 Winter Chaos, Blizzard, by Marsden Hartley (USA) 1909 Opening Letter and Selections for Marsden Hartley’s Winter Chaos, Blizzard Dear Writers, When the challenge features artists who are long gone from this world, I find it a shame they’re unable to read The Ekphrastic Review. The incredible variety of responses never ceases to amaze me. Please know that I’ve loved reading every poem and story. Choosing from among them is a task done with great sensitivity. I hope you enjoy this eclectic collection: a mixture of serious, conversational, reflective, mystical—as well as whimsical, incorporating folk tales and sayings, even touching on love. Warmest regards during this season of true winter chaos, Sandi Stromberg Editor, The Ekphrastic Review ** The Lesser of Two Evils I have to ask you Marsden, where the mountain went. Its bulk has been obliterated by your brushstrokes betraying your penchant for the mayhem of snow and ice and the stripping of the leaves from defenseless trees. The blue confuses me, and Marsden, what’s the pink I see? My first thought: there are two lost girls, their cheeks flushed from the slap of things unseen, their limbs flailing against this whirling, swirling mess and if this is what I’ll find in Maine, I might rethink the timing of my trip. Don’t get me wrong, Marsden, I like the chill of winter weather and the wild commotion of a storm, especially if I’m inside with rum and milk. I’d be happy just to buy your art and hang it on my wall. Then I wouldn’t need to come to Maine at all. What was that? The price is what? On second thoughts, just book my seat. Linda McQuarrie-Bowerman Linda McQuarrie-Bowerman lives in Lake Tabourie, NSW, by the sea. In this beautiful environment, she writes poetry and has recently dabbled in flash fiction. She is completing her degree in Creative Writing at Curtin University and enjoys seeing her work published in various literary spaces. She is a recent Pushcart Nominee thanks to The Ekphrastic Review. ** Cold Front Oh, you’ve never been through one of these, have you? Some advice (because I still remember my first one too): take a deep breath. Breathing is about to get a whole lot harder. First things first, keep something warm against your chest – no, not just over your shirt, against your skin – you’ve gotta safeguard the exposure, the tender stitch and rough patch-job and every other part of you that hurts easily, because that’s where the cold comes in. That’s where the howling comes in. You hear that sound, like a freight train? Like a pack of wolves? It takes a blizzard raging in your ears to understand how something with no voice can howl, how something with no teeth can bite – listen to me, this is siege warfare, and the wind and the cold and the wet and that dreadful noise will tear through your skin, they will tear through the mud and your blood and your bones, and they will not stop until they have ripped the breath from your lungs – listen to me, this is not the kind of storm you can fight, but we can keep it from tearing you apart at the seams, so just tuck that scarf under your sweater, would you? Next step, gather everything you love around you, and let the warm weight of it quiet your shaking hands, your chattering teeth – I know, I know, the world outside is spinning, yes, dizzying, yes, I hear the tornado siren too – but trust me, spiraling in the other direction will not stop the house shaking or your stomach churning, and there is no virtue in nausea. There is no virtue in hyperventilation. There is no virtue in running towards the whiteout – here, sit with me. Sit with me and count your heartbeat. Hold it in your mouth, warm and out of the wind. Remember, everything in this room loves you. Everything in this room will keep you grounded, warm and out of the wind. Here is my hand. Remember, the eye of the storm is not watching you. Here is my hand. Here is the needle. Let me teach you how to thread the eye. Let me teach you about seams, and sutures, and mattress stitching. Let me teach you how to install storm windows in your ribs, and where to store the shatterproof glass. Here is my hand. Take it, or don’t. Your choice. And remember, the next time there’s a storm passing through your head: don’t chase it. Kimberly Hall Kimberly Hall (she/her) received her master’s degree in behavioral science from the University of Houston-Clear Lake. Her poetry has appeared in online publications such as First Flight and Sappho’s Torque, as well as in several ekphrastic