Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation

Ross Danis, Program Director, Education

So much of our culture supports being “mindful.” The ability to store and quickly access information is highly prized in school and in our personal and professional lives. But the process of being creative or the act of creativity often involves allowing the mind to wander, to not think, to daydream, to de-focus.  And if you read my earlier post on the creativity gap, then you know that I believe we should be doing more to foster creativity.

Native Americans sometimes refer to “cricket talk” as what takes place in the brain when we just keep rehashing all the stuff we already know. It is believed that new ideas—things we don’t already know—can only emerge in the mind when we shut down the noise, turn off our logical-analytical brains, dial down the “cricket talk,” and just be.

Unfortunately, we live in a world that has little tolerance for daydreaming and “flights of fancy.” Just think of the parents who are gravely warned that Johnny has trouble staying focused, or that Jessica lets her mind wander sometimes. I want to say, “Yes, and?” Sadly, if such behavior persists in children, adults begin to call it Attention Deficient Disorder.  Of course, there are times when ADD is a legitimate diagnosis, but I believe it is overdiagnosed. Imagine someone telling young Ben Franklin to stop flying that kite and get back to his real work, or telling young Leonardo da Vinci about the folly of his observations of birds and his drawings of helicopters. What a challenge Robin Williams must have been in third grade!

Once, many years ago, I taught a lesson on the book The Little Prince to a group of eighth graders. All completed projects on the book. Many of the students created lovely mobiles that retold the story. One young lady brought in her cello and played a nine-part cello piece she composed, which musically illustrated the themes of the Little Prince. Pretty cool, huh? Where did that come from if not from letting the mind wander a bit?

Maybe it is time to stand up for daydreaming and become advocates for a little mindlessness, all in the name of fostering creativity in ourselves and our children.

Martin Farawell, Program Director, Poetry

Last week’s blog began an exploration of poetry in translation by listening to poet and translator Peter Cole. It discussed the sonic shape of a poem, and the challenge of translating that shape into another language.

This week, we hear Mexican poet Coral Bracho say, in her introduction to her poem “Agua de bordes lúbricos,”

“The images float. They escape. There is also another sense intertwined: That’s pleasure.”

Those of us not fluent in Spanish might take her comments as another hint for how to enter a poem in a foreign language. We know that to experience the pleasure of floating in water we must completely relax our bodies. Any tension would cause us to sink. So now, allow yourself to simply float in the aural flow of Bracho’s poem for the shear pleasure of it, and suspend any need for judgment or analysis.

Can you hear the sonic shape of waves in Bracho’s reading? Now listen for the waves cresting and falling in Forrest Gander’s reading of his translation, “Water’s Lubricious Edges.”

Water achieves its effects through accretion, repetition. Once immersed in Bracho’s poem, the images and sounds may affect us in much the same way. The images do “float” and “escape” within the rhythm of the poem, almost like objects floating in the sea. The aural and visual images in the poem seem to move as one.

As in the video of Peter Cole and Taha Muhammad Ali, this recording of a poet and translator reading the same poem, both in its original language and in translation, offers a unique opportunity. Through repeated hearings, a listener might become familiar enough with Bracho’s poem in English to hear the sense of it in Spanish. You might also obtain a copy of Firefly Under the Tongue: Selected Poems of Coral Bracho, translated by Forrest Gander, and read along in one language while listening in the other.

Visit the 2008 Dodge Poetry Festival Poet Pages for biographies of Coral Bracho and Forrest Gander. Be sure to return for upcoming Poetry Fridays, when we will feature many poets from past Dodge Poetry Festivals in the weeks ahead, including Martín Espada, Joy Harjo, Jane Hirshfield, Charles Simic, C. D. Wright and others.

Elaine Rastocky, Program Associate

The third floor of 14 Maple Avenue has dedicated gallery space for artists who live or work in New Jersey. Currently, the Arts Council of the Morris Area is hosting the “New Jersey Green” exhibit, which is open to the public and on display until July 15. If you haven’t been by to see this engaging exhibit, please do!

In preparation for the next exhibit, “From Here to There,” the Arts Council is seeking submissions that evoke the theme in any medium. The exhibit, which runs from July 23, 2009 to January 20, 2010, will be curated by Jeanne Brasile, Gallery Director for Seton Hall University.

You can get more information by visiting the Arts Council’s website or by calling Karin Becker at the Arts Council at (973) 285-5115.

The deadline for submissions is Thursday, May 28, 2009 by 5:00 pm.

See some of the works from the New Jersey Green exhibit below. (more…)

Michelle Knapik, Environment Program Director

Last week, the Dodge Foundation sponsored a two-day workshop entitled, Bringing People and Land Back into the Economy. This diverse stakeholder process is a continuation and expansion of the Whole Thinking Retreat we launched last summer with the Center for Whole Communities (CWC) as a way to explore the connections between agricultural land preservation and local food systems. The workshop invitation from Peter Forbes, CWC Executive Director, framed it as “an effort to strengthen land based movements for change by connecting leaders who are working with New Jersey communities around land conservation, food systems, urban development, and business.”

There’s no way to unpack all of our learning in a short blog post, but there was one moment that particularly struck me. We were talking about “what we longed for around food, land and people,” and one participant said, “setting the table for a formal meal.” I don’t know about you, but I can barely remember the last time I sat down to enjoy a meal with loved ones. This points to a deeper, fundamental issue about the way we over-schedule our lives, but setting the table for dinner felt like a metaphor for how we might move toward an integrated model of land preservation and community food systems. (more…)

Lisa Bregman, Program Associate

Known at the turn of the century as the Venice of New Jersey, the Union County Township of Cranford grew up around the meandering Rahway River. The River has always been a source of joy and pride in Cranford as residents utilized this natural resource as their primary mode of transportation: they would take their boats, which were docked in front of their homes, and travel along the river.

In 1970, as Cranford was becoming more developed, citizens concerned about preserving Cranford’s open space, natural resources and habitats formed the Cranford Environmental Commission. Since its creation, it has accomplished a great deal in Cranford, in addition to collaborating with other town commissions in the area.

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