a year, a place,
another time before the dawn
of horseless carriages, before
the wars that tore at them were lost
or won. They speak of school, of birth-
day presents, Christmas and the Yule.
Their sisters, cousins, aunts and others
impressed upon these leaves ...
... all dead. What lives are words
and promises ink-penned between these lines
once wrote, once read. Now read again.
The postmarks fade; the ink is smudged
from mail that was sent back then. [163.82]

Asking for reviews

These items have 9 reviews and I'd love to get 10 (or more) so I can figure out some stats and decide whether they need further editing. Please, though, do me a favor and ignore ratings by other people. I need your honest impression, thumbs up or down.

"Mission girl"  13+: We are becoming a class stratified society. Not all of us are ab-fab. Sarcastic?
"Seventeen"  13+: An anniversary poem for friends who married late in life.
"'heart's home'"  ASR: A prose poem lament in letter form to a friend from New York praising Oklahoma and Kansas.
"Koan on an October sky"  ASR: Based on the prompt: like an image tattooed on the sky.
"The silk shrouded Rose"  13+: A prose poem vignette written in 20 minutes with a prompt: a bench and a found object ...
"One ... Mississippi ... Two"  ASR: Kansas perspective as Hurricane Dennis approached Mississippi. Then Katrina hit.

They all are 'poetry', but quite different from each other in form. Thanks in advance.

And a special thanks to andrew who reviewed one yesterday.

Got a very special note from sentimente yesterday also. Kindness does count. Just want everyone to know.