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The 9 Muses Project
The 9 Muses Project was the brainchild of artists Namon
Bills and Steven Stradley, and poet Shawn Stradley. The concept
was to ask 9 poets to each write 9 poems over a period of 3
months, each poem inspired in some way by one of the 9 muses. The
resulting 81 poems were then distributed to 9 visual artist, so
that each artist had work representing all 9 poets, and all 9
muses. The artwork was also completed over a period of 3 months.
The poets had line length and page length restrictions so that
the poems could be displayed on 9" x 18"panels, and the
artists were restricted to 18" x 18"' panels. The
resulting panels were mounted with the poem to the right of the
painting, with all the work inspired by a single muse in a single
grid. A softcover book has been published through Black Rock
Books. The first gallery opening was January 9, 2009 at the Davis
Bountiful Art Center in Bountiful, UT.
Text of Poems - The 9
Muses Project
Calliope - Revelations (2008)
Clio - Habitat of History (2008)
Erato - My Greedy Soul (2008)
Euterpe
- Rondo (2008)
Melpomene - Alas,
Babylon (2008)
Polymnia - Morning
Prayer Song (2008)
Terpsichore - Step,
Pivot, Turn (2008)
Thalia - A Change of
Seasons (2008)
Urania -
Constellations (2008)
Revelations
Sunflower fingers threaded through chain link fences
locked
hands over the silos of radioactive waste
and pulled them deep
into the earth.
Then the sunflowers held themselves erect
and
turned their faces towards the sun
and the People turned with
them and the People knew.
The serpent in the mountain awoke
and the mountain
trembled and cracked
and vomited forth generations of
poison.
The swords were turned into plowshares
and the
bombs flayed their own skin
into petals that caught the wind
in a lullaby.
The grandmothers danced their dances
and our Mother
rose up with new strength and spoke to the People.
“I will
give birth to a star and call her salvation.
I will call the
many Nations into a circle to heal the sacred hoop.”
The
Nations spoke to one another and understood.
The decaying
cities shook loose their parasitic vermin
and the ground
liquefied and swallowed the seething masses
and their false
gods into its dark depths.
The trees awoke and rising from riverbed cairns
rebuilt
the shattered bodies of the mountains
and planted themselves
as sentinels and habitats.
The great rivers brought the dams
tumbling down
and the Colorado sprinted for the sea
and the
salmon leapt and spawned in the Columbia.
The soil rumbled and roiled to cover her black veins.
We
sang to the sheep, to the wild horses, and the bison.
The
peach trees bloomed and the ants sang to the corn-rain.
The
sweet grasses and sage and cedar grew high
and the taro, the
pine nut and the quahogs were plentiful again
and medicine
flowed in the air and the waters.
Habitat of History
I have sought the rigid permanence
of square corners,
of cold brick and plate glass
insulation above, insulation
below, layering levels of illusions.
Sought safety from the
fables we tell ourselves
of wolves and fairies and knights in
shining armor
that seep through seams and relentlessly lay
siege.
I’ve spackled the cracks, and hung the drapes
to
keep everything in and everything out.
I have floundered in makeshift, spendthrift
feeble
coverings of straw.
Reveled in the smell of danger,
breathed
whisky and dreams.
Felt the sting and steady erosion of tears
joining the stream that displaces, that erases
the will to
raise hands in the air;
ashes, ashes, we all fall down
I have huddled in sweat lodges and bomb shelters
seeking
mental health and homeland security
and other heavy
imponderables.
Wandered through glass houses and ivory
towers
crèches and cliff dwellings houses of cards and words
with jokers wild tumbling me down, tumbling me down.
I’ve
sought refuge in silos and hogans and ramshackle shelters
and
the absolution of comfort.
I am finally learning how to build my house;
carving a
floor of earth to cradle my body.
Molding the firm corners
into smooth continuous curves;
Setting a framework with roof
and walls of willow,
safe from wolves but open to the smell of
spring.
Placing locks and latches beside windows, doors and
skylights.
Shifting from intransigence to transience
with a
safe room and an open sky.
My Greedy Soul
Spasmodic feints and shadows
breathe, breathe, extend
and release
reveal and retreat
palms open and
innocent
imprinting on flesh.
Words on paper, fingers on skin
a restlessness, a
distemper, a thirst
a need to slow the spinning wheels
to
dull the keenness of need.
An eagerness to fill
open spaces of want,
open
wounds of regret
open and aching arms and eyes -
my greedy
soul, that wants to want.
Rondo
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1. Primavera
Cantabile
A
tremolo heralds a trickling of icy water.
Pennywhistle playing
dandelions and flautist daffodils
serenade the waddling
goslings in a crescendo of warmth.
