Midnight Garden

reprint from March 23, 2007



The full moon shines
with all its might,
drenching my garden
with mystic light...............

L. 11 years old

Flowers such as "Queen of the Night" bloom only in hours of darkness and belong to my sister's midnight garden. They open pale eyes under the light of the moon, when the rest of the world is sleeping. Their perfume is more intoxicating than ordinary flowers for they belong to dream and mystery. One of the night flowers; Cereus greggi blooms only for one midsummer's night each year. The flower exudes its exquisite perfume as night falls, then closes forever with the first touch of dawn. There are people who are like that too; special people who in a unique moment touch us with ephemeral beauty.

Conversations with Helene Grimaud or through the mystery flower Part Eight, said Princess Haiku

Every great artist inspires love, devotion and awakening of true self as does the pianist, Helene Grimaud. I visited her guest book on her web site at Deutschgrammophon and spent a long time perusing her messages.

These intimate conversations with Helene Grimaud, left anonymously by her fans touched my heart. They were a fascinating and poetic outpouring of love, spiritual confession, appreciation and devotion. You can read the original article here and below you will find more of the letters.

I hope that you enjoy them.
Princess Haiku


Conversations with Helene Grimaud:



PrincePeterofNewYork
USA
12-16-2008

Pour Helene!

Sous le ciel de Paris
S'envole une chanson,
Mmmmm, Mmmmm
Elle est nee aujourd'hui
Dans le coeur d'un garcon
Marchent des amoreux
Mmmmm, Mmmmm
Leur bonheur se construit
Sur un air fait pour eux...



AN
03-19-2009

Somehow dreams feel like they take me up and down the musical scales where conflict seeks resolution.

What do you think?



Ka
Greece
01-09-2008

Helene,

Your interest in classical art in history was not a surprise to me. A play with the olive tree, exploring the Karyatides, the Parthenon, looking for the statue of Athena, made this visit an interesting escape into architecture and sculpture of an old civilization.

I can appreciate why you visited this site. As Le Cobusier understood better than most modern critics, the manner in which the Doric system was calculated in the Parthenon to evoke that "sensation of a profound harmony" that philosophers have sometimes called the esthetic emotion.

I feel proud that you chose this civilized site versus any other. On the other hand, you certainly made friends with one of my favored women. For in her there is a spirit that is awesome-just like yours! Discovering the olive tree- a symbol of well- being.



photo from theoi



Note
USA
10-09-2008

I told you in Atlanta, that I was a fan because I heard you play a seection from Bach and it made me cry. That was something that had never happened to me before.



MT
USA
08-21--2008

Your interest in the alternative painter John William Waterhouse was a surprise to me. My original choice was Dante Gabriel Rossetti, but you prefer John.





Stone
USA
03-29-2006

Dearest Helene,

I am staying in touch with the center through your wonderful website. The death of dear Eno has taken my heart with him. Those whom we love and lose are no longer where they were... they are wherever we are.

I cannot express how the memory of witnessing your fund-raising recital in, Westchester has haunted me through the years. It was the first time that we met and there has not been anything all to compare with it in my life. I have tried to keep up with all of your beautiful recordings including the marvelous Credo. It still overflows and takes my heart away like no other.

I don't know if you will ever read this, but if you do, please know that you are never far away from my most admiring and loving thoughts.



Aph
USA
03-24-2006

I visited your fan line and a few of your concerts and spoke to you briefly. what is most interest to me is the way that you treat each person on the queue. You seem to greet everyone with interest and enthusiasm. The young, the old and the in-between get a heart warming welcome. To the person in front of me you were a goddess of music.






SV
italty
03-27-2009

Beauty and the Beast

I checked a mirror and I saw a beast
I did not understand the qualities of the mirror until I met you
So years went by and now when I look into the mirror I see beauty.

How do I know?
I see it in the eyes of others. The faithful go to church to pray for forgiveness
I go to your line to get your signature.

