The pinpoint perspective of the present moment can feel so sharp but ultimately always impossible to fathom and out of our reach. As Erich von Hungen writes, it is simultaneously hard and soft, early and late, tiny and all-encompassing 'like a pocket-sized Big Bang.'
Osip Mandelstam spent many years of his life being persecuted for the views he held and the work he made. 'And I Was Once Alive' was one of the last poems he wrote before his death from heart failure in a transfer camp.
The orphan Ch'i-chi became a monk at an early age and matured during the end of the T'ang era, which was a tumultuous time in China both socially and politically. Ch'i-chi gathered a lot of recognition during his life for his poetry and writing. 'Little Pines' is a meditation on time and the mystery of… Continue reading Ch’i-chi’s Little Pines
