Nature is a temple where the living pillars
Permit, from time to time, confused words to escape . . . .
"Correspondences" by Charles Baudelaire
William H. Crosby, translation
MARCH CORRESPONDENCES
by Frank La Rosa
March is the month of the living Force of nature that the Romans named after the god Mars. This essential Force of nature is the life energy that flows through all plants and animals; the Romans observed it as a 'vis' or 'virtu', and it can also be seen as an 'elan vital'. Being a living Force, the Romans also saw it manifested as an agricultural power to be propitiated with spring rites and rituals.
Mars is the god of boundaries and limits. The Force marches inexorably to the climax of summer, the season of deep green leafiage, blossoms, fruits of all kinds, and intense growth. I see the Force marching in step like a Roman legion to its appointed destiny on the edges of the empire. The Italian province of Marche was once considered a borderland or frontier between two ancient kingdoms both facing the sea. It was the same in regard to Wales, the border of western England.
For us as gardeners, March is that month of sun, plants, and bees infused with a primal, energy that proceeds in a relentless march to high summer.
In my garden the plants and blossoms are burgeoning announcing the end of winter; the roses are in leaf of rich red, above all, the citrus trees are in bud and blossom. The bees have taken notice of this scented citrus blossoming, and I see them hurrying, shuffling, and rushing into the hive with lovely white, yellow, and buttery rich yellow pollens sacks on their hind legs. All of their pollen gathering is proof that the Mother-queen bee is laying eggs and that the workers are feeding pupae that will grow into new workers; they bring in such large quantities of pollen that I see the remnants of it dusted like gold flecks on the landing board of the hive. And, as I place my ear right up to the wall of the hive box, I hear a marvelous gentle roar of the living Force that is called the Spirit of March.
This powerful roar makes me think of another creative roar, that of the wonderful roar of my pottery kiln that is also in my garden. If at all possible, a living, growing garden should have a beehive for honey or a kiln for the firing of ceramics--pots and sculptures. I cannot conceive of it being any other way. The two are so merged in my psyche, that when I think of one I feel the other. I remember the Cardews who had a magnificent kiln and rich red roses growing up the wall of their county home in Saint Breward, Cornwall
The heart is both a beehive and a kiln. I do not add the word "like" because they are so very similar. Through great living heat or passion (one of the Force of nature, the other of man instigated flame-fire) magical transformation take place through heat and energy. The focus of heat and intentionality causes transformation to occur. A natural law of the Cosmos.
Within a shield or containment barrier, (a refractory of firebrick in one case, or, the wooden walls of a beehive) the heart roars with life. There is a pulse of the fire as the kiln begins its moment to moment climb to the required heat (to cone) to vitrify clay and melt glazes. My pots fire to about cone 5 to cone 7, requiring about eight hours of heat-work.
The same is true of the heart pulse of blood as it flows on its course nourishing the life of the body and it organs; the energy which is not burnt" thoroughly is deposited on the heart just as in the kiln's unburnt energy (or carbon) deposits itsel as black splotchings called "flashings" on the walls of pots. On the pots the flashings are quite beautiful, perhaps not so much so on the heart, for obvious reasons that anyone can understand.
The very first time that I fired my kiln many years ago, I felt an excitement rising up in my chest and heart--a correspondence with the rising fire of the kiln. It was a marvelous simulacrum of my body corresponding to the soul of the rising flame and heat. After many years and numerous kiln firings I still feel the excitement at the surge of the heightening heat.
The firing begins with a fluttering orange-yellow flame called a "candling" to drive off water in the clay body. Then, the flame is gradually increased until it takes on a blue, almost clear resonance. With this stage the kiln atmosphere is clear and hot (free of unburnt carbon) and breathes so powerfully and its sound is a sweet susurration that purrs, or more aptly, buzzes like the core of bees working around the Mother in a hive. The kiln works its magic of permanence on the pots and the beauty of the glazes. Both the kiln and the hive have alchemically created out of earth, air, water and fire eternal forms and healing honey.
The Perfume of Poison
By
Frank La Rosa Mazza
The poison of a bee's stinger has the most intense, beautiful fragrance in the plant or animal world.
Only the alchemy of the bee's body and soul can create this magical scent. It is actually a scent that is expressed by the death of the bee. This fragrance is released when the bee stings and its entrails and stinger are torn from its body, thus killing it. The fragrance of this wounding is transitory, fugitive, pealing on the air for only a few seconds if that. It is a sweetness and pungency and colors of flower petals, stamens, pollen, and nectaries. The perfume of this sacrificial death is like Rilke's crystal bowl that rings as it is shattered.
I wonder how many people (even beekeepers) have experienced or acknowledged this lovely, precious perfume? It is as a Wallace Stevens suggested--death is the mother of beauty. There resides in all this a poignancy the possibility that we as human beings perceive something about which the bees seemingly know nothing (I wonder), I suppose.
