Moonrise Press: rose photos

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Friday, February 14, 2020

210 Pages of Love Poems in Rose Always - A Love Story of 2020

The question on pink and red Valentine's Day cards and candies is: "Will you be mine?" I think that's the wrong question. The right one is: "Will you walk by my side?" You cannot own another person, that's slavery. But you can walk together, not in front of each other (leading), not behind (following), but together, side by side, on the path of life. To do that, we have to focus on what's truly important. As T.S.Eliot said, "the still point of the turning world" - Light, Love, Christ...

The Still Point

I like the way you look at me,

drinking me in

with quick, short glances,

as if it were too much

to see me whole

Very thirsty for love,

aren’t you?

You are the matter of a man

I’m the spirit of a woman,

we belong together

From all the possible futures

I pick the one

where you are with me

The space-time cone moves,

the options shift and shrink

every second

I place you at the still point

of my turning world

There are so many delightful, meaningful stories, endless truth hidden in fairy tales. I've always loved fairy-tales and folk-tales, and have a nice collection of international stories. Only Brothers Grimm are so truly grim... others have discoveries of the walking kind, for instance, the princess that walked the world for three years in iron shoes to find her beloved (Slovenian "Pigeon Prince" tale). Or the Prince Charming who climbed over ancient thorny hedges and walls to find his Sleeping Beauty and wake her up with the kiss. That's the kiss of Love and Light, of course, true union of their souls.

Up, Up, Up

With you, I’m a fairy-tale princess,

a Cinderella, perhaps, with her gold

spun-glass slipper on my nightstand

by the Polish Bible I use each day

to find out if I’ve been good.

I really do not know.

Sometimes, I’m a sleeping Beauty

with rosy cheeks, awakened

by the lightest touch of your lips.

Why are you my Prince Charming?

I really do not know. Why

did I have to cross the Great Plains

fly over oceans, wear out

three sets of iron boots, defeat

the Leviathan and the dark

Chameleon in my dreams?

Here I am – here we are

together. Step by step,

holding hands, we climb

the inaccessible heights of God’s

white mountain, its snowy peaks

dazzling with the brilliance

of the sky – song – light –

Heart

…petal by petal, the flower of our heart

~ Amy Lowell

drawing together

the vine of heart leaves

stroke by stroke

from darkness

into light

intertwined –

with the vine

of love

As love grows, its meaning deepens, beyond passion, beyond infatuation, towards endless delight and admiration, arising from the true clarity of a shared purpose, shared light... The more we know the profound beauty of the beloved, the mysteries within, the more love there is. Love is truly endless, the more we give, the more we have to give. It never stops, never dies.

Amber

Red gold of falling leaves

and amber, liquid amber

engulf me with the intensity

of our love for all seasons –

Even the invisible California winter

without snow, with bright sunshine

and birdsong each morning – in time

for Darjeeling tea, Columbian coffee

and naleśniki, flat Polish pancakes

with a touch of maple syrup from Vermont.

The whole world celebrates with us

for we know true meaning of attachment –

not the pink blush of infatuation –

not the wine-red rose of passion –

but this, only this – pure clarity

of azure skies – clear radiance of red gold

and amber – liquid amber

Forever - is made of "nows"- wrote Emily Dickinson in one of her timeless poems. Indeed, forever is nothing but a string of moments, each more precious than another, each shining with a warm light of love within.

Afterglow

you taste of sunlight

sweetness, soft swirls

of ice cream melting

on yellow rays of mango slices

the golden glow of honey

in your eyes

you surprise me

I turn my head and

there you are, looking at me

over your oil-smudged fingers,

engine parts –

smiling

you know what I think

you taste of sunlight

Lost and Found

… the sky of the sky of a tree called life

~ e.e. cummings

I found myself

in a perfect place

I laugh to tears

and I like what I see

after broken pieces

of Devil’s mirror were

washed away from my eyes

There’s no torment here,

no limits, only the infinite

glory of becoming One

with Universe, One with

the Divine, endlessly delighted

No anxiety, no desire –

I live right here, right now

Thank you for the key

that opened my door to Paradise –

Serene, fearless, I’m wholly

and whole made of Love –

Twin Flame Promise

to have, to hold, and to cherish

~ old English wedding vows

I take you to be my beloved

for today and tomorrow

for all days and nights

for a week and all weeks

for a month and all months

for a year and all years

for all eternity

wherever we are and will be

in rain and sunlight

in joy and happy togetherness

of our most holy marriage

our divine union

I promise you solemnly my love

faithfulness and honesty

and that I will not leave you until my death

I will be with you as long as I exist

I promise you the love of my heart

because you are my heart –

and the love of my body

because you are my body –

and the love of my eyes

because you are the light of my eyes –

and the love of my soul

because you are my soul mate

my being’s other half

my fulfillment now and forever

In God, our Divine Source, Way and Life

sharing our love for ever and ever

And so let it grow and last and be

my promise for you and yours for me

I Did Not Dare To Hope

Yet I know it is true.

