FinNALA Newsletter
June 2013, Volume 6, Number 2
Publication of the Finnish North American Literature Association
© June 1, 2013
~~
Renew Your
Membership for 2013
Continue your
connections & support FinNALA: renew your membership at our website at www.finnala.com.
Membership is $20.00 for 2013. You can renew by mail
by sending your check or money order made payable to “FinNALA” to Beth
Virtanen, President, FinNALA, P.O. Box 11, New Blaine AR 72851, or renew by PayPal
by visiting www.finnala.com
~~
Announcements
~~
FinnFest USA 2013
June 19-23
~~
FinNALA Members and Friends Presenting
FinnFest USA 2013
Thursday,
June 20
Scott Kaukonen—Lecture
“A Little More Finland: Finnish
Crime Novels in Translation”
11:00 a.m. MTU Fisher 126
Lauri Anderson—Instructor
“Chronicling Finnish-American Lives
from Moosehead to Misery Bay”
11:00 a.m. MTU Fisher 133
“Writing Memoirs with Lauri
Anderson”
1:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 127
Kelly Nelson—Lecture
“Writing Poems from you Family
History”
12:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 101
Steve Lehto—Lecture
“The Italian Hall Disaster: What we
Know 100 Years Later”
12:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 325
Arnold R. Alanen—Lecture
“Making of ‘Finns in Minnesota”
12:00 p.m. DOW 642
Sheila Packa—Lecture
“Poetry Writing: dancing with the
Past”
2:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 132
Josef Aukee--Poetry Reading
2:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 139
Jouni Korkiasaari—Lecture
“Genealogist in the Footsteps of Finnish Immigrants”
“Genealogist in the Footsteps of Finnish Immigrants”
3:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 127
Beth Virtanen—Lecture
“A Poet’s Perspective on Her Work:
Reflections on and a Reading from Guarding
Passage”
3:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 101
Börje Vähämäki—Lecture
“What Everyone Should Know About the
Kalevala"
3:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 138
Friday,
June 21
Panel discussion:
"Promoting Finnish and
Finnish-American Literature in North America."
Participants of the panel are
Richard Impola, Scott Kaukonen, Jarkko Sipilä, Jouko Sipilä, Beth Virtanen,
Börje Vähämäki, and G.K. Wuori (Helena Halmari facilitator).
10:00 a.m. MTU Fisher 125
Panelists will give a brief (up to
5-10 minutes) introduction of how Finnish and/or Finnish American literature
and culture are promoted in their areas. Successes and possible challenges will
be addressed, and the discussion will then be opened to the audience. Audience
questions will be addressed, and topics will be elaborated on. We hope to see
plenty of audience participation.
10:00
a.m. MTU Fisher 125
Lillian Lehto—Reading
“The Copper Country Strike of 1913”
12:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 325
Arnold R. Alanen—Lecture
“Finnish rural Buildings and Landscapes in
Michigan’s U.P.”
1:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 138
Jane Piirto—Lecture
“The Finnishness of my Americanness Redux
2:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 126
Börje Vähämäki—Lecture
“The Kalevala and Worldview”
2:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 130
Jouni Korkiasaari--Lecture
“Finnish American Hall of Fame”
“Finnish American Hall of Fame”
2:00 p.m. MTU Fisher125
Ismo Söderling—Lecture
“Finland and Its Demographic Future to 2050”
2:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 127
Saturday,
June 22
FinNALA Board Meeting
10:00 a.m. MTU Fisher 131
Karen Johnson—Lecture
“Picturing the Past: Finlandia
University, 1896 to the Present”
10:00 a.m. MTU Fisher 127
Ismo Söderling—Lecture
“The Institute of Migration and Its
Collections”
10:00 a.m. MTU Fisher 127
Marlene Wisuri--Lecture
Marlene Wisuri--Lecture
Marianne Wargelin—Lecture
“The Hymn Tradition of Finland and Finnish
American
11:00 a.m. MTU Fisher 101
FinNALA Public Meeting-Open Membership Meeting
11:00 a.m. MTU Fisher 133
Ismo Söderling—Lecture
“Finnish Milestones in Emigration to South and
North America”
11:00 a.m. MTU Fisher 125
Gary V. Anderson—Lecture and Poetry
“Five Steps to Successful Family Memoirs: How
to Get started” 1:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 101.
