Rose of Roses Exhibition and Poetry Readings for the Month of Love, 2017

St. Valentine’s Day 

Evening of Poetry & Roses

The “Rose of Roses” Exhibition

Hosted by Dr. Maja Trochimczyk 

Featuring Mariko Kitakubo with Roger

and Kathabela and Rick Wilson

The Back Door Bakery and Café 

8349 Foothill Blvd, Sunland, CA 91040

February 14, 2017 at 7:00 pm

                  

        

Moonrise Press presents the second solo exhibition of photographs, "Rose of Roses" by Maja Trochimczyk. It could be subtitled "Rose Photos for the Month of Love." The title is a tribute to the Song of Songs, of course.

This exhibition is held in the Back Door Bakery and Cafe in Sunland (8349 Foothill Blvd.),   on display for a month, from February 4th to March 4th, 2017. The Valentine's Day Evening of Poetry and Roses is on Tuesday, February 14, 2017 at 7-9 pm. and the Artist's Reception is on Sunday, February 26, 2017 at 7-9 p.m. after the Village Poets Monthly Reading at the Bolton Hall Museum in Tujunga. We will have live music, poetry readings and more...

The "Rose of Roses" exhibition features roses from Trochimczyk's garden and from Descanso Gardens, as seen after rain, in the evening, in the morning, with sharply contrasted shadows, in the shade and in direct sunlight. As she writes on her Poetry Laurels Blog: "I discovered an endless variety of patterns in their petals and decided to capture the blossoms for far longer than the five days they remain on the bushes. The result was my private collection of electronic rose photos, that I used on my website and on margins of poems. It was fun."

Rose Garland

I thought roses.
I thought rich, velvet blossoms.
I thought a red rainbow 
from deep crimson to delicately pinkish.

The secret was underground
where the roots sustain 
the multi-hued orgy of sensuous allure – 
flowers opening to dazzle and fade.

The strength of the rose
is invisible – you see the blush
of seduction in each leaf and petal, 

You admire their charms.
Yet, you care for what’s out of sight,
not for the obvious.

I thought your love.
I thought how you adore me.
I went deeper down to the source.

The rose, Sappho’s lightning 
of beauty, breathes love,
laughs at the wind and wonders

how the mystic rosebush twirls, 
crowned with the royal 
garland of fire. 

[Untitled]

For you, I'm a pear
with persimmon flavor
bathed in vanilla milk,
my skin is smooth, electric
it tingles when you touch me
I sing -
Of all the gardens of the world,
all the orchards,
all the fruit-bearing trees,
all the roses,
I'm the richest.
my blossoms are most abundant,
my fragrance - the rarest,
beyond reach

Rose Always - A Court Love Story was all in dew-drop rose-red, and filled with love poetry of delight, desire, fulfillment, and heartbreak.  Inspired by the Songs of Songs and centuries of love poems, from Sappho to Milosz, this novella in verse consisted of 85 lyrical poems and 24 brief, narrative fragments, based, in part, on authentic court documents. A range of literary allusions enriched this unlikely love story. Revised edition, Moonrise Press, 2011, 152 pp. (withdrawn in 2018).

Rose Window

I place you in the heart
of my rose, dark red one
with dew drops on its leaves.
Like a tricked-up baby
from Ann Geddes' postcard
you rest, snugly wrapped
in the comfort of my love.
"That too shall pass," they say,
"That too shall pass.
The rose will wither,
love will fade away."

Respectfully, I disagree.
I know the symmetry
of velvet petals
is but an opening
into a different universe,
a cosmic window,
timeless.
I see it in the shyness
of your smile. Yes.
You are that lucky.
In the morning
when the curtains of mist
open above silver hills
carved from time
like a Japanese woodcut,
you taste freedom.
You found your true self
under the detritus
of disordered life.
Isn't it strange
that you've been saved
by the perfection
of just one rose?

All lovers should be happy, even if their love is gone, dead, or lost in the mist of time. It is the supreme gift of having been able to feel what generations of poets have felt, from the divine Sappho until today...

The Music and Poetry of Chopin's Raindrops

Rain Clouds in California.

