Annagrammatica's Poem of the Week

Holy GPS

2012-01-29T14:36:00.001-06:00

She Has God's Purse

Excuse me, please. Have you seen God today? She left
her handbag in my parlor. Yes, of course I'm serious.
I don't know her address, but I'd have thought, if she
were anywhere nearby, it might be kind of obvious.

SOME FELLOW ON A TALK SHOW SAYS HE'S GOD
OR ELSE GOD LIVES INSIDE HIM. WORDS TO THAT
EFFECT.

Well, that complicates my job a bit. I don't suppose
that you could locate him and shove the handbag
down his throat?

NO, I DON'T SUPPOSE I COULD. THE GUY IMPLIED,
THOUGH, THAT WE ALL ARE GOD. SEEMS THAT
WOULD MEAN SHE LIVES INSIDE YOU, TOO.

No way I'm swallowing her purse. Besides, I'd rather
not be God. I really do prefer to worship somebody—
some entity, much larger and more powerful than
me, and smarter, who can summon angels and
perform a miracle when necessary. Isn't there a Holy
Spirit, too, who visits now and then from Heaven,
bringing Peace?

I get mixed messages, know what I mean? Like, one
day it's, "Surrender," and the next day it's The Work?
And then someone authoritative claims that we
create our own reality, and honestly, it's more than
I can do to make my bed. Back in the day, whenever
I would get confused this way, I'd lay my burden
down for God to take, and she came through
dependably.

WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN? THE BUZZ IS, YOU CAN
MANIFEST YOUR HEALTH AND HAPPINESS. IT'S
ALL ABOUT VIBRATIONS.

Doesn't anybody pray these days?

WELL, NOT SO MUCH. THEY MEDITATE AND
CONTEMPLATE AND SUCH.

I don't mind meeting God halfway most of the time;
but now and then I want to be taken care of, like the
Bible says, you know, rest in green pastures....

YEAH. GOOD LUCK WITH THAT.

On a rainy afternoon...

2012-01-28T17:59:00.000-06:00

Claude Monet, Water Lilies and Clouds, 1903

If It's Living in a Tree, It Isn't Me

(If with its own wings it flies, it isn't I)

Shall we go live in a tree, you and me? We

will need to become very wee or to

Claude Monet, Au Parc Monceau

find a colossal-size tree.

As for me, I like cottonwoods, personally.

They tell secrets, you know, with coy,

whispery voices. When breezes blow gently,

the leaves exchange kisses. I listen beneath to

their chorus of bliss:

“I am happy, so happy, to be,” says one leaf

to her neighbor, “exactly where I’m blessed

“to leap, dance, and rest on this cottonwood

tree,” and they clap for the joy of it.

“Rain shower’s coming, oh boy!” I hear

somebody say as the wind starts to rise,

bringing rumbles of thunder our way.

“What great fun!” cries another; they jump

and they spin and they somersault madly; the

clouds tumble in and the sun disappears and

the branches bend this way and that—then

the dancing begins.

Now I watch from my window, a little

relieved that we don’t have to live in a

cottonwood tree, you and me.

“Well, the cottonwood tree and we ought

“to be friends,” I decide, “and perhaps we

“could camp in it when the rain ends... but I

“don’t wish to dwell in the damp or the

“gloom or the sweltering afternoon heat in

“the middle of June, and I definitely don’t

“want to nest out of doors in a storm. I

“prefer to be dry and I like to be warm.”

Now I treasure my room more than ever I did

before thinking I might like to live in a tree;

for a leaf is a leaf on the planet and happy to

be, and I’m equally glad, in fact rapturously—

I aver and command and request and

entreat—to be me.

Children's Song Version

Would you like to live in a cottonwood tree,

You and me, you and me, you and me?

We could build a nest—oh, how merry we would be,

For a nest up in a tree must be heavenly.

But can you fly?

Can I fly?

Can you fly away

To a place that's warm and dry?

When the wind blows cold?

When it rains or snows?

Where would we go, you and I?

We can have our tea in a tree when it's dry,

Not a cloud in the sky—if it rains, we can't fly away.

If it starts to pour, we can always go indoors

Where the cookies and the attic will be warm.

Let the robins gobble all the worms!