This certainty is of a bubbly

sparkling kind – it floats up

like champagne in a tall flute

to welcome the New Year

of promises to keep, of bliss-filled

Love that never was, but always is –

always as in a country song of old

shining on pink rose petals

covered with diamond dew

in the morning, under

the periwinkle sky

“of endless possibilities

and our greatest dreams”

that we’ve known

and will know –

together.

Diamonds

In a seashell there is an ocean

There is Universe within my heart

A myriad galaxies dance in my mind

I’m a microcosm of Divine design

In a seashell there is an ocean

In dark coal mine bright diamonds grow

In your eyes I find ageless wisdom

The One Love that sustains us all

In your guilt I see my darkness

In your beauty – radiance and light

In your voice – the calling, the calling

Mountain air on a spring morning

Sparkling diamonds, radiant and pure –

For all forevers you enfold me in Love

ISBN 978-1-945938-48-1 (color hardcover)

The final version of Rose Always - A Love Story has been published in hardcover format, available only on lulu.com. With 224 pages, 180 poems in seven sections, it is a veritable encyclopedia of love, and the shifting emotions, from romantic infatuation, through bitterness of rejection, longing, and fulfillment in togetherness, found in serenity of mutual acceptance and forgiveness.

http://www.lulu.com/shop/maja-trochimczyk/rose-always-a-love-story/hardcover/product-24410148.html

https://www.lulu.com/en/us/shop/maja-trochimczyk/rose-always-a-love-story/hardcover/product-1qkdevkp.html

Surprisingly sweet and gentle, this love story is told in over 180 poems set into seven parts (Wishing, Seeing, Longing, Knowing, Feeling, Loving, Being). Inspired by Life itself and great love-literature classics, especially The Songs of Songs, with its surreal mixture of the romantic and the spiritual, this collection is Maja Trochimczyk’s most intimate and poignant poetry book, following a series of music studies and poetry anthologies.

Preface

A book of poetry is a tapestry made with threads of impressions, memories, emotions, images, visions, and dreams. It is made with words borrowed from others and those discovered in moments of revelation. The greatest influence for this collection came from the most astounding and mysterious book of Love that has been written by Life. Thank you, my Beloved! Or, as Polish people say, Kochanie moje… Then, there is the mystical poetry of The Songs of Songs and its saintly commentators, especially St. John of the Cross and the blessed Hadewijch. Catholic liturgical and religious allusions include quotations from the Gospels, as well as allusions to the genres of the litany, lamentation, collecta, completa, lauda, the hymn and psalm. From the Buddhist and Hindu worlds, the One Divine Love and Light appear along with the concepts of reincarnation, karma, wisdom, compassion, forgiveness, and the mysterious Wheel of Fate that keeps turning, turning, turning…

The rose of Antoine de Saint Exupéry’s Little Prince makes an appearance, and so does the Sleeping Beauty, accompanied by other enchanted figures from fairy-tales. Words of my favorite poets – Emily Dickinson, Sappho, Rumi, T.S. Eliot, e.e. cummings, Rainer Maria Rilke, and Czesław Miłosz – are reflected in paraphrases or quotations. Roland Barthes’s study of A Lover’s Discourse was an inspiration, along with Dante’s Il Paradiso, Goethe’s The Sufferings of Young Werther, Stendhal’s The Red and the Black, Kant’s categorical imperative, Kierkegaard’s Either/Or, and a variety of country songs, jazz standards, and folk ballads.

Certain poems in this collection have previously appeared in print or online: my chapbooks, Glorias and Assorted Praises and Poems for My Friend (2007), Poets on Site’s chapbooks (2008), Epiphany Magazine (2011), Loch Raven Review (2010, 2012), Clockwise Cat (2015), Spectrum (2016), Altadena Poetry Review (2016, 2017), Into Light (2016), Lummox (2017), many entries of my blog, Poetry Laurels, and other venues. This book includes most of the poems from previous versions of Rose Always (2011) minus elements that I decided were harming this true, timeless love story with its many ups and downs, and a constant focus on the beauty and permanence of Love. The previous versions of this book have been all withdrawn and replaced with this edition. One cannot erase the past, of course, one can only redo the future, and this final version of Rose Always is dedicated to the beautiful present, where Love, like the mystical Rose, always is.

~ Maja Trochimczyk

January 2020

Monday, February 13, 2017

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...

Friday, February 14, 2014

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

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

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