To See or Not to See

 “Jack can see he sees

       what he can see Jill can’t see

and he can see

       that Jill can’t see that she can’t see

but he can’t see why

       Jill can’t see that Jill can’t see.”

– R. D. Laing, ‘Knots’

‘Who are you going to believe, me or your eyes?’

– Grucho Marx, ‘Duck Soup’

It is spring. I am considering the Bigleaf Magnolia, quietly and as unobtrusively as I can. Or so I think. Yet, my being still and looking at a flower has caused an unintended ripple. For this is a much visited tourist spot. Many determined people solemnly, briskly walk the highline, only stopping to take photographs. As expected a few stop next to me, click a quick picture and move on, others shrug their shoulders (probably thinking ‘what’s she looking at’) and the more mindful people (concentrating on one thing at a time) quickly estimate a way to bypass me without slacking their pace.

An elderly woman asks, ‘what flower is that?’ I reply, ‘Magnolia, a bigleaf magnolia.’ She, ‘It looks nothing like the magnolia in my garden’ and shaking her head walks away.

(Bigleaf Magnolia has the largest simple leaf and single flower among all native North American plants.)

A season of birds in NYC. Some prominent ones missing because there was no camera on hand.

“Every person takes the limits of their own field of vision for the limits of the world.”

–Arthur Schopenhauer, ‘Psychological Observation (Studies in Pessimism)

It is summer. In Chelsea, a robin is singing (Cheer up; cheer-ee-o). The song can be discerned among the human noises, only if you listen very hard.

Yesterday at lunch someone said that the only birds you see in New York are pigeons. Perhaps she belonged to that category of Americans who according to a Cornell Lab poll thought that house sparrows grew up to become pigeons.

Meanwhile on this summer day, by listening very hard I heard more than a handful of birds call out to the morning. And all before lunchtime. (The birds were: White-throated Sparrow, Northern Cardinal, American Robin, House Sparrow, Starling and Northern Mockingbird.)

“Seeing is a neglected enterprise.”

–Saul Leiter (quote from his obituary in New York Times)

“The hardest thing to see is what is in front of your eyes.”

– Goethe

It is autumn. We are walking on 20 some street, right next to the public housing projects (that is low-cost housing for the working classes– nurses, policemen, teachers and such like) when she suddenly blurts out, “You don’t see any black people in New York, how surprising.” I am speechless for a split second. To start some of our neighbors are “black people”, the four concierges in our building are “black people” and right now we are walking besides towers that house mostly “people of color”. How blinkered has our vision become? What is the function of the human eye?

But then most people from India who visit us in New York are people of a certain educational and class background, who like people of their kind all around the globe throw around their biases and ignorance as unselfconsciously and as loudly as their voices (especially in public places)– they are unapologetic about flaunting their privilege because for the most part they have chosen to be willfully ignorant.

And no, just because you’ve watched Friends, it doesn’t mean you ‘know’ life in New York City.

(The part of Chelsea we were walking through is the subject of a new documentary on income inequality “Class Divide”: http://hamptonsfilmfest.org/features/qa-marc-levin-class-divide/ )

“Let every eye negotiate for itself,

And trust no agent”

– William Shakespeare, ‘Much Ado About Nothing’

“One hundred tellings are not as good as one seeing.”

–Chinese proverb

It is winter, a freakishly warm winter. I am contemplating the parable about a student in search of a renowned teacher. Every culture has some version of the story. A student seeks a great teacher. But to get to the sought after teacher, the student has to go through certain hardships– ford unruly rivers and climb steep mountains, or else, solve tricky puzzles– to prove to be worthy of the wisdom being desired. Often wisdom is found during the course of the search itself, even before the student sets sight on the teacher. Because knowledge though arguable free, does not come to those who wait passively.

And sometimes, even the best of teachers can’t help you. For as the German proverb goes, if the eye does not want to see it, neither light nor glasses will help.

And then there are those other times:

“(What do you see when you turn out the light?) I can’t tell you, but I know it is mine.”

– Lennon–McCartney, ‘With a Little Help from My Friends’

April: Say it with flowers

 Late April and the city is like a young person in love...

From Top: Bradford Pear (more lower down), Star Magnolia, Dawn Viburnum (so fragrant), Narcissus, and Eastern Redbud.

Late April and the city is like a young person in love, saying it with flowers. No matter where you are– in Central Park looking towards the matchstick skyscraper rising, in Midtown jostling with the pavement crowds, or with your back to the river–there are flowers everywhere. The light is reddish gold and the birds are singing. In the window of the apartment on the opposite side, the fat white cat is smiling at a sunbeam.