Bugs and thunderstorms are for the birds.

Claude Monet, 1840-1926

born in Paris, 1840

Renoir, Claude Monet
Reading, 1872

Claude Monet was and still is one of the most famous artists in the world. He painted for money, but he also liked to paint for the joy of it. Most of his paintings are scenes of water or nature. This is because he liked the way the outdoors looked in different seasons, in different light. He was one of the painters who invented Impressionism — a style of painting in which artists use dabs of color to show how a scene or object looks and how the light falls.

Monet liked to paint water. He liked the way colors reflected in the water. Boats, oceans, and lakes were some of his favorite subjects. He liked water so much that he fixed up a boat as a floating studio. Monet kept paints, brushes, canvas, and drawing supplies on his boat.

In school, Monet didn't do very well. He said, "School seemed like a prison and I could never bear to stay there, especially when the sunshine beckoned and the sea was smooth." He always drew funny caricatures of his teachers. He got in trouble for his drawings, but he became very good at them.

At the age of nineteen, Claude had to join the army. He was sent to Algeria, a country in northern Africa. He liked the way the bright clear light of Algeria lit the sky, and how the shadows moved when the wind blew. A year later Claude became very ill with typhoid fever and returned to France.

An artist called Eugene Boudin liked Monet's work. He told Monet that he should paint outside. "That way you can feel what you paint." Monet DID paint outdoors, but usually things would stick to the wet paint—sand, bits of rock, leaves, and other natural litter.

Monet made money by selling his paintings in art museums, including the great Salon in Paris. One painting that the Salon did not accept was The Women in the Garden (1867-1868). A model for the painting, Camille Concieux, would become his wife in 1870. They had two sons, Jean and Michel, before Camille died of tuberculosis in 1879.

The Women in the Garden

Monet and other artists began painting in a way that showed how pretty objects looked when the sunlight reflected on them. A newspaperman called these artists "Impressionists" after Monet's painting Impression: Sunrise. The newspaperman actually didn't care for the style, thinking that Impressionist art looked “unfinished.”

Often, Monet painted many pictures of the same things, in different seasons and at different times of the day. He tried to make colors, shadows, and light in his paintings appear as real as possible.

Monet’s painting had made him rich, and in the 1880s he moved his family to a large farmhouse at Giverny. His second wife, Alice, died in 1911 and his elder son, Jean (married to Alice's daughter Blanche), died in 1914. It was Blanche who cared for him in his old age, as he was going blind. But he continued to paint until he died in 1926 at the age of 86.

He spent the last ten years of his life painting scenes of his water garden. "What I need most of all are flowers, always, always," he said. These paintings are among his most beautiful and famous. Some of them are over forty feet wide. Among these late paintings are Water Lilies, Panel of Water Lily Decorations, Snow at Argenteuil, and Venice--the Grand Canal.

Sources: Wikipedia and library.thinkquest.org

Keeping Cats

2012-01-07T16:35:00.001-06:00

I never wanted anyhow to be one of those plump

and fuzzy-headed muttering old cows whose house

is redolent of lavender and talcum powder…

keeping cats like stage-play props and wearing black

organza dresses, living in a cottage by herself and

being hard of hearing… introduced and soon

forgotten, merely typical of one long in the tooth...

invisible to children and the nonchalant.

In want of sensitivity, my youthful doctor called me

“Dear,” you see. No one, I’ll bet you, treated

Hepburn so dismissively when she was in her winter

years. I need a bit more eccentricity — a memorable

sort of chic that’s mine alone. Suppose I go with

slender, spirited, a bit untidy, blowsy, mussed, and

sunburned as if just returned from horseback riding,

dressed in faded Levi’s and chiffon, diaphanous in

white, a generously ruffled blouse high-collared

with a china button cover at the neck... and energetic

in my charity and kindness, doing all the good I

might... set in my ways, however, vaguely batty,

slightly deaf, and keeping

cats

The Deferential Deity

2011-12-28T00:07:00.000-06:00

Aubusson rug—reproduction? The Bella Cottage

ANYBODY HOME?
“Hello?” the entity once known as God is
whispering. No one is listening. Nobody pays
attention. Ken is busy with his inner conflict.
Well, a fellow’s gotta make a living. Ah, we have
a winner—EGO: One. CEREBRAL CORTEX: Zero.
But Integrity collapsed and couldn’t finish.
Oughta throw the sap a pill, huh?