Poetry: Reading from My Finnish Soul and Bunchgrass
and Buttercups
2:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 101
Steve Lehto—Lecture
“The Italian Hall Disaster: What we
Know 100 Years Later”
2:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 138
Jouni Korkiasaari—Lecture
“Finnish American Landmarks”
“Finnish American Landmarks”
2:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 125
Börje Vähämäki—Lecture
“Shamans in the Kalevala”
3:00 p.m. MTU Fisher 138
3:00 MTU Fisher 101
Joyce Koskenmaki—Art Exhibiter
Joyce will be having a show of her new work at
the Community Arts Center in Hancock for the entire month of June. Joyce’s
reception will be Saturday, June 22nd from 1:00 to 3:00 p.m. All
galleries in Calumet and Hancock, as well as at the Rozsa Center on the campus
of Michigan Technological University will feature work by Finnish artists, both
local and international.
Photographic Exhibit
“Rural Reflections: Finnish buildings in the
copper Country”
Photos by Ryan Holt, Text by Arnold R. Alanen
Carnegie Museum, Houghton
~~
Authors – Sell Your Book(s) at FinnFest 2013!
If want to make your book(s)
available at FinnFest 2013 (June 19 to 23) in Houghton/Hancock, Michigan, then
FinNALA has a great opportunity for you.
For
a modest $20.00 (U.S.) fee, FinNALA will:
1. display your book on its table in the Tori for the duration of
FinnFest; 2. keep a small reserve supply to replace sold books; 3.
keep an accounting of all books sold so that sale monies can be given to each
participating author; 4. keep you from having to pay the $300 fee to rent
and staff your own sale table; and 5. staff the FinNALA table during all
regular Tori hours of the FinnFest.
We
think this will be a great opportunity for our authors to gain exposure and to
make some money, whether they can attend or not. If you’re interested and will
be present at FinnFest, please contact me as soon as possible at bethlvirtanen
at yahoo.com.
If
you are unable to attend FinnFest and wish for your books to be sold at the FinNALA table, please
contact me at the email address above. Also, no more than seven (7) days before
FinnFestUSA2013 (no earlier than June 12), mail no more than ten copies of each
book you wish to make available at the FinNALA booth in a USPS priority mailer
to the following address: FinnFest Tori Vendor, Student Development Complex –
MTU, 101 MacInnes Dr., Houghton, MI 49931. Mark your box clearly:
Finnish-North American Literature Association.
Enclose
with your books, a check or money order for $20 made payable to “FinNALA” for
the display costs and a self-addressed stamped envelope in order to receive
proceeds from your book sales.
NOTE:
FinNALA will not pay postage for the return of unsold books, so you should be
sure to make arrangements with Beth (bethlvirtanen at yahoo.com)
for return postage for unsold items.
Unsold books for which no return postage arrangements have been made will be
discarded by July 14, 2013—be sure to make arrangements.
Volunteers Needed!
Volunteers are needed to staff the FinNALA table in the Tori for FinnFest 2013. If you can give us an hour or two just once or, hopefully, several shifts of an hour or two it would be greatly appreciated. Responsibilities include telling people what FinNALA’s all about, keeping track of books displayed and sold at our table, being really nice and meeting just a whole bunch of people and possibly running into someone you haven’t seen in years. If you can give us some help on this please contact Beth at blvirtanen at gmail dot com. We’ll work out the schedule. Thanks!!
~~
Kippis! Contest Winners Announced
Our
fifth annual Kippis! literary contest
brought forth exciting entries ranging from the beautiful to the bizarre, with
all of them providing fascinating reading for the judges. Worth noting, too, was the broad range of
experience of our entrants – a few emerging and even unpublished writers, and a
few with long lists of publishing credits.
Kelly Nelson’s two poems, “First Trip As
A Widow,” and “Blood Loss,” brought her into the winners circle with a first-place
award. Coming in second was Gary V.
Anderson’s poem, “Ruoantähteet.” Rounding
out the group was Marlene Mattila Stoehr with her short story, “The Bells Of
Karstula.”
