Below: Writings by members of the Writers' Group and the works in the Ruthmere collection that inspired them. You may also listen to the authors read their works using the audio players that accompany each piece.

Confluence

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We gather together on Saturday afternoons to share our love of words, be it poetry or prose, which Webster’s describes as: “an ordinary form of written or spoken language.” We may be ordinary in some ways, but sharing our individual talents makes each one of us unique. We listen attentively as each writer shares a passage from his or her favorite author, or a current project. Little did we know when we first began this journey that it would be so uplifting and rewarding.

Today we are seated around the table in the library at Ruthmere prepared to share our assignment with each other. The assignment given at our previous session, was to choose something within the room, research it and write about it. So many choices, which to choose, how to put into words how particular piece speaks to us, what it reveals about the artist, the writer, the period, the past.

I remember glancing around the room and thought “so many beautiful pieces of art—books, photographs, paintings. What shall I select?” Then I realized I was focusing on the lamp in the center of the table. I admired it as it was much like the one in my childhood home. So there it was – my assignment!

When I returned to the library several days later to begin my research, Marilou was there and I asked her something about the lamp. She said there was very little information about it, other than it was “original to the furnishings” at Ruthmere. We examined the lamp for identification, some clue to its origin. Marilou looked through several art books, but found nothing specific to this piece. This was going to be harder than I thought! No date, designer or artist’s name, no manufacturer or lamp maker, no particular style, other than Victorian. I realized that whatever I needed to know must come from the lamp itself; thus I asked the lamp to “tell me a story.”

with rolled scrolls and shields. It is twenty seven inches tall. The ornate shade has eight sections measuring eight inches each. The metalwork covering the shade contains shields, acorns and leaves. Four bulbs illuminate the pale green and yellow stained glass. Acorns are a fruit of the oak tree and the table on which it stands is an oak library table from Harvard University.

Could this warm sturdy lamp once have been on this very oak table at Harvard, where studious young men discussed urgent matters beneath its golden glow? Their aspirations and thoughts written within the scrolls? Guarded and protected by the shields? Confluence of lamp and table.

I realized when I first saw this impressive piece at our first session, that it resembled a lamp which belonged to my grandmother, eventually residing on a table in our living room. That lamp was a much smaller version, but I thought it quite beautiful. No vibrant multicolor, but a stately black metal with opalescent glass. My mother used it as a nightlight, and would leave it on when we left the house in the evening. What a comfort when we returned, to see it warming our living room, its glow welcoming us home.

Marilou remembered the library lamp had been moved from the house to the library some time ago. Perhaps it will move elsewhere in Ruthmere in the future. In the meantime we will `let its light shine down on us’, as we continue to share and explore our love for the written word.

~~ Mary Ellen Shamory

 

Birds finishing each other’s sentences,
Rough, unexpected, tempestuous, cold boiling waters,
Swamping birch boat as he
Pin balls from rock to unknown;
Now a mini lighthouse, fake phallic:
Morning fogs reveal odors
Not seen in crimson daylight,
Seeping, anti-camus man;
Aftermath Gettysburg, after battles meadows,
Desecrated, dishonored by toxins, plastics, resin industrial poisons,
Mindless, amoral chemicals invented without ending,
Lung enemies.
Greed heeds no bounds of decency;
Certainly not the promised human.

Autumn railed sailboats bucking, heaving lover,
Pleasing; struggle spawned
Of fall/winter lake raging.

The devil’s deal struck;
Critical, editorializing folded arms;
Disdainful, despairing, wise sparrows leaving,
Unlike he and why not? Young beeches plucked,
Filled with visionary dread,
Wounded like no arrow:

A future where aliens exchange paper:
Nothing produced and traded for life’s essentials.

First, a white, high steepled church,
Second, a grain sewing water mill;
Still, he’d see his prophetic dream fulfilled-
The utter destruction of his tribe’s spiritual, natural, idyllic life.

He’d never seen such pale blue eyes,
Spectacular green ringed pupils;
She’d never seen so lean a body-healthy sheen,
Unashamedly athletic.