This is where we keep the children. Anybody
home? They’re electronically engaged; it’s a
contemporary form of bonding. Jeremy is
leaking serotonin on the Aubusson, but that’s
okay. It doesn’t stain. Don’t you adore
technology?

“Ahem,” suggests the ex-Almighty deferentially,
but nothing penetrates Eliza’s body suit and
anyway there’s righteous indignation welded to
her frame and doing violence to her adrenals
and intestines.

What’s-his-name—yeah, him, Divine Wow—is
on the schedule, penciled in, for—when? Oh,
Christmas Eve. Until then everyone is occupied.
Until the lights go out. Until the silence.

Where None Had Been

2011-12-13T21:01:00.000-06:00

Holy Light

Heaven wept so many tears
(the angel told us), there began
a waterfall, and streams appeared
where none had been.

Where none had been, there filled a lake
and angels gathered there to pray
for you; we grieved not for his sake—
He lives today.

Where none had been, now rivers run
of joy and sorrow, side by side:
sweet, healing streams of tears that come
from angels’ eyes.

Throughout the night the angels prayed
with him—Did you know he was near?—
until the first and bravest ray
of dawn appeared.

His soul (the angel said) is young
and curious. Upon his face
shine wisdom and compassion, love
and Heaven’s grace.

In this life or another, you
will know him; trust your intuition.
With him will go angels, too,
as they have done

through eons long passed out of sight
since God in love created him
to be a ray of holy light
where none had been.

In memory of Monty Fey 1936-2011

Playing God

2011-11-23T22:06:00.001-06:00

Forgiven

I wondered at another's strength
begrudged her victory
despite the cost
and was ashamed
of being not as strong

I contemplated Jesus on the cross
while I forgot the resurrection
and the lessons: gratitude, compassion
and I walked away from grace, ashamed
of clinging to my body and not
making of it such an offering

I shunned companionship, ashamed
of wanting it—a friend, an intimate
would be too soft a pillow for a
head that ought to bear a crown
of thorns instead—and with such cruel
thoughts, in solitude, I clawed my spirit
even as I prayed for God to spare me
suffering and loss

Follow Your Bliss

2011-09-27T23:12:00.000-05:00

...AND DEMONS FLED

Did you know me when I prayed for you? I was the

first and bravest ray of dawn that shimmered

through your window; as you slept, I swaddled you
in light, a tissue-cotton blanket... leapt and

skipped (as if I were an acrobat) for happiness
above your bed; swept down to kiss away your pain,
the way my mother did when I was feeling lonely or
had skinned my knee... but this was for the knitting
of your bones; and demons fled dismayed by my

     caress. Your muscles, where they had been taut,
       began to soften like a stick of butter left beside
         an open window on a summer day.

'...and demons fled.' Michelangelo, The Last Judgment

          I played a little
        fugue and sang my way into your dreams—
               Follow your bliss... follow your bliss...
     —the song expanding to a symphony so lovely that
   the stars swayed, and the fading moon embraced you
just before it set. In that eternal second all the universe
was rapt, a captive to the beauty of your spirit, gleaming
     and intact; the earth, the seas and mountains wept with
        love. And as you lay there, sleeping, still, by heaven's
      grace protected in a fortress built of peace and painted
   dreams, a smile as sweet as lilacs' fragrance crept across
your face.

John Atkinson Grimshaw, Spirit of the Night

I sped away; your private flock of angels never left your side.

Believe it when you sense a something like a feather (velvet as

a languid breeze) brush past or feel a something

like a blessing as if fingertips of sunlight had escaped a

wedge of leaden cloud to smooth a drop of salve across

your brow

—for Jody

Transplanted

2011-09-06T10:58:00.000-05:00

WallpapersOnWeb.com

Evolution

The desert shrubs outside my window -- gray-
brushed-green-limbed tiny-leaved mesquite,
today ungainly, squat, a haven for the rabbits and
the quail -- will soon become unconquerable
trees with their ability to thrive in all extremes, from
paralyzing winter freeze to unrelenting summer

Velvet mesquite tree at Tumacácori Mission —
National Park Service

heat. Why, even in July they blithely point their

lacy fingers toward the sky. Do they defy or have

they simply learned to love the midday sun?