The work of these winners as well as
other contest and non-contest submitters will be available in June both in
print and on the Kippis! website.
The editors wish to extend a sincere
thanks to all those who entered the contest as well as those who sent in
regular submissions. We depend on your
work and hope that the home we provide for it is worthy of your efforts.
Beth Virtanen
& G. K. Wuori
~~
An Important Date
By Sirpa T.
Kaukinen
This
spring we are marking a most important anniversary date for all Finns and
Swedes and their descendants living in North America. It was 375 years ago that a small group of
Swedes and Finns (Finland was then a Duchy of Sweden) first arrived at the mouth
of the Delaware River in early 1638. It
had taken three months for these twenty-six individuals to sail, first to
Holland, and then journey across the rough and wintry Atlantic Ocean in a small
sailing vessel called Kalmar Nyckel. A leader for this crossing was Dutchman Peter
Minuit.1
This May a replica of the original Kalmar Nyckel arrived at the Fort
Christina Park (named after the then child-queen Christina of Sweden) in the
city of Wilmington, USA. Aboard were the
Swedish King Carl Gustav and Queen Silvia, as well as speaker of the Finnish
Parliament Eero Heinäluoma and Mrs. Heinäluoma.2.
The Finns of the early 1600’s were used
to living in forests and cutting trees into logs and using these logs to build
homes, some of which remain to this day, and which eventually became to be
known as the American log cabin.3
Finns
travelled to the New World throughout the 1800 and 1900’s and it is estimated
that some 750,000 Finnish immigrants and their descendents now live in the
United States.4
Sources
– 1 & 3 - Engle, Eloise. Finns in North America, Leeward
Publications, Inc. 1975.
2 & 4 - Niskakangas, Tuomas – Wilmington, USA – 375 Vuotta Amerikassa – 375 Years in America, article in
Helsingin Sanomat, Ulkomaat, May 13, 2013.
Sirpa Kaukinen named Assistant Editor
to FinNALA Newsletter
Sirpa
Kaukinen, our assistant editor, lives in Ontario, Canada. She was educated in both Finland and Canada,
and received her Bachelor of Arts in English Literature from York University in
Toronto. She worked for 23 years at the
Toronto Hospital where her work centered on writing and producing small
publications and public relations documents.
Sirpa writes in English and Finnish languages. She is the winner of several short story
writing competitions including a first place winner of the first issue of
Kippis with a short story – No Place for
a Woman – and a second place winner of a North American short story
competition which stories were collected into a book - Lännen Kultaan Kurkottamassa - Searching
for the Western Gold - and published by Werner Söderström OY in Finland. Sirpa says she enjoys reading and editing the
immigrant experience poetry and stories published in the
FinNALA Newsletter and the literary journal, Kippis!
She
says it’s interesting to note how strong the north south family connections of
the Finnish immigrants who travelled to the USA prior to 1924 and to Canada thereafter
remain to this day.
~~
Books
Ernest
Hekkanen and Margrith Schraner have recently finished publishing Vol. 16, No. 1
of The New Orphic Review, the theme
of which is “Addicted to Story.” Hekkanen’s painting, A Time for Assassins, graces the cover. A Sweet Sixteen Anniversary
Celebration was held for their magazine on May 17 at the Oxygen Art Centre in
Nelson, British Columbia.
~~
Steve
Lehto’s book, Death’s Door: The Truth
Behind the Italian Hall Disaster and the Strike of 1913, will be released
mid-June as a second edition. It will be available for sale at FinnFest
2013.
Creative Contributions
Prose and Poetry
by Eero Sorila
Remembrance of
Mother
Like
a beautiful rose, your life was on this earth
The
golden nib of your pen consoled many who were hurt.
One
day a shadow of death from the rose was cast
The
writing came to a halt and the life of a poetess was past.
The
last strokes of your pen revealed a thankful heart
In sorrow I was happy, for in me you remain a
precious part
Jewels of Finland
As the first born to my parents in the
city of Jyväskylä Finland, it was very exciting for me to run away from home almost as soon
as I was able to walk. I had a good home and loving parents but the excitement
of adventure was too much for me to resist. Even if my escapades were limited
to a few city blocks, I felt like a world explorer.