poetry anthologies. She still gets the idiomatic butterflies whenever anyone mentions that where she can hear it. ** This Too Will Pass When the snow shrouds The shivering shoulder of leaves, And the bodies of trees arch Under the touch of frosty winds, When the milk of morning’s warmth Turns into evening’s ice, And the present wheezes into time’s Wintery blue loneliness, When the orange scent of laughter Turns into the moan of a dull memory, And bone-white mingled with cold blue Is all you can see, Remain calm, breathe and listen Every snowflake that falls, tells you, this too will pass. Preeth Ganapathy Preeth Ganapathy is a software engineer turned civil servant from Bengaluru, India. Her works have been published in several magazines such as The Ekphrastic Review, Soul-Lit, The Sunlight Press, Atlas+Alice, Ink, Sweat and Tears, Mothers Always Write, Tiger Moth Review and elsewhere. Her microchaps A Single Moment and Purple - have been published by Origami Poems Project. She is also a two-time winner of Wilda Morris's Poetry Challenge. Stone, Cold It’s a painting, Winter Chaos, Blizzard but it’s a portrait of airborne shades of apatite and blue kyanite, verging into lapis lazuli. Dumortierite needles suspended in cold quartz as sodalite is tossed skyward. Amid the dappled blues; brown striations, green inclusions, and purple waves lend imperfect intention to the pent vitality of this mineral snow storm in progress, suspended since 1909. Something grasping wants this image cut, faceted, polished and buffed. The piece of art is a setting in itself, but it’s a raw gem, without its true place. As yet unmade, it’s a cabochon of a picture, bezeled but too flat, unilluminated. It’s a static but constant unfinished jewel, stuck midstorm, awaiting its lapidist to take its measure and release the latent power of its icy shifting light. Rebecca Dempsey Rebecca Dempsey is a writer in Naarm / Melbourne, Australia. Her recent work is featured in The Primer, Unstamatic, and Triggerfish Critical Review. Rebecca can be found at WritingBec.com. ** Marsden Hartley's Mysticism "On February 8th and 9th, 1909, a major snowstorm enveloped the area with blizzard conditions...removal on rails was primitive at best...many areas were para- lyzed for some time." Computer information for winter, 1909 "We'll have the sun now... The shiver of an ash leaf and of pine makes the music for a day's determining even sea gulls love the shape of roses ere day closes." Confidence, Marsden Hartley "...like so many single looking elements, when they seem the most playful, it is then that they are most dangerous.' Indian Point, Marsden Hartley The Christmas Blizzard in New York could not disguise his messages from Green Acres a first canvas with a silvery fish swimming among roses the ocean a palette of night -- the Mason boys drowning -- the lobster fishermen with sunburned skin that began to resemble the reddish-brown flesh of native Americans in the same way Mt. St. Victoire became a place of Indian magic -- a mountain anywhere, in Maine or New Mexico, or in France when he followed the footsteps of Cezanne and painted his own interpretation of the world... So it was understandable that the child who stood before his canvas of a blizzard her small hands holding a paper with instructions as to how to make a snow glob would say "It is so blue!" to no one in particular her personal opinion that Marsden Hartley's Blizzard looked like a field of bluebonnets; meaning, to her, that the seasons could reverse themselves, that nature has a life and movement all its own so she would not put people in her snow globe a spring landscape that could be transformed by -- as the directions said -- 1 to 2 teaspoons of glitter. How like real snow the shining flakes would be! How blue a cloud-free sky, the background! She was tempted to add an old man, like a father or a grandfather, holding up a mirror -- its reflection, double snow, or double bluebonnets -- springtime or wintertime like Hartley's canvas on the wall of a museum where (she read) the bluebonnet field was named Blizzard. She liked the artist who confused the ice with flowers; how blue paint could swish on the tip of his paint brush like a wish so she'd know the winter storms were over as she sat at a little table in her grandmother's bedroom, working on her globe beneath a photocopied print of a Blue Girl in its dime store white frame, trimmed with just enough gold to make it look as expensive as a picture for sale in