LEAVES AGAINST THE BLUE OF THE
SKY
Ute Kaboolian
One day in June of 1986 I looked up and saw nothing out of the ordinary, just an umbrella of leaves against the bright blue sky. Yet strangely inspired, I wrote my poem ‘On a Moment’s Loan’, which celebrates nature and features the sky.
The next day was overcast as I sat on my little wooden deck, which at either end is framed by the outer branches of two large pine trees. Between them, overshadowing the deck is an umbrella of tiny leaves of a Japanese maple, which at that moment was trembling in the wind. I looked up, and through the lace-work of leaves saw the brightest patch of blue I had ever seen in any sky. What is that? I wondered. I kept looking, and after a time saw smaller smudges of the same strong blue as if flung by a giant paintbrush against an otherwise gray sky. Why, it’s only the sky, you dummy, I answered my own question as I went back into the kitchen.
My daughter walked in, a few minutes later, and I told her about the silly thing I had experienced and she said, “I looked out of my window” -- she lives a few blocks away on the top floor of a five story apartment building with an a panoramic view of our picturesque town – “and I saw nothing but gray.”
<> “Yeah, but look,” I said, “You can still see some of that strong blue through the kitchen door window.” This door leads to the deck. She saw it.
The following day, the third day, brought
the culmination of this experience, which not only impresses me but I
suppose
might impress anyone with a similar bend of mind: It
was another fine day to sit outside. I had
started A.S. Byatt’s ‘Djinn in the
Nightingale’s Eye – Five Fairy Stories’, the day before, and had my
morning
coffee out on the deck while starting on the third tale, “The Story of
the
Eldest Princess.” One must read the
story for oneself, and then it becomes clear that stories and life
stories are
certainly intertwined if one does pay attention. How
else was it possible, I thought, that I
have had my attention on the bright-blue sky for the previous two days
and now
on the third am presenting myself with a story, which deals almost
entirely
with the color of the sky, which is described for us in detail at each
princess’s birth and then subtly changes from blue to green? For in the story I was reading now the eldest
of three princesses goes out on a quest to restore the bright-blue sky
they
have lost. That is nothing to say against the mostly green sky they
have at
this moment, which has its own beauty. But it’s all in the telling of
the tale,
which must be read to realize how some writings, like those of A.S.
Byatt, can
create a magic all their own for the attentive and appreciative reader.