To travel 225
km ( 140 mi ) mostly by train to the
family summer cottage in Tuusniemi was nothing short of euphoria.
Looking out from the train window the pristine landscapes with birch trees and
lakes formed a gliding panorama. It was the best movie of my life.
Already with
my grandparents it had been a family tradition to stop in the city of Kuopio
to buy provisions for the time of stay in the cottage. I will never forget one grocery item. It was
about a foot and a half long salami sausage. The high salt content would
preserve the salami without the need for refrigeration. There is nothing
like a buttered piece of hard tack-näkkileipä crowned with a slice of salami.
In culinary terms it is a jewel among many other delightful morcels in the
finnish diet.
As we arrived
to the cottage named Koivuranta it was
a new world for me to discover. There was no end to the excitement. The
cottage, shed-aitta and the smoke- heat sauna-savusauna were all
made in a traditional way from pine logs. Many sauna experts maintain that the
soft heat of a savusauna cannot
be matched by any other heat. I was
fortunte to experience that sweet heat at a very young age.
The savusauna
was only a few steps from the lake named juojärvi which covers 85 sq mi
( 220 sq km ). The water was crystal clear with plenty of fish like perch, pike
and roach.
Traditional Rowboat, Soutuvene
As I stood on
the steps of the savusauna my eyes could not escape a most beautiful
sight. It was my grandfather’s row-boat-soutuvene. In Finland with over
60 thousand lakes the wooden row-boat has been a mode of transportation since
time immemorial.
Master boat builders were highly esteemed
species that were proud of their work.
There are two basic styles of Finnish
row-boats: the savolais and hämäläis types. The first one is lower in height and it has a
sharper turning radius than the second one. Similar boat styles are used in
Karjala-Karelia.
The
boatbuilders would first choose a naturally curved tree from the forest and use
it for making the bow. It had to be strong like a trunk of a tree from which
the pine boards, like tree branches would be formed to complethe the boat. The
exterior was covered with a coat of tar to make the boat water repellent.
Tarring of the boat was like a joyful ritual repeated every spring. After a
long winter to tar a boat was a sign of
much waited summer.
Today the
master boat builders from the old school are rare to find in Finland.
Fortunately traditional row-boat building courses are given in Finnish community
colleges. This way the young people will learn to appreciate, perpetuate and
enjoy a tradition which has been a vital part of Finland for centuries. Janne
Vilkuna a professor in the University of Jyväskylä is one of the top
experts in the cultural history of wooden row-boats in Finland.
While visiting
Finland years ago, to take a trip with my grandfather’s row-boat was
something very special. The boat pierced the calm water like a knife made by Iisakki
Järvenpää. Even the smell of
tar eminating form every board of the boat was better than any perfume.
Lately
aluminum and fiberglass row-boats have
become popular in Finland, but for me there is nothing like a traditional
wooden row-boat.
Much after seeing my grandfather’s
row-boat for the first time I traveled widely to find and photograph more of
these jewels of Finland.
Eero Sorila has travelled in 140
countries and has selected
30 travel destination of hair
raising adventures into a book
GREEN MATTRESS UNDER THE STARS
Orders@Xlibris.com
Toll free: USA. 1-888-795-4274 $19.99
~~
Two Poems
by Kaarina
Brooks
Museum Piece
Look!
A skimmer!
Haven’t
seen one in years.
Not
since we were
at
Aunt Elsa’s farm in ’49.
Lot
at that butter churn!
Just
like Aunt Elsa’s!
The
cream refused to turn to butter
till
she took over the churning.
There’s
the whatchamacallit!
Grandpa
used one just like that
to
slice slats from pine logs
and
weave them into baskets.
And
aren’t those skis a hoot!
With
leather straps
to
slip over curly-toe boots.
I
had a pair like that.
My
God!
I
just realized—
my
whole life is
in
a museum!
Ghost Arms
“Lots
of good wind going to waste!”
That’s
what he would have cried,
my
greedy sailor, on a day like this,
when
the laundry flaps on the line,
like
the luffing sails of his boat.