A few years ago I almost did not get your signature
Instead, got the feeling that I was a burden
So, I looked into the mirror and discovered an ugly me.

If I were to get a second chance at impressing you,
What mirror do I look within?







PrincePeterofNewYork
The Bahamas
11-25-2008

Mon Cherie Helene,

Le 2 Decembre a 20h00, Pierre Boulez dirigera "L'Oiseau de Feu" le chef d'oeuvre de Stravinsky, sous la celebre
Pyramide du Musee du Louvre! C'est la pied!

Recontrez moi la!
Pierre



ACI
Croatia
2007

I've been working on a play based on Anna Akhmatova.. whose flat or prison in St. Petersburg I visited the day after your concert in July 2005. You played Schumann on 7.7 during the white nights... Thank you Helene for all of the unforgettable moments.

Conversations with Helene Grimaud or through the mystery flower Part Seven, said Princess Haiku

Every great artist inspires love, devotion and awakening of true self as does the pianist, Helene Grimaud. I visited her guest book on her web site at Deutschgrammophon and spent a long time perusing her messages.

These intimate conversations with Helene Grimaud, left anonymously by her fans touched my heart. They were a fascinating and poetic outpouring of love, spiritual confession, appreciation and devotion. You can read the original article here and below you will find more of the letters.

I hope that you enjoy them.
Princess Haiku


Conversations with Helene Grimaud:



PrincePeterofNewYork
USA
12-23-2008

Mon cherie Helene,

In summer's heat or snowy winter deep,
Whether you are are near or far,
You'll always be y piano virtusosa shining star,
More beautiful than the Sisters of the Pleiades, by far!

Happy Holidays et Season's Greeting et Bonne Annee!
Je t'aime et Je t'adore,

Pierre

P.S.
What you are, you are by accident of birth;
What I am. I am by myself,
There are and will be a thousand Princes;
There is only one Beethoven!



Char
USA
03-03-2009

Wisdom in Hibernation

In Courtly Love we gather our forces and circle
the rest is Magical and Divine.



AVR
USA
12-11-2008

Breaking out of Cliche

Longing for anything
A gape evolving daily
T asting the essence of the loved one
E vaporating and condensing in new forms
R oaming the Universe together
A ndrogynous
L overs without limits

T he score you played next door
H eavenly sounds mesmerizing me
I nsights inside a circular design
N o is not in my dictionary
K isses are forever French



TX
Germany 11-11-2008

Dear Wolfwoman,

some parts I played last year...
You have to know I never learned it; not even notes...
I had the courage and played in Munich near the Marienplatz on the street and saw people's eyes after playing. I saw their feelings and know I met their hearts.





Credo
Austria
07-11-2008

Bon anniversaire and happy birthday, liebe Helene!
May there be joy for you and all your beloved ones
on this God given day.
May this joy unveil the sorrow,
if there is any afflicting sound in the sense
of your wonderful heart.

a silent bearer of a rose.



JT
USA
07-11-2008

Dear Helene:

I wish you a very happy birthday.
I very much enjoyed the new Bach recording with its wonderful logical program. I still remember the night in Troy, New York where you performed the Bach/Busoni Chaconne as if your life depened on it. I always look forward to your very special musical insights that strike a chord in my heart.



KE
USA

12027-2007

When you are absent I notice
No movement in the waves of perceptions
The fields stand still in dead calm



Pei
Greece
12-16-2007

Magical Helene,

In awe I reflect my perceptions.

The hands of a craftsman shape visions
Free Aphrodite from an amorphous marble
Carving, sanding, shaping the next goddess

Tools of creation possessing life force
Tiresome and agile moving with speed
Giving life, mixing, arranging, creating music.



Valz
USA
12-12-2007

I asked you to dance with me
Moving apart in tachyon speeds we land in a new world
Mine will remain a mystery while yours a fairy tale



HT
France
11-20-2007



Chopin and Helene
Genius meets Genius
Creativity meets Synaesthesia

Pythia's dreams of a magical union
Between the two
A soulful connection.