The ground seems inhospitable, but they persist.

Their roots find nourishment enough, whatever

water might exist and minerals secreted in the

sandy surface, the caliche, and the stores that must

lie hidden deeper still. And not by will or work but

gentle evolution did they gradually adapt here

over who knows what great span of years --

millennia, perhaps.

But I was only recently transplanted and I haven't

quite that long to make my roots secure. So I

look elsewhere for a cure for my fragility so as

to strengthen my enfeebled hold upon the earth,

relying on the certain grace of God and kindly

friends to tend my bruised and battered spirit

blinded by the dust and nearly toppled by the

searing winds.

Golden Ball

2011-08-31T09:10:00.000-05:00

Sunrise in the Forest —SkyWallpaper.com

MORNING SMILES

Horse farm sunrise, Versailles, Kentucky —wallpapers-diq.com

Lovely energy of morning, wrapped in

pink and silver-gray and lavender, a

dazzling parade of shifting shades as if

you can’t quite make your mind up what
to wear… and then you smile… and I
breathe in the sacred glory and the
immortality of your unfailing grace
displayed with boundless generosity as
every day begins and claim again that I
too bear within, beneath whatever
wrappings I might wear, a golden ball
too bright and beautiful to look upon

Google Wins

2011-08-27T14:37:00.000-05:00

Jon Kabat-Zinn went to Haverford College, a Quaker institution. This is the Haverford College Duck Pond by reuterslowdown on Flickr

SEARCHING FOR 'JOHN CABOT ZINN'

Jon Kabat Zinn speaks at Google—more points for Google!

Praise God for search engines that are

forgiving and whose admonishments, if

any, are well-mannered, even sweet and

gentle. The unenlightened ones, if I am

looking for "John Cabot Zinn," a very

feasible misspelling, give a response

that tells me someone needs her nap

because she's beastly, crabby, all

undone. She snarls (or else he

does), "Your search turned up not

even one result. What's wrong with

you?" And then he/she dissects your

personality and makes offensive

comments re your mom, your

parentage in general, and the

futility of your existence; and

infects your laptop with a virus

that's incurable.

A monument to Shays' Rebellion in western Massachusetts

Now Google understands "John

Cabot Zinn" because it's logical;

and Google knows that many

of our intellectuals can't spell for

crap, and so, respectful of your

dignity, it simply takes you to

a list of URLs relating to "Jon

Kabat-Zinn" but doesn't simply

drop you there; with due

humility, it offers you an opportunity

to make a further search anent

"John Cabot Zinn," in case

that's what you really meant.

From Wikipedia, I'd hoped

for better. Faced with what I've

learned is nonexistent or

unmet in cyberspace, "John

Cabot Zinn," it takes the path

of least resistance; id. est:

The page "John cabot zinn" does not
exist. You can ask for it to be created,
but consider checking the search results
below to see whether the topic is already
covered. For search help, please visit Help

"Lowell Mill Girls" was the name used for
female textile workers in the 19th century in
Lowell, Massachusetts —Wikipedia

...and then offers links to Shays'

Rebellion and the Lowell Mill

Girls, Anti-Union Violence,

and Christopher Columbus\—

none of which, I hardly need to

say, is pertinent. I'm very fond

of Wikipedia and wish it well,

but if you plan to search in

Wikipedia, you'd better learn

to spell.

So Google wins the prize--which

is my faithful, frequent use of it--for

patience, tact, and accuracy,

plus it's free, which matters

greatly to the poor, including me,

and also to the simply frugal; and I

wish, in this respect at least...

Gee, if they made me Supreme

World Queen, before

I did another thing, I'd issue

this command: Be More Like

Google.

Amen

Search Amazon.com for jon kabat zinn meditation cds

Lingua aqua

2011-08-19T04:42:00.000-05:00

POET, OPEN WIDE THE WINDOW

The Little Mermaid

Poetry’s the language of the heart and mind in sympathy, and such a tidy way this is of saying it’s a shame this isn’t all there is, but it gets messier because there’s something altogether more, I find, when sweet and simple lines occur to me — a kind of calling, quiet, firm, and not to be denied: O Poet, open wide the window. So I try, oh, yes, I try — the kind of word smug masters love to pounce upon (“Don’t try, just DO”) — Do you not see, the window’s stuck, alas; I almost give it up and start a nap, but there’s a tapping at the pane.