And
whipped to life by a strong breeze
the
sleeves of a shirt—not his—
fill
with air, puff out, and wave wildly,
like
ghost arms, still reaching for me
from
beyond the grave.
~~
My Yellow Rose
By Fran Wiideman
The sign said, “Yellow Roses 50 cents.”
They were thick, full, so yellow in the dimly lit case.
“Why so cheap?”
“They’ve opened too much. They won’t
last long anymore.”
“Oh.”
Too full. Not buds anymore.
“I’ll take one.”
She wrapped it up in green paper,
stapled it and took my fifty cents plus tax and wished me a nice day. Then I
carried my long stemmed yellow rose all the way through the mall and out to the
parking lot. Then home.
At home I had to tear that green paper to
get my rose out. It lay there full, yellow, and alive. Thick petals curling up
and around the stamens in the center. Golden rods hidden in yellow velvet
petals. Fragrant. I picked it up to smell the fragrance. Like summertime. Like
sunshine. Full, fragrant, fragile. Not really fragile.
I found the little vase, the white one.
Ran some water into it. Then put it on the edge of the table and knelt down to
measure the rose against it. Up and down I moved the rose. How much should I
cut off? About there. It will be twice the height of the vase. Cut it right
now, with the knife. Then I pushed it gently into the vase.
The rose stood there, strong, straight,
full and yellow. I pushed away the other stuff that cluttered up the table,
always that clutter. Books. Papers. Onto the floor. The typewriter too. And the
napkin holder. Off to the counter.
There. Just the yellow rose in its vase
on the middle of the table. Yellow, like the sun. Warm. Fragrant. My yellow
rose for fifty cents.
~~
Prose and Poetry
By W. S.
Anderson
FIRE
The
first time I knew fire was, I think, a time before I remember. But I’ve heard
the story enough that I do.
I was maybe three or four. My mother was
cleaning, as she always did. She had removed the metal grate from our furnace
and propped it against a wall in the living room. This grate was like any other
you might find covering the floor or wall vents of a house, where heat wafted
into rooms. Only it was much bigger than most, as it covered the only opening
that heated our entire downstairs. The grate covered a three-by-four-foot
hole in the floor where our furnace dropped into a metal encasement, which
fitted into the dirt cellar below. Feeding the furnace was a big tank of oil
behind our house. Wearing shoes or thick slippers to stand on top of that grate
in winter was the best way to get warm, as heat would blow directly onto your
legs and bum and entire body.
This morning Mom meant to snake the
vacuum hose around the furnace depths to clean out the soot. I was standing
nearby, and she commanded me to “stay put right there.” She got on her
knees. She turned on the vacuum. She looked at me, decided I was safe, and
began to concentrate on the task at hand.
That’s when I decided something else:
that this was way too interesting for me to remain a spectator -- and one
without even a good view. I moved closer. I crouched. I peered. My body
slackened, and the next thing I knew I was headed into the big hole that housed
our home’s burning heart.
Mom was faster. She snatched me by the
back of my pajamas just as my hand brushed hot metal. I screamed, and she
rushed me to the kitchen and shoved my whole arm under cold water. She put
Vaseline on the giant blister that was forming -- folks did, with burns, in
those days.
To this day I have a barely discernible
scar on the back of my right hand -- not the mark of the devil, exactly, but
the mark of what my mom would come to call “that devilish Wendy Sue.” It became
a point of pride for Mom as years went on -- the time her curious little Wendy
took a tumble into the furnace, just to see what it was like, and her sainted
mother rescued her.
(From Gone Woods Queer, a memoir-in-progress about growing up in a tiny
town of Swedish, Finnish, and French-Canadian immigrants in north-central
Maine.)
Holding
On
My
best friend, Vicki, is in our kitchen
playing
dolls. She yanks a sweater
over
Tressy’s big head and topples
her
Kool-Aid free.
My
mother is on her fast.
My God! I just
washed that floor an hour ago.
I told you to be
careful
with that drink.
My
mother talks loud
as
head of our Sunday School;
and
in the choir she is the fiercest voice.
Just go outside!
she
shouts suddenly.
This instant!
Scoot! Scoot!
