{"id":8406,"date":"2024-04-21T08:45:35","date_gmt":"2024-04-21T15:45:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.poetry-chaikhana.com\/blog\/?p=8406"},"modified":"2024-04-21T08:45:35","modified_gmt":"2024-04-21T15:45:35","slug":"lisel-mueller-monet-refuses-the-operation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.poetry-chaikhana.com\/blog\/2024\/04\/21\/lisel-mueller-monet-refuses-the-operation\/","title":{"rendered":"Lisel Mueller – Monet Refuses the Operation"},"content":{"rendered":"

Monet Refuses the Operation
\nby Lisel Mueller<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Doctor, you say that there are no haloes
\naround the streetlights in Paris
\nand what I see is an aberration
\ncaused by old age, an affliction.
\nI tell you it has taken me all my life
\nto arrive at the vision of gas lamps as angels,
\nto soften and blur and finally banish
\nthe edges you regret I don\u2019t see,
\nto learn that the line I called the horizon
\ndoes not exist and sky and water,
\nso long apart, are the same state of being.
\nFifty-four years before I could see
\nRouen cathedral is built
\nof parallel shafts of sun,
\nand now you want to restore
\nmy youthful errors: fixed
\nnotions of top and bottom,
\nthe illusion of three-dimensional space,
\nwisteria separate
\nfrom the bridge it covers.
\nWhat can I say to convince you
\nthe Houses of Parliament dissolve
\nnight after night to become
\nthe fluid dream of the Thames?
\nI will not return to a universe
\nof objects that don\u2019t know each other,
\nas if islands were not the lost children
\nof one great continent. The world
\nis flux, and light becomes what it touches,
\nbecomes water, lilies on water,
\nabove and below water,
\nbecomes lilac and mauve and yellow
\nand white and cerulean lamps,
\nsmall fists passing sunlight
\nso quickly to one another
\nthat it would take long, streaming hair
\ninside my brush to catch it.
\nTo paint the speed of light!
\nOur weighted shapes, these verticals,
\nburn to mix with air
\nand changes our bones, skin, clothes
\nto gases. Doctor,
\nif only you could see
\nhow heaven pulls earth into its arms
\nand how infinitely the heart expands
\nto claim this world, blue vapor without end.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/a> \u2014 from Second Language: Poems<\/a>, by Lisel Mueller<\/font><\/p>\n


\/ Image by Nik Shuliahin<\/a> \/<\/em><\/font><\/p>\n

A rare Sunday poem this week. Last week was especially full with work and dental appointments, so I didn\u2019t get to the poem on Friday. I received several thoughtful emails following the previous week\u2019s poem, and I didn\u2019t get many responses out \u2014 but I read them all. <\/p>\n

Here\u2019s something to remind us of the hidden glory in aging. (A big thank you to Mirabai Starr and her email newsletter for remind me of this poem.)<\/p>\n

Permission, I suppose, to be a little less focused and a little more present. I hope you feel the heavenly nearness in those haloed lamps!<\/p>\n


\n

<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/a>Recommended Books: Lisel Mueller<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n\n

<\/p>\n

\n\n\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

<\/center>
\n<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/td>\n<\/a><\/td>\n<\/a><\/td>\n<\/a><\/td>\n<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Alive Together: New and Selected Poems<\/a><\/small><\/td>\nSecond Language: Poems<\/a><\/small><\/td>\nThe Need to Hold Still: Poems<\/a><\/small><\/td>\nDependencies: Poems<\/a><\/small><\/td>\n<\/a><\/small><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\n\n
\n\"Lisel<\/a>\n<\/td>\n\nLisel Mueller<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

US & Germany (1924 \u2013 )
\nSecular or Eclectic<\/a><\/a>
\n<\/a><\/a><\/em>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

More poetry by Lisel Mueller<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Monet Refuses the Operation by Lisel Mueller Doctor, you say that there are no haloes around the streetlights in Paris and what I see is an aberration caused by old age, an affliction. I tell you it has taken me all my life to arrive at the vision of gas lamps as angels, to soften […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1147,2100,2306,1997,2557],"class_list":["post-8406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry","tag-aging","tag-eyesight","tag-halo","tag-lisel-mueller","tag-monet"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.poetry-chaikhana.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.poetry-chaikhana.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.poetry-chaikhana.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.poetry-chaikhana.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.poetry-chaikhana.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8406"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.poetry-chaikhana.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8406\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8407,"href":"https:\/\/www.poetry-chaikhana.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8406\/revisions\/8407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.poetry-chaikhana.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.poetry-chaikhana.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.poetry-chaikhana.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}