I try again, with better luck this time. And then I couldn’t say at all which spirit comes and carries me away: a rogueish ray of sunlight, free to sail the skies above whatever sea or continent we fancy – where the zebras are, perhaps, or Bimini or Madagascar. But if not the sun, the sigh, then — breathing out and breathing in, each exhalation stirring in me an infinity of possibility; the IN breath offers comfort, intimate, as if I were a baby in the womb and knew the mother’s heartbeat as my own.

Spongebob's Underwater Kingdom

If not the womb, the rain, creating rivulets upon the old brick path, creating streams that grow with heaven’s generosity and wend their way to greater streams and thence to oceans, thence to clouds and mist and I have only floated on the rivers to the sea with pelicans and fish for company, and mermaids genuine as you and me. The mermaids led me to their underwater universe no human on her own could possibly discover.

Effortless my movement is on air, in water — everywhere on earth, in space, I go, loose-limbed and unafraid, conveyed by ships or chariots of grace; and what began as mutterings of love undisciplined and tapping on the windowpane, an invitation to embrace eternity, became the language of our common soul. But I am not an angel yet and have let Ego’s pen distort the pure, clear vision I was given, and corrupt the soul’s impression.

So I pray that something fine, a slender scraping of divine resplendence, might escape this poetry of mine and drift like thistledown into your willing spirit. May you find whatever it contains of heaven’s truth, in heaven’s time.

...a slender scraping of divine respendence

The Land of In-Between

2011-06-05T10:23:00.000-05:00

Claude Monet, Au Parc Monceau

After an Early Supper with Friends
June 4, 2011

This is the time when shadows start to blend; the
day is not quite ended, nor has evening quite
begun. There is a kind of hush — no chorus
sounds; each noise is singular: the scrape of
Papa’s chair, a pair of doves emboldened to
converse, the bleating of a lamb. This moment
seems to stretch, the earth is sluggish in its
spinning. Is the sun reluctant to surrender at the
hour appointed? Is our star just now

Claude Monet, Evening at Argenteuil

undisciplined and truculent?

Something holds its breath; we hardly notice even
as we cease activity and rest upon a hammock
strung between the first peal and the last one of
the village clock; and then we slide upon a great
collective sigh that’s part contentment, part regret
at being not allowed to stay here in this mystic
land of in-between, this fissure in the continuity of
day and evening

Archer, Hold Your Arrows Now

2011-05-13T12:57:00.001-05:00

Above: Medieval Archery Competition. Below: Depictions of the 1415 Battle of Agincourt

Food for the Wounded Heart

O God, make soft my wounded heart, which
wants to grow a dragon’s skin so it cannot be
pierced again, a coat of armor to deflect the
daggers and the arrows that with deadly aim
would make it bleed. But I need courage more
than shielding now, to keep my heart exposed...
to open and remodel it. I wish it to become a warm,
inviting heart, O God, one that is friendly, even
welcoming, for there are those it would embrace
and make for them a fragrant garden, sweet and
safe and scented with the rose, the lilac, and the
honeysuckle vine... a place above the grime of city
streets where visitors can climb to find security,
as squirrels sniff the air and scurry to their nests
before a storm. Here is my heart, my precious
ones, I cry to them. Here is protection; here is rest.
Now close your eyes and listen. You will find that
everything there is to know about reality is said
between the steady heartbeats and in whispers
at the pausing of the breath. And I would teach
them that to love is not a risk at all; it is an antidote
for death. Love speaks the language of the soul, of
sunlight, of the nightingale, the hum of summer in the
grass, the old oak groaning in the wind. If love is
stolen from an open heart, there is in heaven an
unlimited supply of it, and innocence as well.