Then
her voice drops.
Better yet,
Vicki, you go back
to your own
house.
Let your own
mother
clean your
messes.
You can’t even
be trusted
to play right in
other people’s homes.
My
mother doesn’t like Vicki’s mom,
who
works in a tavern
on
the Greenville Road.
She
gets in Vicki’s face.
I know you’ll
end up
a fat little
whore
just like her,
so why don’t you
go on home?
The
only sound is the slamming door
and
Vicki’s shriek across our yard.
I
run down behind the barn
to
the garden, to my dad.
~~
The
First Summer
By Sirpa T.
Kaukinen
My first summer
at the boarding house,
Hot water and
soap blister my hands.
The cook
urges: “Bring stew to the men.
Do the dishes
later whenever you can.”
The kitchen
heats to a sauna on a summer day.
I dry my sweaty
forehead with a towel astray.
The cook
snaps: “Take the pie to the table.
Wipe your face
on something when you’re able.”
Walking home
tired in the evening breeze.
Thinking about
the distance across the sea.
My aunt sees the
teardrops on my face.
“Why the
tears? I washed dishes at the same
place.”
Sirpa T.
Kaukinen, from the Finnish-Canadian
Poetry Collection: Greetings from Canada.
~~
Flying to Marquette
By Jane Piirto
“Rise from the waters, mistress
with your spirits” Runo 12, Kalevala
Flying to Marquette,
over Lake Michigan,
sunshine burnishing
ripples far below,
it bodes unwelcome,
in far depths of greatness;
lakes,
and a forlorn and deserted island
beneath a fluff of white,
the golden water gleaming
as if it were not menace
but beckon.
~~
A Finnish Grandfather Remembered
By Diane
Dettmann
A box of family pictures
Tucked in a trunk—forgotten.
A musty odor releases
Time gone by.
Embracing the tattered photo,
My grandfather’s hand
Clasps mine.
Grandpa Kaurala’s wrinkled face,
Weathered from wind and toil,
Whispers, “Dinah.”
Memories of
Time together
In the barn,
The carpenter shop,
And distant potato fields
Echo through my soul.
His smile pulls me back
To the Minnesota farm
Cultivated with Finnish hands
And hearts.
Beyond his tattered pants
And the manure stained boots,
His spirit shines
With pride and joy of family,
A Finnish heritage preserved,
And a life in America
Well lived.
My grandfather, Paul Kaurala, was
born in Kiuruvesi, Finland on October 1, 1888. He left his childhood home at
the age of twenty-five to build a new life in America. He arrived in Montreal,
Canada in 1913 with little more than the clothes on his back and his Finnish
leather boots on his feet. After spending a year in Montreal as a logger, in
late 1914, he left Canada. Working a variety of jobs, he arrived in Ely,
Minnesota and eventually found steady employment in the iron ore mines. In
1917, he married my grandmother, Hilja Lukkarila, a young woman from Simo,
Finland who he had met on the ship. In 1923, Paul and Hilja moved their growing
family to a piece of property in rural Babbitt, Minnesota that Paul Kaurala had
purchased several years earlier.
My family spent many summer
vacations on my grandparents’ farm in Babbitt, Minnesota in the 1950s. Many
years have passed, but the fond memories remain. The following poem is a
tribute my grandfather’s strength, courage and Finnish “sisu”.
Read about Diane’s Finnish family in
her book, Miriam Daughter of Finnish
Immigrants (Dettmann/Dloniak) at < http://www.outskirtspress.com/dianedettmann> Also, Diane’s memoir, Twenty-Eight Snow Angels: A Widow’s Story of Love, Loss and Renewal is
available at http://www.outskirtspress.com/snowangels
~~
SNAKES ALIVE!
By Hazel Lauttamus Birt
2013 is the Chinese Year of the Snake, which reminds me of the nice sunny day my family and I were visiting the cemetery in our home place New Finland, Saskatchewan.
All of a sudden my sister Norma started
to scream hysterically. We all rushed over to see what was the matter.
“A snake, a snake!” she cried. “It was
at least three feet long and it ran over my bare feet!”
She
had forgotten that we Finns shared our New Finland Cemetery with garter snakes;
it was also called “Snake Hill”!