the museum's book store where she'd made her choice, and counted out the coins in her allowance to buy the snow globe. When she added the glitter -- the beauty of snow -- and imagined looking out into a moment where nothing was certain -- where turmoil equaled chaos -- why she was alone unless dreams could change the hours... Could love fill her heart with a blizzard of flowers? Laurie Newendorp Laurie Newendorp lives and writes in Houston where it was her good fortune to study poetry for a Master's Degree in The Creative Writing Department of The University of Houston. Her book, When Dreams Were Poems, explores the relationship of art to poetry and life. Selected multiple times by The Ekphrastic Challenge, she has found that art and writing poetry can be a mystical experience, as in one of her early poems -- "Quantum Physics, Emily & Einstein" -- a personal pathway from reality into the imagination facilitated by the use of ekphrastics. It was at Green Acres that Marsden Hartley began to delve into the philosophical study of mysticism. A first canvas created there, of fish with roses, caught the attention of Alfred Steiglitz who arranged a one-man show for Hartley at his 291 Gallery in New York City. ** A Blizzard of Static on the Line I remember the snow globe, how you'd pick it up, shake it and the flakes would tumble and swirl. You were mesmerised by the novelty I imagine all those tiny crystals, the feathery snowflakes formed, each one's separate, unique beauty Communication now between us is full of static. White noise - that's what they call it I think of those tiny particles tumbling, swirling, clogging up the channels like chaotic butterflies Nature's patterns are unpredictable. Storms can rise, drop, cease in seconds. I hold onto that hope Emily Tee Emily Tee writes poetry and flash fiction. She's had pieces published online in The Ekphrastic Review and for its challenges, and elsewhere, and in print in some publications by Dreich as well as several poetry anthologies. She lives in England. ** Growing As a young woman, I turned my nose up at the male artists Alfred Stieglitz supported, happy to promote Georgia O’Keeffe as the best artist he ever took under his wing, the only one he married, the only one he dared to document every detail of her body that made the body of work I want most to wander through. Now, as an older woman, I know enough about artists to admire Arthur Dove’s clever nature collages, John Marin’s dedication to Maine’s rocky shores, Charles Demuth’s moving, unconventional portraits, and Hartley’s coded colors for his lovers’ homage and for this—his swirling scene of white and blue dancing around that fine line between what we think we see and what the artist invites us to see. I’m old enough to say Thank you, Mr. Hartley. Blue is my favourite colour, too. Barbara Tyler As a life-long visual artist, Barbara Tyler began writing poetry after turning 50. Since then, her writing has appeared in Rat’s Ass Review, Poetica Review, and Concho River Review, as well as shortlisted for Ireland’s Fish Anthology poetry prize. More of her poetry and art can be experienced by visiting her website at https://www.btylerfineart.com. ** Restraint On the day that I saw snow fall outside my window For the first time in my life I did not go out. I stayed in. I told myself that it was too late to do anything Though it really wasn’t as late as it could have been. And the restless thing in me In the place where a heart should be It started beating wildly Against its cage. I could tell you everything about this But I know I don’t have to. I think that you might have A wild thing for a heart too I see its indentations all the time On the careful words you choose. Our restless wild things If we let them loose I think they’d eat the whole world They would eat us too. That’s why I keep mine Carefully caged And hidden from the light. That’s why I write these words down But never say them to you. That’s why after waiting my whole life On the day that I saw snow fall outside my window For the first time I did not go out. I stayed in. And I reached out my hand And closed all the blinds. Amrita V. Nair Amrita V. Nair is a writer and researcher from India, who now lives in Canada. Her poetry has appeared in Kitaab, The Nervous Breakdown, and Indian Literature and was included in the Bloomsbury Anthology of Great Indian Poems. Website: www.amritanair.com ** between the lines the exact location of the beginning is lost, much like the