A new side of Poetry & Process was just announced, entitled Memory. This will be built around a community that desires to live with poetry as a companion in their everyday life, developing this companionship by memorizing poetry together. You can read about this launch in the recent post, Announcing: Memory.
Now for today’s Reflection on Mist!
Spoken rendition of “Mist”.
Process
Mist is a poem that found inspiration in a beautiful setting.
My family and I were meeting extended family for a long weekend in northwest Arkansas, a part of the country I had not spent time in. I had been told what a beautiful place the natural areas of Arkansas are, but like most things, you have to see it for yourself for it to really have impact. The views of valleys from clearings on top of the mountains have stayed with me since that time.
During time away from life’s norms, I typically hope for sunshine to encourage long periods of time outdoors. While we had breaks in the weather, most of the weekend was cloudy with long periods of rain and occasional thunderstorms. Thankfully, the cabin we rented sat high on a mountain, had a large, covered porch, and a view of the valley where we were treated to beautiful views, even with weather that was not optimal for exploring. The porch offered an inviting environment to sit and chat while watching dark clouds a few miles away, some cells of rain, brief periods of sun during early evening that cast beautiful hues of blue and gray throughout the sky, and a few hours where the humidity increased and warm mist rose from the valley. There are times when one has to set the mood in their environment to spark creativity. Then there are times where the mood is set for you. This was the latter.
Over the weekend, I stole away for short periods to write. One morning, the mood that was offered created an enjoyable hour-long flow where a first draft of Mist arrived with relative ease. The poem certainly was not finished but left me with a feeling of inspiration for what deep personal work can offer.
When I arrived back in St. Louis and re-read the poem, the message I wanted to portray was there, but the poetry was not. There was a heaviness to the poem and that would just not do. After all, the poem is about mist! There could have been some irony there, but I decided that the poem was wearing the wrong outfit. So, I began to edit.
The editing and finishing process took almost two weeks of changes, additions, and deletions before I decided to call it “done”. I hit save, filed it away, and felt ok about the end product, but did not think this was a poem that would emerge for another’s consumption.
After I published Blue in mid-September, I spent some time revisiting poems I thought were complete that I had written over the past couple of years. It was an interesting experience as I intended only to read and ended up editing. I did keep the original finished works and copied a version that I then edited in the same Word document to allow me to freely edit without losing the original work. While I did not change every poem that I reopened, I touched half of them by adjusting a word or two, breaking a line differently, or deleting some extraneous words. Mist was one of those. A couple of months after “finishing” Mist, just a few words changed and a few more removed allowed a cadence to emerge that felt light and airy with the theme of the poem intact.
I have only been writing for 3 years. I wonder what it will feel like to revisit writing ten years from now with a willingness to edit.
Themes
This poem’s overarching theme is self-exploration.
Self-exploration is difficult work. It can be disruptive, it typically brings uncertainty and if you are anything like me, it layers on the desire of wanting control over outcomes I could never be in control of. There certainly are times of revelation, relief, and excitement, but if one arrives at those places too quickly, it is likely they are only scratching the surface of what it is they seek to discover.
The poem’s first set of stanzas explores the individual who talks about self-exploration but does not seem to be ready to take the brave step into the work. This individual is perched up high and thinks and thinks and thinks and waits for a thought of revelation to float up to them. As soon as they glimpse something that seems like what they seek, they reach out and grasp with the belief that they have the answer. But fast answers are just whisps of thought, not anything rooted in deeper wisdom. They disappear as soon as one reaches out a hand to pull it in.
You expect two things.
Joy to arise
from this valley
and trouble found
only in dust
that settled behind you
as you walked
to this place
perched on the hillcrest.
You ask three questions
and tell yourself
this valley
has three answers
but you sit
on top of your world
looking down,
as if what you seek
will rise to you
the way mist rises
in fingers
from the valley depths,
as if you can reach
out your hand
and grasp
these rising fingers,
as if mist will not disappear
the very moment
it brushes
your skin.
Next, we explore what this mist is. To state the obvious, mist is visible, and it moves from place to place, but it is a fleeting state that emerges as a result of prior events. In this poem, mist is created through the history of yesterday’s rain and where the rain flowed when it came to the earth, coming together with the events of the current day, leading to that water’s evaporation and immediate condensation.
This idea aligns with what we are as humans. We aren’t really our body, and we can’t really understand our consciousness. To try to describe ourselves as anything concrete creates a circular conversation. However, when we look at ourselves as a process that comes from a history, there are aspects that become clearer. We exist because of years and years of occurrences, and who we are today is our history coming together with the present moment (history also explored in the later part of the poem). When we ask questions of ourselves and grasp only what is right in front of us we skip past what has influenced our lives up to this point in time, and this history lacking view will leave us unsatisfied or misinformed.
The tie from mist to what humans are does not stand alone in the following stanza, but this stanza does help establish this view which emerges at the end of the poem.
Look at the way
it blows through
the valley,
mist the remnant of
yesterday’s troubles
that fell steady
from the sky
to join the earth
in consummation,
then let gravity guide
deep into the river
raging in the valley floor.