People have been in love in far less favorable climes.

*

I looked into his eyes and I knew it then. It was so sudden, but I was sure. So I took him home.

The man pauses and puffs at his cigarette. The traffic inches on. The dogs are busy getting to know each other. For a few seconds the conversation turns to the dogs ‘she is very affectionate, though at first comes off as standoffish’ and ‘he’s adorable, especially when he wakes up in the morning’. Then the lights turn green. The humans nod their goodbyes.

Gripping the leash firmly he and his love at first sight totter away on this fine, fine Spring day.

 *

Cheer, cheer, cheer (sharp, quick)

Birdie, Birdie, Birdie, Birdie (stretched)

Even amidst the noise that returns with Spring (calm silence of winter, where art thou?), the song is unmistakable. Stopping and scanning the barely unfurled leaves above, I spot him: a male Northern Cardinal in his splendid red coat. On this narrow stretch of greenery, disregarding the fast-rising towers on both side and the gawking humans marching in single-file, he is calling out to his mate– do birds fall in love? Of course, science has no answer.

"True love will find you in the end
This is a promise with a catch
Only if you're looking can it find you
'Cause true love is searching too
But how can it recognize you
Unless you step out into the light?"
– Daniel Johnston, "True Love Will Find You in the End"

*

She said she’ll wait for him forever. He was with someone else, probably with a couple of them. You know what it’s like in college. But she told him she’d wait for as long as it took. Till then she had art. All very dramatic. But gosh! The art was so bloody good. I mean there was real potential but…

So what happened?

Oh! She waited for 6 long years. They are together, I suppose married by now…happily and all that. But man, it’s like the well of art has dried up. I don’t think she’s put pencil on paper for the past year or more. Nothing. Man, what a tragedy! A real tragedy!

Silence.

The magnolia tree, over laden with flowers (it would take forever to count them all) murmurs something to the breeze. But I don’t quite catch the words. Small, essential things getting lost in translation.              

*

He KISSED her!

No, he didn’t kiss kiss her. It was more like a peck. A very small one. He said so.

Both boys walk with the confidence that comes naturally to 9-10 year olds. A slight rustle from above makes me look up and I spot a juvenile mourning dove, framed by cherry blossoms, eavesdropping.

“As it has been said:
Love and a cough
cannot be concealed.
Even a small cough.
Even a small love.”
― Anne Sexton

*

So you were practically childhood sweethearts!

They are smiling, but their expression says they’ve just been stuck by that idea too. 

Two people sitting at the next table (discussing their Tinder dates…shush don’t tell) suddenly turn and look back, as if somebody has woken them up from a bad dream.

The brunching set is settling down; glasses are clinking and small talk is buzzing. White petals are falling down by the fistfuls, even as new buds are opening.

The 'Bradford' Pear, one of NYC's common street trees, that everybody loves (flowers, flowers, flowers everywhere), and hates (smell of the flowers, invasive etc).

*

The serviceberry flowers are laughing in the sunshine. You have to listen very hard.

Late April and the city is like a young person in love…or at least one pretending to be. But then, as far as pretenses go, being in love, or even thinking of being in love isn’t all that bad, is it? 

“Let us again pretend that life is a solid substance, shaped like a globe, which we turn about in our fingers. Let us pretend that we can make out a plain and logical story, so that when one matter is despatched—love for instance—we go on, in an orderly manner, to the next. ” 

― Virginia Woolf, The Waves

January: Winter Silence

At around 2:45 PM the sun makes a comeback after its early morning visitation, and continuing the gradual ascent that began on 21^st December climbs a little bit further and pours down like honey, once again. And winter silence engulfs me; even in a city like New York; even on a Friday; even with the three towers under construction in the neighbourhood. All is calm and all is quiet.

Once again, I realize why, despite the bleakness bestowed on it by popular imagination, winter is the perfect time to be still. To listen. 

“I wake up–a winter silence fills my apartment

With the mystery of life–

               why here, why now, why me:   

               I wonder what birds are nesting at this cold hour

               in bushes by the river, hibernating in their feathers.

               I imagine they

              do not dream about war,

              each breath for them is a cleansing baptism of a constantly occurring miracle,

              each feather tucked snugly to contain warmth

              purifies each heart

              that beats to be what it is.

I must tell you I seek their wisdom

each day

casually study them as I walk the ditch bank–

they seem to understand there is no death in life,

their serene poise on water

beneath the leafless overhanging branches

is movement toward the center of love.”