The psycho irony,
Long after his demise,
His head held steady, bank wall,
Forced to watch his premonition
Come to fruition just as he’d envisioned.
Then relegated to a resting place, forgotten library.
Alone in a European cove,
He turned to her one night,
A Michelangelo moment as he reached for her outstretched arms,
Unfiltered, unfulfilled longing.

Both stripped of all ego, humiliated beyond the pale,
Finding a beneficial, magnetic attraction,
A clandestine love catharsis
That became an oasis in sands of insanity
That would’ve scorched their lives blind otherwise.

~~ Jon Smoker

L’Implorante   

(A work in progress)

Her bronze face reached into the vacuum
Of the rose-suffused volume of him
As he fled
In darkened angles of anguish
She was left with a hollow heart.

Camellia and rose—
Which perfect flower could he find fault with?

~~ Laurel Spencer Forsythe

 

The Visit

Based around many elements in the Robert B. Beardsley Library

“Ah, you unsung hero. You fundamentalist slayer.”
“Your Mother on your case again?”
“What do you know of my Mother?”
“She's liberal.”
“Liberal, what's that?”
“What you are not.”
“Oh”
“Well, here we are – look the library is in the back.”
“I see it.”
“C'mon, we grew up in this town and you've never stepped over the threshold.”
“You know, you'd think I would have been here just once – on an elementary school field trip or something.”
“Hmm, I don't know. The place has survived time, high wind and water but a bunch of elementary school kids? Maybe not.”
“The door won't open.”
“Try pushing in.”
“Oh.”
“Nice cars.”
“How do you know?
“Okay – wow old cars.”
“Actually they are kind of nice – they're so...”
“Yes?”
“Stylish.”
“Really.”
“Yeah, - you know when men wore ties and hats.”
“And women stayed in the kitchen.”
“Careful, you are sounding like my Mother.”
“I like your Mother.”
“I like the stairs.”
“Why?”
“The carpet – is so green and plush. There is something significant about that color green and the woodwork – beautiful.”
“Perhaps you shouldn't have minored in Brit Lit.”
“Don't mention that, I can still see boarding houses and yellow streaks of eggs.”
“Ahh, good ole James Joyce.”
“His picture always reminds me of Hitler.”
“Every man you know eventually reminds you of Hitler.”
“Look a that window!”
“That's not a window, that's stained glass.”
“Whatever. It’s beautiful.”
“Stop! Look at yourself. The sun, shinning through – you look like you are wearing the window.”
“This is weird.”
“Why are you whispering?”
“Because now I feel like I'm walking into Bilbo Baggins’ Hobbit hole.”
“Or maybe 221B Baker Street. I know you like Sherlock Holmes.”
“Baker Street doesn't have stained glass like this.”
“How do you know?”
“I've been there.”
“Of course. C'mon, let's go the rest of the way up.”
“I don't know...what if I'm disappointed?”
“What if you're not?”
“Go up and tell me what you see.”
“Tons of books.”
“Look out.”
“Hey, look at this little picture.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, look at it.”
“I'm looking – I'm not too good on visual art.”
“It's mostly all green.”
“Yeah, so?”
“Slow down will you?  And think. The picture is mostly all green all different shades of green but look at all the detail you can see.”
“Okay.”
“You're hopeless; go look at your books.”
“It's not so much the books; it's the shelves they're on.”
“Careful that is almost sacrilege coming from you.”
“I like the picture of the lady with the hat.”
“You would, there's no color.”
“Look.”
“What?”
“On the desk, a guest book from Chatsworth.”
“Chatsworth?”
“Yeah, in Derbyshire, England.”
“How do you know?”
“I've been there.”
“Oh”
“You haven't kept up with me over the past few years.”
“You've moved pretty quick, these past few years”
“Oh.”
“We say that a lot.”
“What?”
“Oh.”
“Okay, now I don't know what to say.”
“How about 'I intend to slow down a bit now.' ?”
“What is that?”
“Camille Claudel.”
“What is she doing?”
“Imploring her lover to stay.”
“Why and where is her lover?”
“He's leaving and maybe he is leaving because she is in love.”
“Perhaps she was in love now.”
“She went insane.”
“For Pete's sake.”
“You know maybe you shouldn't have minored in Brit Lit. Maybe a good dose of Walt Whitman...”
“I like this sculpture better.”
“Beatrice.”
“I can read.”
“Yes, I know you can read. You've read all around the world.”
“How on earth did the artist do that?”
“Do what?”
“Make her veil look so transparent.”
“Maybe he was in love.”
“With marble?”
“It happens.”
“Oh look, she's averting her eyes from the old artistic stand by; Hades and Persephone.”
“Here we go.”
“We simply cannot go through any mansion, small or large, without the middle aged man's vision of artistic expression.”
“Well at least it is in black and white, that should appeal to you.”
“Poor geranium.”
“Excuse me?”
“Someone forgot to water the geranium.”
“You sure that is a geranium?”
“Pretty sure.”
“It doesn't look so good.”
“And you know a potted geranium is perfect for this room.”
“I'm not too sure that is a geranium.”
“It's in a clay pot, on a window sill, in a library, of course it is a geranium.”
“Out comes the fundamentalist logic.”
“You'll miss us when we're gone.”
“Hah! It's the true liberal that is the dinosaur, on the brink of extinction – gone like the way of the Dodo.”
“Really? Prove it.”
“Only a true liberal would chart this course.”
“This course?
“Yes. To bring you here. You, of all people. You who have traveled the world, watched volcanoes erupt, walked countless cathedrals, sailed the seven seas but has failed to notice a small, quiet, peaceful place right here at home. You are the majority.”
“I will concede that it is a shame I have not come here before.”
“And only a true liberal would dare to ask the next question. Throw caution to the wind, throw myself upon the rocks below.”
“Oh the drama.”
“Will you marry me?”
“Insane.”
“That is why I wanted to ask you standing next to Camille”
“So I come home to marry the boy next door.”
“I thought that might appeal to you.”
“But my favorite love story is Jane Eyre, she didn't marry the boy next door.”
“Ah but like Edward Fairfax Rochester I am paving hell, with relish - that is, gusto, not pickles.”
“Well at the very least you can always make me laugh.”
“Then that is a yes.”
“That is a yes. And by the way, I've never sailed the seven seas.”
“Poetic license.”
“Oh.”