Then, we hear a voice of encouragement, presumably from one who has gone before or has done their work. This person honestly describes the lack of clarity that happens when we take the brave step into the deep. I resonate with the lines and here where your desire for / clear sight disappears / in your desperation for a / clear breath of air. This statement expresses how often we search for relief by trying to see clearly, but that relief is not actually found in clear sight. We’re using the wrong sense. Instead, when one is immersed in the water or in the deep, we cannot help but shift our focus to the need for breath.
Come be here
here where water does not provide
a clear picture of what will be,
here where soil and silt
cast clouds that call you
to offer yourself
to misunderstanding,
here where current
beyond you directs,
and here where your desire for
clear sight disappears
in your desperation for a
clear breath of air.
For it is in the river,
immersed in all
that was brought together
where your questions
glisten with the drops of yesterday,
dance with dead branches
holding stories to tell,
grieve with leaves whose plans
to shade were cut short,
and touch river stones
worn smooth by millennia of flow.
Finally, the poem resolves by bringing the elements together in some sort of equation. Rain, then river, then the immersion of the seeker, multiplied by the energy of the seeker, resulting in a mist. This mist is altogether different than what we explored at the beginning, for the person that is part of the process and who touches all of the elements is no longer reaching to grasp the ungraspable. Instead, they have become part of the process, and their ability to identify as anything that is separate from the process does not make sense.
The gift
is in touching this place,
your living flame joined
with the cold river of experience,
river evaporating
into a giving of yourself,
compassion rising as mist
through the forest
blown by the wind
up through the hills
to disappear
without answer.
Maybe this leaves some feeling unsatisfied as no answer is found to the three questions we set out with. I believe that is the point. Often our questions that we begin with in self-exploration seem to not need to be answered as we touch the deep.
Ending Thoughts
Just a few final musings to wrap up this Reflection.
I was intentional about the two and the three in the beginning of the poem (two things, three questions).
The two, joy and no trouble, are the basis of what we think we are chasing when we are unhappy or living unconsciously. We seem to think both of those things should be our normal, but it’s not realistic, is it? Joy and not being troubled are options, but not for those that do not engage themselves with honesty, history, and depth.
The three ties to questions and answers to those questions. I left the specifics of any questions and answers open-ended. You get to decide what those questions are for you. In the poem we find the rain, the river and the seeker. That is the source of the mist, and those three cannot be separated. Are these answers? Maybe in their own way.
Finally, this poem starts with a binary, a choice between staying high on a mountain or taking a brave step to the deep. Now, I think few situations we face only give us a binary choice. Between two extremes are miles of middle ground. As you reflect, consider the seasons of life that are not as conducive to deep self-exploration. These might be times that are demanding, times we need to rest or just take care of the basics, or maybe coast for a while, or even hide to prepare to emerge. Lets meet ourselves with compassion if we are not in a spot of deep self-exploration. No one is all the time, nor should they be. However, I think this poem cautions about never choosing to go to the deep place. Those that choose to go gain experience with this unsettling process, accept who they are and the world they are in, and become more ready to act in line with who they uncover. Those that choose also find themselves more prepared for the times that we all eventually face, times when we are thrust into those deep places without our choosing and find ourself in “desperation for a clear breath of air”.
As always, thank you for reading! I hope you’ll take everything I wrote about the themes in Mist and entirely throw it out to replace it with what you feel when you read it. Let me know what else you picked up on and felt in the comments. I would love to hear and converse. This is the intent of Poetry & Process, designed to allow you to have space to let the poem do its work in you. Poetry is alive and should inspire many different impressions. There is no wrong way to interpret.
May you join with the experience that surrounds you.
Brian
If you missed the “A Poem” post of Mist, I hope you will read and enjoy! You can find it here.
Mist
You expect two things.
Joy to arise
from this valley
and trouble found
only in dust
that settled behind you...
Do you write your process pieces in the same time allotment that you write poetry? Or is poetry a morning experience, process an evening one?
Brian, thank you for letting us see the canvas and the paints that you used to make this poem. For me, it feels alive and spacious. Time as a River is one of my favorite ways to try to understand the mystery of yesterday, today, and tomorrow. And I agree with you. Who we are today is, indeed, created by our history in a delicate alchemy with the present moment.
For me, that describes the work of The Beloved who is continuously creating Time. One who dreams the story of our lives and gives us a chance to help fill the pages with what we love and care about— our work and our callings in the world.
The poem reveals how each moment is fleeting. We can't see the whole process at once. We can only notice the smoothness of the river stones today, and how they have become more beautiful, their rough edges now gone. That is exactly what draws me to the practice of walking on familiar trails and watching for the tiniest changes. I wonder if the present microseason can only really be seen, and touched, and savored in the gentlest, most selfless way? Maybe this is also true of our lives...
And this: “Instead, they have become part of the process…anything that is separate from the process does not make sense.” Absolutely. The process is everything.
I like how you made “Come be here” stand alone. It is the invitation I always feel as I enter the quiet, ancient rooms and hallways of the forest. My favorite line in this work is “your living flame joined/ with the cold river of experience” Often, the water is so very cold. We wonder if we can keep our heat going in this swimming?
Thank you for this one, Brian. It’s very timely. I’ll keep it in my pocket for this season.