The most famous piece of "rain" music in the classical canon is Fryderyk Chopin's Prelude in D-flat Major, Op. 28, No. 15.  Several contemporary poets wrote about this work for the anthology published in 2010, Chopin with Cherries: A Tribute in Verse.

To accompany the readers on their Chopin-inspired journey, here are some links to various pianists' interpretations of the Prelude:

• Artur Rubinstein (a classic)
• Martha Argerich (a classic)
• Valentina Igoshina (with the pianist as a romantic star)
• Yundi Li (fast, elegant, and delicate)
• Evgeny Kissin (with a romantic painting as a backdrop)
• Grigory Sokolov (extra slow and expressive)

Prelude in Majorca

Christine Klocek-Lim

The wet day carried rain into night

as he composed alone.

With each note he wept

and music fell on the monastery,

each note a cry for breath

his lungs could barely hold.

Even as his world

dissolved around him

“into a terrible dejection,”

he played that old piano in Valldemosa

until tuberculosis didn’t matter;

until the interminable night

became more than a rainstorm,

more than one man sitting alone

at a piano, waiting

“in a kind of quiet desperation”

for his lover to come home

from Palma.

When Aurore finally returned

“in absolute dark”

she said his “wonderful Prelude,”

resounded on the tiles of the Charterhouse

like “tears falling upon his heart.”

Perhaps she is right.

Or perhaps Chopin “denied

having heard” the raindrops.

Perhaps in the alone

of that torrential night
he created his music simply

to hold himself inside life

for just one note longer.

Notes:

Prelude No.15 in D-flat Major, Op. 28. 

Quotes from Histoire de Ma Vie (History of My Life, vol. 4) by George Sand (Aurore, Baronne Dudevant).

(c) 2010 by Christine Klocek-Lim, published in Chopin with Cherries (Moonrise Press, 2010).

Chopin’s “Raindrop”

Cheryl M. Thatt

A steady rain

drop

drips down

insistent as the minutes

he looks out the window

cannot escape it.

He translates rain

drop

damp spirit

travels inward

passionate

notes whittle away the dreary

steady rain

drop

a clock

in the distance punctuates the gray day

wrestling with his own dark language

his soft fingers caress the keys to sanity

slowly he shapes adversary into ally…

pounds out melancholy

drop

by precious damn drop…

A steady rain

drop

dripped down

like the click of a shutter

slippery hours

captured forever.                                                                  

(c) 2010 by Cheryl M. Thatt, published in Chopin with Cherries (Moonrise Press, 2010).

Prelude in D-Flat Major, Opus 28, No. 15

by Carrie A. Purcell

You have to

my teacher said

think of that note like rain,

steady, but who,

my teacher said

wants to hear only that?

On Majorca in a monastery

incessant coughing

covered by incessant composition

and everywhere dripping

sotto voce

move the rain lower

let it fill the space left in your lungs

let it triumph

We die so often

we don’t call it dying anymore

(c) 2010 by Carrie A. Purcell, published in Chopin with Cherries (Moonrise Press, 2010).

Poetry of Valentines, Love, and Roses

Happy Valentine's Day to all happy and unhappy lovers. All lovers should be happy, even if their love is gone, dead, or lost in the mist of time. It is the supreme gift of having been able to feel what generations of poets have felt, from the divine Sappho until today...

For lovers of love poetry, Maja Trochimczyk's Rose Always - A Court Love Story was all in dew-drop rose-red, and filled with love poetry of delight, desire, fulfillment, and heartbreak. All versions of this book were withdrawn in 2018.

"This novella in verse is a tragedy; intense love against betrayal...Love is a strange truth--no two loves are the same. There are spiritual depths in each being. It is astonishing to see a woman's soul clearly in public in the white heat of love, the thought light of kisses sparkling on skin, the departure point into worlds. Even after it seemed lost her love takes a deeper spiritual form; she continues to love..." ~ Russell Salamon

Rose Always - No. 58

I’ve never done so much

to destroy a love, yet it lives on,

lingers in the corners of my soul,

explodes like summer fire, joy ineffable

con moto, agitato

I’ve never seen so much beauty

in one body, outlined by a halo of grace,

smooth lover’s sweat at midnight,

bright morning sunrays, light invincible

sotto, colla voce

I’ve never felt so much

desire, blinding me to all

but your heartbeat, the warm touch

of your strength, dangerous charm

semplicemente

I’ve never dreamed so much

of a happy future, two strangers

who share nothing, just surprise

at the unthinkable bliss of chance

molto scherzando

I’ve never loved so much  

(c) 2011 by Maja Trochimczyk

For lovers of love's wisdom in poetry, Maja Trochimczyk's Miriam's Iris, or Angels in a Garden, describes a life trajectory from homesickness, through romance, grief, and reconciliation with the most beautiful of loves, found only with the Angel called Sophia, the Divine Wisdom. This book, too, found its admirers among reviewers. 