My sister Effie then recalled that when
she was a teenager she was visiting old Mrs. Rautio on the farm next to Snake
Hill.
Make us some coffee (keitä kahvia) ordered the old woman.
Effie went to the stove and started to scream, “snake, Snake!” (Käärme, Käärme!)
“Olle
hilja!” (Shut up!) the woman said. “It won’t harm you. In fact I like them,
they eat rats and mice and other than drink milk from the pails at milking time
they do no harm.”
We’ll be visiting the cemetery again
this summer but we’ll be sure to keep our shoes on!
Hazel Lauttamus Birt grew up on
her grandparents homestead in New Finland, Saskatchewan. She has written
several books on her Finnish heritage illustrated with award winning woodcut
prints. She lives in Winnipeg.
~~
Homeless
In My Own Country
By Anita
Erola
There
Was I
A lakeside
Nordic
summer
Slate
steps
Dewey with
moss
Wildflowers
Adorn the
way
To the
sauna
By the
water
In
solitude
By the
tranquil lake
Longing
Not
belonging
Homeless
in my own country.
Reflecting
on water
Seeking
answers
Below the
surface
Fish dart
Too small
for grandmother’s soup
With
potatoes and dill
I quietly
listen
Hoping for
answers
Contemplating
Being
Homeless
in my own country.
Pondering
Taking
steps
To the
water
For a swim
Across the
lake
Aspen
trees call
I
recollect them
By the
window
Their
distant welcome
Is not the
same
Reconciling
My
memories and being
Homeless
in my own country.
The sun
warms
The water glistens
A family
of swans
Brings the
answer
In
peaceful stride
They glide
Living in
peace
And
harmony
One with
Their
being
How it is
Is what it
is
In
solitude
I ponder
my own being
Homeless
in my own country.
~~
Viola Turpeinen
Musician,
1909-1958
By Sheila Packa
The pendulum of the clock swung –
the bodies in motion.
Think of grandmother’s face
when she was young.
The accordions echo time and resistance
inebriate Prohibition
go from straight to syncopation
uneven rhyme. Close your eyes.
The places her toes wore through
dancing shoes gave way
to the rise of smoke in neon haze
silver light on your mic.
Open the clasp on the case
spread the diamond, lift
the bellows, press the chords
open wide this gift.
The hellos of death, nothing can erase
the bloom of birds in paradise.
No words can place the miles you ride
along the coast at sunset.
You played the halls,
emptying your chest.
In the velvet dark, sorrow
holds its breath.
Once you slid into the leather harness
(no voice tomorrow)
hands on the ivories and ebonies
made the stars race in a steeplechase
heedless.
http://vimeo.com/64887018
~~
Two Poems
by Michael King
A Pause before Parting
Endowed with the
figure of Pallas,
She ponders the grand Summer Palace,
where pavilions applaud as She passes.
Secured in glass cases,
ancient works of exquisite art
glimmer in the glaze of Her brown eyes’
brilliant rays. Classic curves
caress Miranda’s gossamer green
dress while gardens grow by Her grace.
Hand in hand, we climb Longevity Hill
and look out over Kunming Lake from the
top.
Her charming chubby cheeks fill
the opulent imperial chalice before us.
Below, lotus leaves and blossoms reach
upwards, revel in response to Her
resplendence,
which reigns over Yíhé Yuán.
On a ferry departing from beside
the Cloud-Dispelling Gate,
She sits mulling over the deck.
Her cheery cheeks have chilled.
All I can do is kneel at the bow
as Her surrendering frown and somber eyes
obscure the once-blue sky.
Walking along the West Dyke,
we see a flicker amongst flowers
beneath willows. A dew-drinking
phoenix flushes, flashes its flames.
Blushing qilins approach and gently
paw Miranda’s puffy pink
cheeks.
While we rest at a stony beach,
Her mesmerizing smile returns. From atop
the Mirror Bridge, Her eyes beam
blessings to drifting dragon boats.
Evening begins to engulf
the Garden of Nurtured Harmony.
Towers and temples bow
their arching eaves as we walk
slowly down the Long Corridor.