The union of conscious femininity
Can only be contained in a love container
Made up in Quantum Soup of Super Strings

The mystery composer in love
Not the poet but the choreographer discovers
Graffiti in secret envelopes

JB
UK
06-21-2006

Get well soon!

Trust that the music in your soul shall cast aside your maladies; these shadow impostors of illness. Then rising up again unobstructed, you can pour your soul into the music. Destined to perform you shall lay unhindered and we shall listen.



Anon
USA
06011006

Connecting with all the waves may bring the miraculous into being.



AP
France
04-20-2006

Chere Mademoiselle Grimaud,

While I adore you I sometimes feel this world is not such a friendly place for talent like yours, because I perceive this theme from below the collective, the matrix.



DA
Greece
04-05- 2006

Your thoughts triggered a trip to Christina's world.
Here is my favorite poem written by her.

One face looks from all his canvases,
One selfsame figure sits or walks or leans:
We found her hidden just behind those screens,
That mirror gave back all her loveliness.
A queen in opal or in ruby dress,
A nameless girll in freshest summer greens,
A saint, an angel- every canvas means
The same one meaning, neither more or less.
He feeds upon her face by day and night,
And she with true kind eyes looks back on him,
Fair as the moon and joyful as the light:
Not wan with waiting, nor with sorrow dim;
Nor as she is, but was when hope shone bright;
Not as she is ,but as she fills his dream.

Christina Rossetti
12/24/1856

Conversations with Helene Grimaud or through the mystery flower Part Five, said Princess Haiku

Every great artist inspires love, devotion and awakening of true self as does the pianist, Helene Grimaud. I visited her guest book on her web site at Deutschgrammophon and spent a long time perusing her messages.

These intimate conversations with Helene Grimaud, left anonymously by her fans touched my heart. They were a fascinating and poetic outpouring of love, spiritual confession, appreciation and devotion. You can read the original article here and below you will find more of the letters.

I hope that you enjoy them.
Princess Haiku


Conversations with Helene Grimaud:



PrincePeterofNewYork
United States
03-11-2009

Ciao Bella Helene,

You are so very special and your most beautiful gift of your piano music to the world, is a reflection of your inner and outer beauty and grace as well.

"More"

More, than the greatest love the world has know,
This is the love I'll give to you alone,
More, than the simple words I try to say,
I only live to love you more each day.

Ciao for now, Bella Helene,
Pietro
the Beggar Prince

"More"
English words by Norman Newell
Italian Words by M. Ciorciolini
usic by R. Ortolani and N. Oliviero



Aci
Croatia
11-22-2008

Dearest Helene,

The 10th of November in Berlin was like a dream... from which I continue to live...

Yours devotedly,





Tara
Germany
11-21-2008

Got a ticket, 23rd March next year...



Composer
United States
11-15-2008

A few years ago, before I knew of you I dreamed vividly about you. Nothing more existed outside of us. I've never felt anything so pure. And here you are at such a distance. Everything since has felt superficial but the longing has kept vested inspiration. I sound like another one of these lovesick dolts but I can't help believing you had a dream like this. What am I doing?






Ni
Italy
12-11-2008

She's wonderful, so powerful. I can' help being in love with her.



Circle
Austria
03-14-2008

Harmonies experiment

I recently explored a visual Mathematics of Music. Pythagoras, an old friend visited the future and creates visual forms through invention. As I play the piano with my emotions and feelings I think I'm emoting as my own master. A twin of sorts.




Shadow
Scotland
09-03-2006

As music enters my space, rhythm, form and tone blend in alchemical ways. The Mandala design reminds me of reconciliation; a bringing together of two opposite points of view. The ego and the shadow are dancing on the same floor.

Helene, share with me your insights. When I look for Mandala designs I am attracted to you like the bee to the colors of Spring. This attraction is strange. It's source is not ego based. I speculate the need is journey based. This seeker flies in a dream where music is energy that causes movement into the imaginal and archetypal.