My wounded heart, left to its own devices, would
have long since withered, gone to seed, all but
invisible among the weeds whose thorns make
inhospitable the space around. How could it heal,
this heart inflamed, when barely capable of
pounding blood through arteries and veins?
Created durable enough, it must have maintenance
just like the rest of us, with exercise and fresh air
and a diet rich in love. Admonishment to toughen
up is well regarded, and the heart is, after all, a
muscle not to be neglected, but its nourishment,
the best of it, is heaven-sent. No heart can thrive
on bread alone.

O God, make whole and clean my wounded heart
and sweep away the scales; it needs no armor from
now on. I call to the archer, Hold your arrows. I am
friend and no one’s enemy today. Almighty God,
endow me with endurance and vitality, for I would serve
thee and be happy, as my heart, by nature wise,
by thee restored to purity, advises me.
-------------------

The Battle of Agincourt was a major English victory against a numerically superior French army in the Hundred Years' War. The battle occurred on Friday 25 October 1415 (Saint Crispin's Day, November 3. NS), near modern day Azincourt, in northern France. Henry V's victory had a crippling effect on France and started a new period in the war, during which Henry married the French king's daughter and his son was made heir to the throne of France. However, his battlefield successes were not capitalised on by his heir, Henry VI.

Henry V led his troops into battle and participated in hand-to-hand fighting. The French king of the time, Charles VI, did not command the French army himself as he suffered from severe, repeating illnesses and moderate mental incapacitation. Instead, the French were commanded by Constable Charles d'Albret and various prominent French noblemen of the Armagnac party.

The battle is notable for the use of the English longbow, which Henry used in very large numbers, with English and Welsh archers forming most of his army. The battle is also the centrepiece of the play Henry V, by William Shakespeare.
***

Queen of Dreams

2011-05-04T12:01:00.000-05:00

The Dark Before the Dawn —wallpapertime.com

Demons in the Dark

God, grant me energy and courage equal
to my aspirations....

In the deep deep dark in the hour before the
dawn, the demons being desperate, their power
waning like the night... in the deep deep dark
before the dawn, the demons fight in desperation
for my spirit. They are weary, and their subtlety is
spent, but they are hungry, too. They fear to go
home empty-handed. They invade my dreams as
easily as snakes slip through a slender opening
between two rocks, though they, the demons,
never could have entered without my permission.
They’re oblivious to this, of course. Sometimes
they’re more laughable than fearsome. They’ve
run out of clever ploys and so this way and that
they chase me, ‘round and ‘round, and I escape
eventually. It’s only, after all, a dream and I’m the
queen and I could dream them into soot and
ashes and perhaps next time I will. I’ll dream
them into daylight, which is fatal to them... not
that they are living, technically....

Here’s the thing with demons: They’ve no power
of their own. They borrow it from people’s fears
of growing, of their aspirations unpursued, the
talents they’re not making use of. They’re the energy
that builds whenever someone says, “I should,” “I
will,” and doesn’t. When that someone turns
around and aims for glory, he reclaims his energy,
she needs all of her strength, and when she calls
upon it, doesn’t it immediately drain then from
the demon and become available? Thus do
demons turn to others, indiscriminately so. They
have no way of knowing who is vulnerable,
whose power they can have by pulling on a good
intention, like a bit of yarn that when you tug on
it the garment ravels.

It is a simple matter to protect yourself: Be who
you are, according to your spirit. Act on your
good intentions. Do the small things. Call your
niece this very second. Write a letter to the editor.
Give lilacs to Marie next door. Now do the large
things. Can you possibly believe that God created
you with talents so that you could waste them?

Ah, but who am I, the queen of dreams,
to give advice? I’ve yet to try
my own wings, I am that afraid of heights.

Being a Seed

2011-04-30T22:22:00.000-05:00

I am a seed that swells with earth and water.
Though my shell is hard enough to break your
teeth on, time and melting snow accomplish what
exertion never could. I am a seed that would do
nothing but to heed my longing, ancient, deep,

beyond my understanding.

I am a seed that has no memory of being planted
in this fertile land. Safe and secure, I hug my
sturdy skin around me, grateful in my tiny
burrow when the winds with frigid fury wail an
inch, no more, above. Protected and content, I rest
until awakened by the thaw that never fails to
come in season. Buried, waiting, I can feel the
change in how the planet breathes, with each
unhurried exhalation warmer till the snow
recedes, the stony ground relents and softens.
Only then do I expend the energy I hoarded
through the winter... only when the elements
cooperate and not before. I neither labor nor
procrastinate, nor do I push against the soil... it
parts for me if I am patient, just as if it were the
Sea of Reeds and I were Moses bound for Canaan.

