
The landscapes/inscapes are both spiritual and tactile. And the reader is catapulted into a rich mecca that includes both the sacred and the profane: of “beltless” romances and the “opening star” of a persimmon, of trickster deer women, barflies and hills of Quetzalcoatl’s rainbow yucca, of electrical currents and hips holding the endless light, and ample doses of Torah lessons and grandma’s latkes. Both magical and local, the four voices merge into a splendid swirl. They tell ecstatic and transcendent tales about the diversity of Southern California lives. “There is so much to love in these four books. Hadara Bar-Nadav, author of The New Nudity, Fountain and Furnace, A Glass of Mill to Kiss Goodnight, and the Frame Called Ruin. Eastern, Western, and aesthetic beliefs collided in this stunning and contemplative collection that invites us to restore of faith in the magical powers of language, to listen deeply to a poet who speaks carefully, thoughtfully, ‘in muted prayers sewn into me through countless afternoons.'”
#Broom tree series#
“Chris Baron’s Under the Broom Tree takes us on a series of awe-filled, expansive, spiritual journeys, whether they occur in domestic spaces or in Mecca. His search for a transformed self has forced him to walk a physical and spiritual path confronting the truth of his beliefs set against the strong pull of family history and cultural heritage. His adulthood offered a rediscovery of the self and a making of his own journeys as an athlete, a husband, a traveler, and a father. His upbringing in a home where nude models were commonplace left little room for innocence. Under the Broom Tree: Chris Baron was born and raised in a Jewish family of eccentric artists. Lantern Tree won the award for BEST POETRY ANTHOLOGY at the San Diego Book Awards in 2012. Each poet responds to the beauty, the truth, and the ugliness found along the way. The poems lean against each other for support and weave the light and the dark in a quest for purpose, family, community and reason.

The portrait, the narrative, and the muscle of language collide and reform.
#Broom tree free#
In this collaboration, the lyrical greets the ecstatic in free verse and form. The cypress tree named Hahakigi actually existed today, only the bottom of the trunk can be seen at the back of Tsukimi-do (regarded as the site of Kojo-in Temple built by Saicho (Dengyo Daishi)) in Sonohara, Achi-mura, Nagano Prefecture.The voices of four San Diego poets meet at a crossroads of poetic traditions to contemplate home––home as a sense of place and a sense of self, home as much outside as it is inside. In addition, 'ha-ha' in Hahakigi shares the same sound with 'haha' (Mother), so it was used as a metaphor for a mother that one never met. This poem became a metaphor for a lover who pay attention to you even when you came close or a lover you seemed you would meet but you couldn't, and the word "Hahakigi" became the title of the second chapter of " The Tale of Genji" (where the lover Genji couldn't see was Utsusemi (the Lady of the Locust Shell). The tree became widely known due to SAKANOUE no Korenori's poem in " Kokin Wakashu" (A Collection of Ancient and Modern Japanese Poetry): 'Sonohara ya Fuseya ni ouru Hahakigi no Aritote yukedo Awanu Kimi kana (As the broom tree that grows by the lowly hut on Sonohara Plain, manifest to the eye, but beyond arms' reach are you, my love).' It was a legendary tree that looked like a standing broom when one saw it from a distance, but went out of sight as one neared it. Hahakigi was a tree in Fuseya of Sonohara, Shinano Province.

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This chapter is famous for 'appraisal on a rainy night' where the nobilities hold a discussion about women. One of the 54 chapters in " The Tale of Genji." It is the second chapter. Also called Hokigusa or Kokia.Ī Japanese cypress tree in Fuseya of Sonohara, Shinano Province. Its stalk is dried to make brooms (hoki) and its seeds are called "tonburi" and are used as food.