Timpani thunderclaps and a
riot of strings
mark the march to summer.
2. Estiva
Adagio
Pollen floats
on grazioso stream.
The peach trees swell in abundant
rhapsody.
Bees flit like grace notes on honeysuckle.
Finches
sing in polyphonic cacophony
with a fermata before the entry
of woody winds.
3. Autunno
Maestoso
Glissando
of leaves floats on rallentando river.
Staves of wheat, wine
giocoso and brassy apples
fill the orchestra with sinfonic
plenty.
Geese trumpet the coming of winter while
starlings
in coloratura aria decrescendo across clouds.
4. Invernale
Ritardando
Staccato
ice marks the lento water.
Legato clouds cover the modal
sky.
The dry reeds draw their bows in finale and
sleepy
trees creak in measured rests
breaking the basso profundo
silenzio.
:||
da capo
Alas, Babylon
Alas, Babylon!
Hear me Ashurbanipal!
Where are your
gardens,
your cradle of civilization?
How many coins, how
many souls,
how many ferries across the river?
I see the
nameless bodies
that bloat and tangle in the reeds
as they
make their sad passage to perdition.
Alas, Babylon!
Hear me Melpomene!
Do you sing
lamentations with the wailing woman
who eats the bitterness of
despair,
who rends her garments, drops her stoic mask
and
lays a fragrant wreath
upon the body of her beloved?
Do you
hear the cries of the orphans?
Do you hear the screams of the
maimed?
Rise up, O Babylon!
Hear the pleas of the innocent
dead,
raise your voices in glad defiance,
vanquish your
vainglorious foe
and his love affair with oppression.
Taste
the sweetness of the dates,
sway in the grace of the
palms,
sail again the waters of the fertile crescent
and
know peace.
Morning Prayer Song
In memory of Corbin Harney
Come down to the fire, join hands, join hands
The shadow
of Tenabo slides down the hills
Give thanks for the water,
give thanks for the air
Shundahai, Shundahai
We pray for the plants that can feed us
We pray for the
plants that can heal us
Sing to the pine nuts and sing to the
sebup
Shundahai, Shundahai
We pray for the horses to ever roam free
We pray for the
water below us
Sing to the horned toad and sing to the
cricket
Shundahai, Shundahai
We welcome the sun as it crosses the fire
We make
offerings to each direction
We embrace one another in peace
and love
Shundahai, Shundahai
*Shundahai is a Western Shoshone(Newe) word
meaning peace and harmony with all living things
Step, Pivot, Turn
In the collision of bodies
that passes for
love,
desperate hearts leap whole flights
in reckless
trajectory,
teetering and plummeting,
landing buffeted and
bruised.
A crippled heart is a closed heart
blind to tender
intention
and approachable intimacy.
fated to momentary
fortuitous pairings.
A silhouette of a soul, a split
infinity;
brooding and dark and impenetrable.
Courtship is a dance of expectation;
Yin leading the
body, Yang leading the heart.
A delicious delay of
gratification,
in measures and rests -
grace notes and
flourishes
turning and arcing, leading and following.
Step, pivot, turn, wait
Step, pivot, turn, wait
Step….
A Change of Seasons
Doves peck for thaw
amongst the matted leaves
and
patches of shade-frost.
Ring-necked pheasant
startles fallow field with
brilliance
as branches blush with sap.
Mallards rise from misty river
where pungent, sleeping
remains
of yesterday’s trials awaken.
Starling ribbons flick the clouds
as the scent of somber
brown death
succumbs to eager green life.
Gray goose stands sentinel
atop green-fuzz hillock, leg
tucked
vaning the breeze towards spring.
Constellations
At the birth of the sun and the moon
their mother died,
and their father
set her body to be the fountain of all
life.
He cast her soul into the heavens
so that her
children would remember her,
and she would keep watch over
them.
Is this why the North Star stands still?
Why the
coyote looks up when he howls?
Why grieving hearts form
constellations?
Why we wish on the persiods when they traverse
the sky?
I have wished for the earth
to fall away from beneath
my feet
to escape the seeming fixed orbit
of fears and
grief and obsessions
to join the twinkling spirits
in the
vast emptiness of the sky.
At an ancient mission in an orange grove,
I came upon
rows of candles, clad in red votive glass.
I dipped my
fingers in the holy water,
and crossed myself for the first
time in thirty years.
I entered the chapel, and lit candles
for
my mother…her mother… my first child
I felt them
flicker in my eyes, and dance in my memory.
As I stepped
outside, I saw the first stars in the cold night;
their
souls, my soul cast to the twilight,
and my heart run away
into the sky.
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