E
USA
08-11-2006

There is a Pre-Raphaelite painting I adore
The Painter's Honeymoon; a gorgeous dress
of green and gold dominates the theme.

The painter and his new bride think together,
Parallel thoughts jump out of the canvas
When I observe the picture.

This is my favored painting
Innocence jumps out at me
An affair with dark resonators.

Sceptical of who she is.
Dare to enter the great symphonies,
Allured by her score.
Mesmerized by great talent.






Aci
10-24-2006
Croatia

Krakow is a fascination town; like a place from fairy tales... Highly cultural, intellectual, spiritual.. Do come. You'll fit perfect in here.




Mimi
France
10-24-2006

Hello Helene,

In a recent radio interview you stated your opinion that Beethoven was the first minimalist composer. But ... while listening to the fugue from Bach's Second Sonata (BWV 1003) for solo violin, I was wondering if Bach was the first? He makes a seven minute fugue from two sixteenth notes and eight note.

Je vous embrasse.




PrincePeterofNewYork
06-30-2006

Mon Cherie Amour Helene,

My love is like a red red, rose,
That's newly sprung in June,

My love is like the melody,
that's sweetly played in tune.

As fair tho art, my bonnie lass,
So deep in love am I,
And I will love thee still, my dear,
Till all the seas go dry.....

by Robert Burns

Je t'aime pour tous les temps
Pierre

Conversations with Helene Grimaud or through the mystery flower Part Four, said Princess Haiku

Every great artist inspires love, devotion and awakening of true self as does the pianist, Helene Grimaud. I visited her guest book on her web site at Deutschgrammophon and spent a long time perusing her messages.

These intimate conversations with Helene Grimaud, left anonymously by her fans touched my heart. They were a fascinating and poetic outpouring of love, spiritual confession, appreciation and devotion. You can read the original article here and below you will find more of the letters.

I hope that you enjoy them.
Princess Haiku


Conversations with Helene Grimaud:


Fragment
France
04-10-2008

Today, I meditated on the painting below. If you find it interesting it would be a plasure knowing you enjoyed it!

The Awakening Conscience, 1854- Oil on Canvas





KD
Belgium
09-15-2008

You have given to us, complete strangers. You became my twin sister that I would have for inspiration in moments of loneliness and doubt. I listen to your music and the message that I hear is that I'm me. You are more than a musician; you are a channel.




Chrya
Chile
09-14-2008

Helene,

Here is something from my heart.

"Imagination is more important than knowlege. For while knowledge defines all we currently know and understand, imagination points to all we might yet discover and create."

Albert Einstein, "On Science"





Isle
Ireland
03-05-2008


So, I looked back at Dante
As he is arranging your hair
And we argued back and forth about symbols
And decided before doing the painting
To ask which one of our projections can you tolerate?






Gale
Australia
04-12-2008

Red and White

Your music fills me with emotions that I have never felt before
Tender is dominant, warm is common and determined is full of fire
I would volunteer my time for such a cause.

I love such a Goddess



interlude
Italy

To Helene,

Thank you for your words,
for your life,
for your dreams...

You've touched my soul...

"Voici venir les temps ou vibrant sur sa tige
chaque leur s'evapore ainsi qu'un encesoir;
les sons et les parfumes tournent dans l'air du soir;
valse melancolique et langoreux vertige!"

Harmonie du soir- C. Baudelaire





Pia
Nashville
02-15-2006


Dear Helene,

I have never heard the piano played so expressively. I was overwhelmed by the performance of Beethoven's Choral Fantasy on "Credo." Given your interest in German Romanticism and holistic world views, I'm wondering if you are familiar with the thought of Hegel.

I've often thought that Hegel is the Beethoven of philosophy and Beethoven the Hegel of music. Born in the same year, l1770, they both sought pattern, harmony and redemption in and through a world of conflict, disharmony and suffering. I'm deeply impressed by your range of interests and talents, and the fascinating integrations you work out. I would love to hear you perform. Please come to Nashville...