– from ‘Winter Poems along the Rio Grande’ by Jimmy Santiago Baca 

An historic storm was always a possibility, not a promise. That possibility skipped our door. It visited some miles further away.

Most people left work by 5:00 PM. On a Monday! At the grocery store there were smiles and a few laughs as we picked up bread and milk and extra batteries. By 9:00 PM the city that never sleeps was preparing to get some rest. Except of course the first responders and the road crews, whose long working hours had only just begun.

Late in the night, I woke to joyous laughter. It was 2:30 AM. Some people were making snow angels on the powdered sidewalk.

“Well, you know that I love to live with you

But you make me forget so very much I forget to pray for the Angel 
And then the Angels forget to pray for us”

(“So Long Marianne” by Leonard Cohen)

I watched till they did their penguin walk deep into the haze. And then slept undisturbed till 8:00 AM. The city was so quiet that you could have heard the rats scurrying in their underground chambers. (What a difference the absence of motor vehicles makes.)

Braving the blustery conditions, we meet for coffee. There is nothing to say. Time and space fill even the most contentious of subjects with silence. And ours wasn’t even an argument. We have always erred on the side of silence.

Holding our tiny cups of ‘single origin pour over espressos’ we are standing by the window. The gallery crowds are walking, pausing, peering in and then opening the door and stepping in– in an endless loop­– considering that almost every second door is a door to another gallery. The deliverymen on their bicycles are rushing by with sushi and pad thai lunches. The dog walker waiting at the stoplight is adjusting her gloves, while the dogs are sniffing the snow on the sidewalk. A man in a long black coat is muttering to himself (probably talking on the phone). After much aimless pecking a pigeon has found a pizza piece. The shop assistant is taking a cigarette break. 

The city has organized a pantomime. On the other side of the glass standing in silence, we are listening intently– to the sound of silence. And the snow begins to fall.

This silence

remembers in its deep dark chords and drums

a life beyond this life,

a beauty beyond this beauty.

– Jimmy Santiago Baca

Lately

A few days back I revived my Instagram account. Do look it up if you are around: http://instagram.com/anvita_lakhera
                                                       *
Remember a post I did on reading and how publishing is "whitest white and male dominated". Well, if you've followed recent events then you'd have come across this (among many articles regarding the same on the 'watermelon joke'):
Why is American book publishing so white: http://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2014/dec/02/american-publishing-white

*

In other news, they are back in town. Migrant gulls in large numbers come flying over the city rivers in winter, be it the Hudson or the Thames. White darts swooshing past my windows, carrying sunlight on their wings. 

*

While the resident house sparrows seem much satisfied with the bounty offered by grasses going to seed. Thank you very much.

*

At some point in time autumn without a word to anyone, adhering to a well-clocked schedule, peaked. All before the rains came in.

*

Sleet on Thanksgiving brought to mind what it would be like in the coming months. Autumn is a far-away dream. Already.

“Tell yourself
as it gets cold and gray falls from the air
that you will go on
walking, hearing
the same tune no matter where
you find yourself—
inside the dome of dark
or under the cracking white
of the moon's gaze in a valley of snow.
Tonight as it gets cold
tell yourself
what you know which is nothing
but the tune your bones play
as you keep going. And you will be able
for once to lie down under the small fire
of winter stars.
And if it happens that you cannot
go on or turn back
and you find yourself
where you will be at the end,
tell yourself
in that final flowing of cold through your limbs
that you love what you are.”
– Mark Strand, “Lines for Winter”  (RIP elegant, beautiful poet.)

The Secret Garden

'Come in' the gap that opened in the wall seemed to say, 'I’ll give you shelter from the storm.'

   

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(In case you are wondering, she's reading 'The Bachelors' by Muriel Spark.)

A few years ago, one cold afternoon in December as we drifted down the streets of New York City, the sun blushed shyly looking at the bare trees and the almost as bare streets. We weaved our way through West Chelsea, West Village– though mostly sticking to the 8^th Avenue. Somewhere in time, 8^th Avenue tuned into Hudson Street and we stood transfixed by a gap in a wall– a gate to a secret garden. Well, if the garden was supposed to be a secret, it is probably the worst kept secret in time. However, as we entered the delight that is the garden of St Luke in the Fields, it felt as if we had come upon a secret all of our own. And since then every time I see that gate in the wall, even though it is the reason why I’ve left the house, it feels as if I’ve discovered a hidden gem. Regardless of the fact that every single bench is occupied. Or that probably every single person who visits this sanctuary has had these same thoughts.

For this is where people in this part of the city come when they seek tranquility. And hummingbirds.