TRANSLUCENT GOSSAMER
Ode #30 - Trans)Scribed Poetic Dictation with Thread Vision, Translucid Ode
[Translucence has been on my mind since seeing the remarkable exhibit on Raphael at the MET this past Friday. Translucency: the special quality lent to light by that through which it passes. Not only the light, but the image on the other side too is enhanced. Positively augmented. It is pleasurable to us; our attention is brought to the many semi-invisible gauze-like overlapping layers inbetween the light and the looked-at. This quality can appear materially (outside) and immaterially (inner vision/imagination). Raffaello Santi’s pre-painting drawings/sketches (“cartoons”) were revealed by special scans to have a great density of symbols present in the background which are invisible to the human eye. Layers and layers of images preserved only in trace memory. What does it mean that modern tech can detect them? This seeing further enriches the translucency of Raphael’s drawings. The paper is thin, yet it has a great weight to it, a thickness. It is laden. This ladenness creates a certain ambiance to the image. A meaningful felt context. While the symbols cannot be seen, there is a magical quality the memory of their presence offers. And this quality is visible to us. Sometimes we simply like it, mysteriously. We may not be able to quite put our finger on it. Yet, with careful consideration, we may notice the translucence itself. Gossamer-esque and undeniable~ ] Received 4/21/2026 | 3:06-21pm
Companion Missive #30 - ABSOLUTION (12/19/2023)
Listen to the Recitation:
TRANSLUCENT GOSSAMER A thousand invisible layers alter the light Burgeoning brilliance, an auric glow The image behind is not obscured Our attention is drawn into the substance Between, through which the light moves Reflecting and refracting time The scarcely visible red gold thread inside Stretches through every transmission Consider the voice which returns to you Your own, altered comprehensively Without loss of recognizance, we notice The continuum of meaning, a faint mask Dropped, revealing face sublime A material emanence which emits the received Radiance of a sun indirect, apricot shimmer Peach and jewel-like leaves covered in hair Thin tendril roots into the air, immersed In the stories of every lineage diving Toward the present moment, spiraling soap suds Draining flesh of life, I follow the moment As is beneaths a wildebested bellow My eyes move to the ceiling, hairs Reaching down toward me, I hear her voice Whispering mad drivel, perfect elegance Not a word out of place — I am the chain Chained to the ones who came before me They say to break the chain; I keep it And care for it, the patina'd metal links Singing minerals wishing the world into being Lithium and cobalt and copper green Ultra pure silica sand in North Carolina Giant harbor ports disrupting supply routes Mapping new silk roads, stones given wings From fission to fusion — the separation yields To union, the birth of helium (which too is needed) For the earth to express its intelligence in the new Unexpected artificial ways to future unimagines Sing to me of the symbol, the symbolic depths Which merge with the heights to create Neither heaven nor hell, nor terrest embodied The vision becomes flesh, beating red beneath Glowing through, the light shines in translucence As a million stars fall upon the mountaintops Barreling into the sea, grains of sand lost and Found, a feeling of absolescence, charity dried I give myself to the feeling, immersing my self In the feeling — why do the robins gather on the hill Around me: gold-breasted with a round black cap The cherries and lilac and magnolia bud and burst Together with maple, with yew, with aged white pine Pieris cascades, fairy bells — a crest of violets Picked to adorn the body, carried solemnly With celebratory excellence, abominations cry And blood is spilled upon the body, libatory Calls to the swallow's nest, apartment-like Built into the gothic brown stone steeple, ringing Bells sound many tens of times as we pass by Summoning the dead to bed, to rise As the end is already the beginning And the hill shall lament no longer Pink tubilustrium, but not for war We sing with the birds, with the tulip lotuses Popping up along the water's edge, green moss Like jellyfish, hovering transparent in the rippling Way of life; ever changing my outlook Looking in, I recognize the terraced hills, The city of many walls, concentric circles A raccoon is buried at the base of a tree I hope her children are ok, that they are happy Wherever they are, I hope they are well Perhaps looking from afar at the strange Proceedings connected to their mother Who had been so loathed in life, now honored Guarded by the black willow, her pain alleviated Permanently — this microthreading of time Insists on its continuance, a vision of what's to come As it winds and wefts and wafts its way Back to us. I hold it between my hands and pray, Pray for the pleasure of the world~