approximate location of now so much remains interpolated, transformed by the many manifestations of water and wind fire and ice came after—fluid, unruled and unruly-- teeming with what was never there the intersections shifted, multiplied by too many exes and whys-- drifting, tangled and overexposed you say a path once existed here-- you had a map—names, numbers, a compass pointing home Kerfe Roig Kerfe Roig lives and makes art in New York City, where the first recorded snow of the 2022-2023 season appeared on February 1. ** Vortex Weather wasn’t always like this forever winds bouncing off the mountains blizzards bringing the chaos of flailing and falling leaf heavy boughs, their trunks lying still broken or uprooted and the gush and rush of wild, wild water spiralling in chaotic cascades. I had thought that here we were sheltered by the mountains but now we’re in the centre of an angry vortex under the still blue sky, it’s a whirling blue vortex in this dervish of a blizzard. Lynn White Lynn White lives in north Wales. Her work is influenced by issues of social justice and events, places and people she has known or imagined. She is especially interested in exploring the boundaries of dream, fantasy and reality. She was shortlisted in the Theatre Cloud 'War Poetry for Today' competition and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net and a Rhysling Award. Her poetry has appeared in many publications including: Consequence Magazine, Firewords, Vagabond Press, Gyroscope Review and So It Goes Journal. Find Lynn at: https://lynnwhitepoetry.blogspot.com and https://www.facebook.com///www.facebook.com/Lynn-White-Poetry-1603675983213077/ ** In Northern Woods In the startling blizzard—the gnomes step out stealthily through the turbulent icy forest, spying on the good northern folk, as children quake in their homes. Brother hugs sister but cannot say the words, ‘Don’t be afraid, it’ll be all right.’ The gnomes with evil intent in their eyes, peer from behind the thrashing pines, the trees threaten as if brandishing swords. Mesmerized by all the staring eyes they see, the children take on masks of bravery when father enters the room. The wind howls, the rafters quiver, and father tells them the creek will rise. Then, then we’ll run to the river, and float on our raft to a safer place. “No father, no never! for the gnomes will grab us and have us for dinner!” But father shook his children and pushed them hard to the boat. And all the howling we hear in every storm every year since is the voice of the children calling their remonstrance. “Father, father, we won’t have a chance.” And father and children perished in the howl and the wind and the sheer. Carole Mertz Carole Mertz is a recent Pushcart Prize nominee. Her poem “That this Blue Exists…” will be read and discussed on an Ohio Center for the Book podcast, February, 2023. Carole’s work in ekphrasis has appeared in The Ekphrastic Review, Quill and Parchment, Adanna, and her book Color and Line. The gnomes came out in Hartley’s painting following Carole’s recent cataract surgery. ** When The White Blizzard Hits When out on the tundra north of the tree line in Arctic Quebec when the white blizzard hits, my Inuit students tell me it's bad luck to say I'm dying to see a polar bear When out on the tundra north of the tree line in Arctic Quebec when the white blizzard hits, my Inuit students tell me it's good luck if someone in your party runs slower than you do When out on the tundra north of the tree line in Arctic Quebec when the white blizzard hits, I tell my Inuit students if I die out here on the tundra no one gets an A And we all howl into the wind. Donna-Lee Smith Donna-Lee Smith divides her time between Gotland Island out in the middle of the Baltic Sea with her grandchildren; and an off-the-grid cabin in the Laurentian Hills of Quebec; and a walk-up flat in Montreal (where currently it's a bone-chilling -42 degrees on this February afternoon!). She taught in the Faculty of Education, McGill University, for 25 years, teaching academic and creative writing both on campus and in First Nations and Inuit communities throughout Quebec and Cape Breton. She leads a peripatetic, blessed life, often with her husband of some 40-odd years. Their happiness resides in their prenuptial agreement: Separate as to Reality! ** Firewood The weather is ominous with heavy snow and blustering winds pounding against my face. I cannot see in front of me, my feet are freezing, and my hands are