Paperback Edition: ISBN 978-0-578-00166-1
Preview on Google Books: Miriam Preview
Hardcover with Color Photos: ISBN 978-0-9819693-2-9 

EBook (PDF) from lulu.com: ISBN 978-0-9819693-2-9

"Rarely does one find a book of poetry which holds together as well as Miriam's Iris. Although presented as a collection of individual poems, it reads like it was composed as a whole, as a single poem of multiple parts. . .Miriam's Iris is a strong demonstration of how poetry can evoke emotion without getting bogged down in the details of one's affairs. Along the way it provides some wisdom about finding one's place, accepting what one is given." (G. Murray Thomas in Poetix.net, Feburary 2010)

Amor 6 

 the more I love

 the more dangerous 

life becomes 

in its graphic beauty 

carved with a dagger 

stolen from time 

 the blade cuts 

old wounds open 

 it slides on the skin 

of the moment 

 pierced by knowing

 © 2006 by Maja Trochimczyk

For lovers of life itself, and the miracle of living on our planet, surrounded by the loved ones that we sometimes appreciate only if we are truly lost, Ed Rosenthal's The Desert Hat will be a delight, with its incredible story of a true loss - wandering through the Mojave Desert for six days, he wrote love messages for his wife and daughter on his hat. He somehow had a pencil with him, and not a piece of paper or a notebook. The hat is destined for a museum of human spirit. The book - for your shelf or some reading device.

Paperback edition, ISBN 978-0-9819693-7-4

eBook for iTunes or Nook, $10.00: ISBN 978-0-9819693-9-8

"Ed Rosenthal's The Desert Hat not only recounts an incredibly vivid story of survival, but maps out the dangerous journeys of the heart and the imagination in that hallucinatory place between mind and body, between nature and man, between the past and the future. Like poet James Wright, Rosenthal "goes/ Back to the broken ground" of the self and finds a stranger there trapped in the cosmology of an endless, unpitying desert. As the stark "sun burns holes/ into the sky" the psyche'€™s true-north compass finds salvation'€™s shade. Rosenthal climbed out of "the busted monster'€™s mouth" with a beautiful, moving book."

 ~ Elena Karina Byrne, Executive Director of AVK Arts, author of The Flammable Bird Masque and Squander

If all this is not enough, readers may found lots of love poems, and roses, at the following issues of blogs.

POETRY LAURELS

Maja Trochimczyk blog, first documenting her tenure as Poet-Laureate of Sunland-Tujunga, and later whatever catches her poetic fancy, including a series of post on love, the Valentine's Day, and roses.

poetrylaurels.blogspot.com/2013/09/rose-poems-from-shadows-leaves-roses.html

http://poetrylaurels.blogspot.com/2013/06/on-irony-and-love-songs-with-grapefruit.html

http://poetrylaurels.blogspot.com/2013/02/a-history-of-love-and-roses.html

http://poetrylaurels.blogspot.com/2011/05/roses-and-roses-without-end.html

http://poetrylaurels.blogspot.com/2011/02/timeless-after-desire-love-on.html

http://poetrylaurels.blogspot.com/2011/02/what-is-love-valentines-day-reflections.html

CHOPIN WITH CHERRIES

Stories of Chopin's love letters, his interests in roses, violets, his failed love affairs and sublime music. Illustrations include Redoute's engravings of roses.

http://chopinwithcherries.blogspot.com/2014/02/chopins-roses-and-violets-and-spring.html

http://chopinwithcherries.blogspot.com/2013/02/on-chopins-roses-for-valentines-day.html

http://chopinwithcherries.blogspot.com/2012/02/chopins-valentines-and-his-letters.html