I am a seed and more... a dainty-leaved acacia,
lavish hyacinth, a lilac bush, a rose... What do I
care, now that I know the tender sweetness of the
sunwashed air at evening here beside an age-old
forest? I have seen the jeweled curtain of the night
sky and observed as one by one the stars winked
out like servants, dutiful and self-effacing in the
slow euphoria of dawn. For certain, the Almighty
is creating me as beautiful, as useful, and as
strong.

Moms in Hell

2011-04-27T13:17:00.000-05:00

Mom collected and sold 18th-century American antiques. She would have loved this 1868 Winslow Homer,
Artists Sketching in the White Mountains

MOVING PICTURE

I once had in my home
a Hoosier Cupboard much like this

God, I thank you for the mom you lent me to, and for
too short a time it sometimes seems... much more I
could have learned from her about serenity, I find,
now that I know what she went through. Well. What
an education from my infancy, to see her resurrected
from her private hell, and learn to celebrate her triumph.

Oh, I hated her and spurned her hugs and turned to
Dad for love instead. I only knew that she had left
and when she stayed she drank too much and stank
of wine and cigarettes and that the house was always
an embarrassment (I’d yet to learn that life itself is
messy). Well — except my siblings’ rooms and
Daddy’s dresser — little islands gleaming in their
tidiness amid the chaos that my mother left for Alma
to bring order out of, goddess that she was, on
Tuesdays, nine to five, and Friday afternoons.

Dear God, I praise you for this mother and the love
she kept in escrow for me when I came of age, and
that I did so while she lived; I thank you that we
had those blissful years of friendship. When I carried
Marian, I asked her, I remember, “What if I don’t love
my baby?” (I was, after all, the youngest. What could
I know of an infant’s sweet compelling winsomeness?
I’d been unlovable enough myself, unkind, to punish
her, as if she didn't have her share and more of
torment.) Well, she said. I promise, you would walk
through fire — no, you would run through hell to save
your child. And so I have, for all of them. And so I
would again. A mother suffers every pang her children

feel, and doubly, till she learns surrender.

Mom had a corner pie cupboard filled with this type of pottery, called "flow blue,"
which originated in 18th-century Staffordshire, England

Father-Mother, thank you for the scent of Shalimar that

sometimes drifts by... through the window... from the

sky. And thank you for the memories, which are not

fixed like pictures in a book; they are alive, as she is,

very near, I often sense. Well. I can see her now, the

way she’d sit, one leg tucked under her, in tennies on

her favorite chair, and how I wish I hadn’t sold it

years ago to pay the rent. She would have told me to,

Mom's chair, or close enough. This one is from
the website http://www.efi-costarica.com/. It's a
late-19th-century Eastlake; Mom's was
upholstered in dark blue veltet

however. No regrets, then. Now she sits on air.

Creator, thank you for my funny mom, who would
have looked around, as I do now, at papers, manuscripts, and
laundry, at the baskets full of unrelated stuff and sundries,
at the dishes, pots, and pans; and she would not have been
dismayed. Well. She had Dad, I have three cats. I
can’t say Dad was much more help than they are, not

indoors, at any rate, although he kept the bills paid,

did the yard, and loved us all inordinately, as fathers

must. He didn’t dust, however, nor did Mom, except

for company, and that, once I had learned how wise

she was, how rare and good, was fine with me.

Blackout

2011-04-23T02:52:00.004-05:00

For Cheryl Richardson

Sunrise from Pike's Peak

I GAVE UP ELECTRICITY FOR LENT

I gave up electricity for Lent. Naturally it was unintentional — an accidental blackout due to lack of funds
and then I just forgot because my mind was occupied with, oh, who knows at any given time? ...with dust
motes, maybe, bouncing slat to slat and settling at last upon a miniblind ...with all the kinds of clouds there
are, the stacking-up ones that portend a storm, the cotton puffs, the ones that roil, and the flat, still, formless,
suffocating ceiling that can make you feel bereft, make you forget the sun is shining warm and bright above,
and don’t you love it when the jet you’re in glides up and up through mist into the blue?