numb. I should have listened to my wife and not ventured into the forest searching for firewood. In my mind, I see Clara fretting with worry, pacing the floors, her dress brushing against the ground, looking for something to occupy her mind. If I make it back, I will be returning empty handed, but that is the least of my worries. The snow is rising faster, and it is harder to walk in knee-deep drifts. I keep going even though my legs ache, and brace for an arduous journey. Ahead I see a small shack. Shelter. When I get there, it is abandoned except for a turned over chair and kitchen table. After righting the chair with my tired hands, I sit and check my sack for food. Clara is an angel. A large loaf of bread and a block of cheese awaits my watering mouth. It is icy cold, but my stomach does not mind. After I eat, I lay my head down, shivering. I feel myself drifting into slumber and just as I am about to fall asleep, I hear a loud collapse. The roof has caved in and a pile of snow sits in the middle of the room. It is not safe to stay any longer. I lift my fatigued body from the chair and make my way into the forest, positive this is my last venture for firewood. Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher has been writing since 2010 and has had many micro-flash fiction stories published. In 2018 her book Shorts for the Short Story Enthusiasts, was published and The Importance of Being Short, in 2019. Her most recent book In A Flash, was published in the spring of 2022. She currently resides on Long Island, New York with her husband Richard and dogs Lucy and Breanna. ** ocean claims forest A blizzard in a pine forest is just excuse for Ocean and Forest to meet. sea spray stings and winter weather withers the scent of pine penetrates the senses Ocean and Forest combine and are one trees become masts and the sea claims them, from sea to shining sea, this America of ours–but the Ocean cannot be claimed. a ship’s mast rises out of the forest floor and an oak grows from the foaming waves: storms rip through forests, winds unify and stir the ocean to strife and destruction the mind combines the storms of both and makes itself a sailing ship that once was pine. Maureen Martin Maureen Martin is a senior at Hillsdale College studying English and Theatre. Her passions include yelling at period dramas for their historical inaccuracies, working on multiple theatrical projects simultaneously, and having a bookshelf of a To Be Read pile. ** Tanka Foreign butterflies Wreaked havoc, caused a blizzard With just their wing beats Unfathomable power Chaos masked by great beauty Rose Menyon Heflin Originally from rural, southern Kentucky, Rose Menyon Heflin is a writer and visual artist living in Madison, Wisconsin. Her poetry has appeared in numerous journals spanning five continents, and it won a Merit Award from Arts for All Wisconsin in both 2021 and 2022. Additionally, one of her poems was choreographed and performed by a local dance troupe, and she had an ekphrastic creative nonfiction piece featured in the Chazen Museum of Art’s Companion Species exhibit. Among other venues, her poetry has recently been published or is forthcoming in Deep South Magazine, The Ekphrastic Review, Visual Verse, and many more. ** Chaos For millennia, somewhere on Earth, there has always been a powerful Weather event taking place. Afterwards, some suffer, and some thrive. After a wildfire, Digger Pine seeds in Northern California germinate, And the monsoon floods in Southeast Asia nurture the rice fields. The people there know it is Shiva, the god of destruction, Bringing one life cycle to an end and beginning a new one. In the Polynesian islands, when a volcano erupts, the people chant About the fire goddess, Pele, creating a new island from flaming lava. In a few thousand, or perhaps million years, the lava transforms into a rain forest, Covered with ulu trees, mangoes, and seed-scattering birds. Myths and legends evolved from these Earth-changing occurrences, And humans still carry the memories deep in their hearts. In 1909, a blizzard hit the northern states all the way to Maine, piling Up more than twenty inches of snow in a single day. More than a hundred years have passed since this massive snowfall, so No one is left on Earth who experienced it and may have sung a ballad about “The Blizzard of ’09,” but an artist from Maine painted the scene. Marsden Hartley seems to be our only witness to the big storm of 1909. From a high perspective, his