Lxy
San Francisco
11-29-2006

Dear Madam,

I was at the first Brahms Concerto recital that you gave in San Francisco. This is my favorite concerto and I was touched by your interpretation. My deepest appreciation for your work and art that I think requires the soul.




Angel
France
02-25-2006

I just shut lessons that touched me deeply. Your book is a beacon for the traveler. I feel so close to the quest for absolute meaning. It leads me to conclude the need to give and receive, surrendering, to be guided and to marry the art.




PrincePeterofNewYork
United States
04-08-2008

Mon Cherie Amour Helene,

Tonight in Verbier you played
brilliantly,
lyrically,
superbly,
passionately!

Thank you for this wonderful concert!
I will never forget it!

Je t'aime pour tous temps
Pierre

Alana
USA
07-22-2007

A thing of beauty is a joy forever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us and a sleep

by John Keats

Princess Haiku finished making her last Valentine at midnight

The store that I usually purchase fine cards from has vanished as have several others, and I therefore turned to my own resources.



And with a jar of glue, a valentine edition of a local newspaper, an old French magazine and a pair of scissors these Valentines appeared.



Each one made intentionally for a dearly beloved.



This is the true spirit of love: action and thoughtfulness.



I had more fun than I anticipated as I haven't ever done this before. -Or since I was a child and would cut lace trim and draw red hearts.

This post is in loving memory of baby C who passed to the other world, so long ago and his tiny feet never touched the earth for he was an angel.



RIP darling one

an Eclipse of the Heart, said Princess Haiku

I made a "Night of the Eclipse" to do list at....well where else, "To Do List" and had the idea of posting some old love letters. Anon of course. This is what this lunar eclipse has done for me. I reached far, into buried deep wells of early lovers and remembered....those letters.

Anyone interested? What was your personal and introspective experience of the eclipse?

the heart of Rumi is the breath of a Valentine's Day Flower, said Princess Haiku

chrysanthemum,
you left me, my darling
today this unfurling

my soul is red and gold
breath again

Beauty awakens God/dess said the mysterious Princess Haiku

Moon


Why do I return
again and Again
to your altar.

Resplendent in your reflection,

I discover a mysterious
Solitary Us/twin
goddess Dispersed pearl.

Your real name.
Truth is this; your skin
Your beauty, spirit

Speaks on me- to me.

Moon/ clouded cratered
Lake of mind in her
Gorgeous tristesse



February 3, 2008

Beauty awakens God/dess

love in the poetry of Charles Olson

*****
...flight
(of the bird
o kylix, o
Antony of Padua
sweep low, o bless
the roofs,
*****
love is form, and cannot be without
important substance
*****
But that which matters, that which insists, that which will last,
that! o my people, where shall you find it, how, where, where shall you
listen
when all is become billboards, when, all, even silence, is spray-gunned?
*****
one loves only form,
and form only comes
into existence when
the thing is born

born of yourself,
*****
love is not easy
but how shall you know,
New England, now
that pejorocracy is here,



Olson, Charles.
"I, Maximus of Gloucester, to You." _The Columbia
Granger's World of Poetry._ December 3, 2007.
http://www.columbiagrangers.org.




Biography
Olson, Charles (1910–70)

Charles Olson, American critic and poet, was born in Worcester,
Massachusetts, and received his education at Harvard (B.A., 1932; M.A.,
1933). His literary reputation was established with / Call Me Ishmael /
(1947), a study of the influence of Shakespeare and other writers on
Melville's / Moby Dick./ In the
1950's, he became noted as a poet, a central figure of what is now known
as the Black Mountain School, which also included Robert Creeley, Denise
Levertov, and Robert Duncan. Olson wrote what he called projective
(open) verse, which he believed transmitted energy from the past to the
reader. His works include his lifetime poetry project, /The Maximus
Poems / (1960 and
1968), along with / Causal Mythology / (1969), and / Poetry and Truth /
(1971). His best known poem is "The Kingfishers"
, which opens with
the line "What does not change / is the will to change."