~~ Sandy Woodiwiss

Wondering Wanderings

The sky was gunmetal gray, on the day, when, in my wanderings, I saw the old house. I was going to pass it by, but its windows drew me in. they were weeping. For who or what, I do not know. I only know how their sadness spoke to me..

In spite of its weathered siding, and state of unkeptness, the house established an air of grace and gallantry. Its widows wore no curtains, a sure sign of abandonment.

The house stood, waiting. For something. Maybe for its family to come back? Maybe for the sound of children scrambling up the stairs? Or the squeak of the fifth step from the landing, when they crept down at midnight on Christmas Eve, hoping to see Santa Claus?

Could it be waiting for the smell of bacon frying in the cast iron skillet on the wood stove? Or maybe for the sound or coffee perking on the back burner? If it waits for those things, its waiting will endure for forever. Cast iron cookery is almost a relic that has been replaced by non-stick pots and pans. And, today, how many kitchen stoves play hostess to a coffee percolator?

Maybe the house is just tired. Much like the elderly gentleman I visited in the nursing home, days before he drew his final breath. His eyes, though open, were fixed on something I could not see; something beyond this physical world.

The capacity for restoration for either the house or the man is nonexistent. They both know their usefulness in this world has expired.

I looked again at the windows. Something about them reminded me of what I had seen in the old man’s eyes. He, Too, had been waiting… for something. He too had been weeping.

Today, I cannot help but wonder whether the old man and old house had been waiting and weeping for each other.

~~ Margaret Cook