painting looks down through eerie blue light Onto adjoining forested hills, the tall balsam firs, the beeches and the white pines Already heavy with snow. In the nexus between the mountains, there may be a river, Impressionistically suggested by dabs of pinkish purple and green in the lower regions Of the hills. If there are farms in this valley, we are too far away to see them. Marsden titled his painting, Winter Chaos, Blizzard. To the people living in nearby towns, It must have seemed chaotic indeed, as no doubt the telegraph lines fell over in the The icy winds, and snow piled up on the railroad tracks. Even the horses pulling Wagons and sleighs couldn’t get through snow drifts that deep. But to the farmers, invisible in the deep valley, and the remnant of the Wabanaki, Still living in this northern wilderness after eleven thousand years, There was no chaos. This blizzard was simply winter. The Wabanaki had already packed their birch bark canoes with teepees, snowshoes and warm Bever pelts, and paddled away from their coastal fishing grounds, up the river, The pinkish spot in the painting, to the area of green vegetation at higher elevation, Better for hunting moose. From this vantage point, the Wabanaki observed the storm Approaching, calculated the winds, and pitched their oval teepees, where they would Remain, warm and safe with their dogs, their children and plenty of moose jerky. The farmers, whose ancestors arrived generations ago as settlers from France and England, Piled the back porch with split logs in the autumn and filled the cellar with potatoes, oats, Apples and dried cod. As the blizzard howled outside, inside, by the flickering hearth, the Family, the children wrapped in quilts and seated on hand-hewn stools, gathered in the dim Candlelight around their patriarch who, in his spectacles, read from the only book in their Home, the story of Noah and the Flood. Will new stories, new legends, new ballads and chants emerge, Now that winter has disappeared along with the other seasons, Now that Polar bears drown in warm arctic waters, random hurricanes, cyclones, tornados and Even earthquakes strike weekly in unexpected places, Rivers of rushing water roar through the sky, Entire species disappear daily, and Chaos has become our new truth? Rose Anna Higashi Rose Anna Higashi is a retired professor of English Literature, Japanese Literature, Poetry and Creative Writing. Recently, her poems have appeared in The Ekphrastic Review, America Media, Poets Online, The Avocet, The Agape Review, The Catholic Poetry Room and The Scarlet Dragonfly Journal. Many of her lyric poems and haiku can be found in her blog, “Tea and Travels,” which appears monthly on her website, myteaplanner.com, co-authored with her niece, Kathleen Pedulla. Rose Anna lives in rural Hawaii with her husband Wayne. ** Things I Know about Driving in Snow In Montana with long-lonely heart I approach slowly expect freeze on the bridge but before the span hidden ice not playing nice has my Honda skating so I steer into the slide pump the brakes and stop edge of the canyon Behind me a USPS trailer truck heavy, not nimble Even in a blizzard some events you can foresee headlights through a veil of swirling flakes so I bail from the car face-first into a snowbank just before US mail slips like a giant hockey puck plowing through the Honda down toward the river so cold unforgiving The cab submerges Silence, snow falling in sheets and a woman appears clawing up the embankment spitting curses ejected halfway down fractured arm but she can climb Long blue-black ponytail white parka eagle with broken wing Says her name is Sacajawea Jones and she knows her way around says she’s gonna sue somebody’s ass off and then go home to Louisiana where it’s warm and purchase land down there Already on the black ice I’m in love Joe Cottonwood Joe Cottonwood has repaired hundreds of houses to support his writing habit in the Santa Cruz Mountains of California. His latest book of poetry is Random Saints. ** Renewal Look it in the eye Even a Hurricane runs Out of wind and rain Debbie Walker-Lass Debbie Walker-Lass is a poet, artist, literary essayist, and fiction writer living in Decatur, Georgia. Her work has appeared in several journals and magazines, including The Ekphrastic Review, Poetry Quarterly, Haiku Universe, The Light Ekphrastic and Natural Awakenings, Atlanta, among others. Blessings and virtual hugs to all writers!
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