Bibliography:
Clark, Tom. / Charles Olson: The Allegory of a Poet's Life./New York:
Norton, 1991. Merrill, Thomas F. /The Poetry of Charles Olson: A
Primer./Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1982. Olson, Charles. /The
Maximus Poems./Ed. George Butterick. Berkeley: University of California
Press, 1983. ———. /The Collected Poems of Charles Olson, Excluding the
Maximus Poems./ Ed. George Butterick. Berkeley: University of California
Press, 1987. Von Hallberg, Robert. /Charles Olson: The Scholar's
Art./Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1978.


To cite this biography:
Biography of Charles Olson. _The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry._
December 3, 2007. http://www.columbiagrangers.org.

..fair thou art as moonlight after Rain

Joy is but sorrow
While we know
It ends to-morrow---
Even so!
Joy with lifted veil
Shows a face as pale
As the fair changing moon so fair and frail.

Pain is but pleasure,
If we know
It heaps up treasure:---
Even so!
Turn, transfigured Pain,
Sweetheart, turn again, .
For fair Thou art as moonrise after Rain

Christina Rossetti

Christina Rossetti was born into an Italian/English family in London in 1830. Her book of poetry, "Goblin Market & Other Poems" was one of the first, great triumphs of the Pre-Raphaelite era. Christina led the cloistered, confined and sad life of many women of her day. If she were alive today we would hope she could dance with joy under the moon at times rather than only leave tears to water night blooming jasmine.

a dream, said Princess Haiku

"Who know not love from amity,
Nor my reported self from me;
A fair fit gift is this, meseems,
You give--this withering flower of dreams.

"O frankly fickle, and fickly true,
Do you know what the days will do to you?
To your Love and you what the days will do,
O frankly fickle, and fickly true?

"You have loved me, Fair, three lives--or days:
'Twill pass with the passing of my face.
But where I go, your face goes too,
To watch lest I play false to you.

"I am but, my sweet, your foster-lover,
Knowing well when certain years are over
You vanish from me to another;
Yet I know, and love, like the foster-mother.

"So, frankly fickle, and fickly true!
For my brief life--while I take from you
This token, fair and fit, meseems,
For me--this withering flower of dreams."

* * *

The sleep-flower sways in the wheat its head,
Heavy with dreams, as that with bread:
The goodly grain and the sun-flushed sleeper
The reaper reaps, and Time the reaper.

I hang 'mid men my needless head,
And my fruit is dreams, as theirs is bread:
The goodly men and the sun-hazed sleeper
Time shall reap, but after the reaper
The world shall glean of me, me the sleeper!

by Francis Thompson


With appreciation for all of the flowers in my garden:

Japonisme
East Coast Dweller
Get Zapped
Absolute Vanilla
she Who Flies
Jac
Antonia
Marion
dream catcher
kat

bones of trees, for Moon

I dreamed I was in the midnight garden of the Taj Mahal, said Princess Haiku

The white marble tomb of the Taj Mahal stands prominently along the Yamuna riverbank, situated on the northern edge of a classic four-fold Mughal garden built in Agra, India in the 17th century. Although legends of a "Black Taj" across the river had long been dismissed, this research examined the archaeological evidence at the garden opposite the Taj Mahal, known as the Mahtab Bagh or "Moonlight Garden." Working as a collaborative team, we sought to determine the landscape architectural aims, layout, components, and meanings at this historic Mughal garden.

Special thanks to Moonriver who first published a similar post.

mermaids

It is often presumed that mermaids are singing to humans, but I doubt this. I think their most special songs are for each other. What do you think?

Magenta Chrysanthemums After Rain

Once more, once more
into magenta petals of the
chrysanthemum, I dive.

Where is this river that becomes
a mirror, my sea, the flow amidst,
purple flowers drunk with love,

awakening soul?






Princess Haiku expresses deepest appreciation to the flower that awakens beauty and true nature.