Ellen Bass

1 month ago | themarginalian.org | Maria Popova |Ellen Bass

The morning after a relationship of depth and significance long bending under the weight of its own complexity had finally broken with an exhausted thud, I opened the kiln to discover a month’s worth of pottery shattered — two pieces had exploded, the shrapnel ruining the rest. All that centering, all that glazing, all the hours of pressing letterforms into the wet clay — all of it in shiny shards.

Feb 14, 2024 | orionmagazine.org | Ellen Bass

The McKenzie River’s half in shade, half molten silverand today, in the shallow water,a single salmon, has made it back to whereshe began, her scintillant body that moves like a riverwithin the river, undulant, greenish and roseate. Then she flips on her side and tail-whips the gravel. The tumble and clack of rocks, the pearlysmoke of silt blossoming. Then quiet, only the murmur of the river,as she floats, her serious jaw opening and closing,fins swaying.

Dec 5, 2023 | blog.sciencenet.cn | Ellen Bass

英诗汉译：如何道歉 武夷山 如何道歉 作者： Ellen Bass（美国当代女诗人） 译者：武夷山© 烧一条大鱼——挑那种刺儿多的， 需要技术好才能剔出鱼骨架的， 也许就挑侵入五大湖的亚洲飞鲢， 它将其他鱼赶尽杀绝。 如果您不住在某个湖的附近， 那您还得专程去一趟。 为表明您是真心道歉，走着去最棒， 但您亦可乘火车前往， 让火车的颠簸抚慰您的心房。 对方同意接受您的安慰 无论您做什么还是啥也不做， 可怜又美好的人啊。 当我母亲住院时 家里的清洁卫生只能靠我和女儿了 这个家母亲怕是回不来了。 没想到她缓过来了 疑心重重地问道： 你们怎么能把我的鞋全给扔了呢？ 于是你需要一条船。租也行，买也行， 但是，为了修复地球环境， 最好自己造一条。 取自北美乔柏的薄木条是再好不过了， 但是别砍树哦。 如果您进一步想招， 可去拆毁的谷仓和倒地的树木那里找材料。 总有人有厂房设备吧。 总有人会租给您工具吧。 刨木头产生的锯末和刨花的香气 使得时光也甜美无比。 每夜我们都要做360亿个美梦。 在某一个夜里，我们可将失去的一切给梦回来。 因此烤一烤不太新鲜的肉吧。 把自己从烦人的故事里解脱出来。...

Dec 4, 2023 | transcend.org | Ellen Bass

Ellen Bass – TRANSCEND Media Service Reflections on Forgiveness, Self-Forgiveness, and the Paradox of Doing the Right ThingCook a large fish — choose one with many bones, a skeletonyou will need skill to expose, maybe the flyingsilver carp that’s invaded the Great Lakes, tumblingthe others into oblivion. If you don’t livenear a lake, you’ll have to travel. Walking is best and shows you mean it,but you could take a train and let yourselfbe soothed by the rockingon the rails.

Nov 28, 2023 | themarginalian.org | Maria Popova |Ellen Bass

“An honorable human relationship… in which two people have the right to use the word ‘love,'” Adrienne Rich wrote, “is a process, delicate, violent, often terrifying to both persons involved, a process of refining the truths they can tell each other.” And yet if the two pillars of friendship and loving relation are truth and tenderness, as Emerson believed, something terrible and irreconcilable happens when the truth itself is untender — it becomes impossible to discern the honorable thing to...