Miranda’s gauzy green dress
dances around Her classic contours,
sways beside swirling shadows.
Admiral (Plymouth, England, Winter 1982)
Watch keeps me inside while tugs push
us upriver.
After we dock
I sway on sea legs past RN
sentries and take out fish and chips;
sentries and take out fish and chips;
immersed in vinegar, they burn
my tongue. Along a row of pubs
my tongue. Along a row of pubs
an old man calls across the street.
Invited to a tiny house,
I meet the missus and we drink
tea.
Photos tell a World War tale.
The admiral talks of history,
asks of storms I’ve weathered. We pause,
regard our countries legacies
before I’m taken on a tour.
asks of storms I’ve weathered. We pause,
regard our countries legacies
before I’m taken on a tour.
His tiny sedan’s engine raps
and its gears whack as we sail
past traffic and modern sprawl, which
past traffic and modern sprawl, which
surrounds an old cathedral, missed
by blitz bombs. At the Barbican,
our journey’s end, the granite steps
read, “Mayflower 1620.”
~~
YOOPER TRIANGLE CLAIMS TAPIOLA MAN
By Terri Martin
Combining
the words “blaze orange” and “camouflage” creates an oxymoron. Camouflage (camo)
implies concealment and blaze orange (B.O.), on a clear day, is visible in
Canada. Wearing B.O. is nothing but a flagrant disregard of our national
security, leaving us vulnerable to attack by Canada. Secret sources indicate
the Canadians have been studying the feasibility of invading the U.S. via the
U.P. ever since the Mackinac Bridge was built.
And don’t think, for one minute, that
your “turkey hunting camos” are safe, either. It’s just foolhardy to wear that
neutral stuff. Take, for example, this heart-wrenching story that comes from
Mrs. Philomema Heikkinen of Tapiola.
“It all started,” she reported to
the deputy sheriff, “when I sent my husband Bucky—well his real name’s Bill but
everyone calls him Bucky, for short—out to get the paper, which by the way, is
delivered to a box about a half mile down the road. He was wearing his camo
Carhartts and, well, I—I think that he just blended away into the scenery,” she
concluded with a trembling voice.
The deputy taking her statement
nodded his head knowingly and muttered: “Had he been wearing B.O., I’d say the
Canadians got him, but since he was neutral, I’m afraid it’s another notch in
the tree for the (dramatic pause) Yooper
Triangle.”
This made Mrs. Heikkinen gasp and
bury he face in her hands and sob: “No! No!”
A helpful neighbor, Al, who they
call Porky for short, along with the deputy conducted a vigilant search but
eventually (after about twenty minutes) had to terminate the hunt, so to speak,
on account of darkness and also Porky’s wife told him to get in for supper or
she was feeding it to the dogs. The search did not resume the next day because
Porky said he wanted to get his fishing shanty on the bay before all the good
spots were taken.
The police, every duty-bound,
suggested that Mrs. Heikkinen put a fresh pasty out on the porch to see if her
husband might get good and hungry and be guided home by the smell. The
Heikkinens had been blessed with an excellent rutabaga crop that year and Mrs.
H. was able to put numerous odoriferous pasties on her porch for several weeks,
all of which disappeared. However, Bucky was never spotted and Mrs. Heikkinen
was beginning to run low on rutabagas. Police stepped up their efforts by
borrowing a live bear trap (the humane kind) from the DNR and suggested that
Mrs. Heikkinen put the pasty bait in the trap. Though this did not result in
the “capture” of her husband, she did successfully cage a large, grumpy black
bear that had apparently been lured out of hibernation by a warm spell and the
wafting aroma of Mrs. Heikkinen’s pasties. Mrs. H said that the bear, named
“Bucky 2” was not a whole lot different than having “Bucky 1” around, so she
let him (the bear) say “on a trial basis.”
To make a long story short—well
maybe it’s too late for that—but anyway, you fellas can see the risks of
wearing camouflage. Yous may wander into the woods and come back to find a bear
in your recliner hogging the remote control.
FinNALA Newsletter Editorial Team:
Terri Martin, Editor-in-Chief
Sirpa Kaukinen, Assistant Editor
Beth Virtanen, Publisher