Well, unintentional or not, one does the best one can in each and every circumstance. Life gives you
peaches, and what’s that about, except a chance to bake a pie, perhaps a cobbler or a tart instead... and for
a heady, hungry moment you forget your oven is, of course, electric. Damn its cold and unresponsive coils to hell!

I had a fascinating conversation with a nun a dozen years ago and never have forgotten one fine bit of
wisdom she dispensed: Thank God for everything, she said, the flat tire and the lightning strike that split the tree that
sent the limb adrift to smash the roof of your garage... and, I’m interpolating here, the power outage.

Sound advice, I’ve always thought, and meant to follow it, but first I spent an hour being sorry for myself,
and another thirty minutes self-berating. Then I basked in gratitude, not feeling it at first, just doing it, just
glancing nervously at my unruly cache of blessings, finding it a mess as I expected. Focus, focus, said I to
myself, and I began to separate the chaff and wheat and whatnot. Sooner than I had imagined, I had five or
six neat mounds of reasons to be happy. I began with you and then I took a nap.

My family and friends are nothing if not present, steady flames of energy and some of it spent loving me
and isn’t that miraculous, considering that most of what I give back is intangible — sporadic words and
thankful little hymns I dedicate to you.

And every night of this now sacred interval of dark I lit three candles — every night my private trinity of
them — one for the bathroom, one to warm my coffee cup (Elaine made coffee for me and my air pot kept it
nice and tepid), and the third for prayer and meditation and just watching it and getting lost in its forever-changing
flame.

Every night I prayed for you, and if it was because I’d nothing else to do, no music from the Internet to listen
to, it was a fine and satisfying way to spend my time nevertheless. With not as much success I tried to trim my hair by candlelight — my
bangs were hanging in my eyes in clumps — and now I look as if a two-year-old had had her way with scissors while I
dozed and there are spots of frizz and holes where hair once was, pink shiny scalp as if I had some kind of
parasite.

I swept the dust off dresser tops and desks and such with one of those green fuzzy things like hair on trolls
we used to buy. I tried to heat a bowl of oatmeal with my coffee candle, but the mixture never did congeal,
so I said, “Thank you, God, for sustenance” before I plunged into my meal of Crystal Lite and little cookies
shaped like tigers, lions, pigs and goats and antelopes and elephants... and then I chased it with a swig or two
of chocolate syrup. Took a tiny nap and thought while drifting off I’d better pitch the half-a-catfish turning
lethal in the freezer.

My kitties kept me warm. Tim placed a paw across my abdomen and purred with absolutely undisturbed
contentment. Henry buried his entire head and twitched his whiskers in my armpit, and it tickled — wicked
Henry, so aloof so long until he claimed me as his closest friend. Miles likes to lick my skin, whatever is exposed —
my toes, this time.

I rose. I stretched, I folded clothes. I swept the kitchen floor and washed the dishes, made a mental note to
take the catfish and the peas out of the freezer and to set a pan of vinegar in there to neutralize the odor. If
I started to get bored, I meditated more, remembering as Kevin Farmer teaches to include the blues if they
intruded, as they did occasionally. I contemplated poverty but I could not sustain the thought of it. When
you’re encased in cats, you feel how near abundance is, just like the sun, exactly like the sun above the black
and stormy sky. And when my power is restored — tonight or in a day or two — I’ll try to fix or
else disguise the defects in my coif... and I will hope to carry out of this experience, this accidental Lenten
sacrifice, the gratitude for simply life, sustained by energy that doesn’t flow on metal wires, that kindles its
own fires and makes a meager meal of purple water and a lump of gritty crackers more or less delicious,
manna, if you please, from heaven on a cracked Fiesta dish, and— oh, dear God, the catfish and the peas!

LEAD ME ON

On Easter, if you celebrate

no other way, at least do

this: Go out into the young

spring day, and if it rains, it

rains. Engage your senses. See

abundance in the leaves about

to open naturally... relaxed, they

do not strain or struggle in

their work, though it is necessary

to the universe. Now hear

the song that's being sung, the

constant music in the air, and feel

the breeze that strokes your face

and stirs your hair. Breathe deeply of

this sacred space, and smell the fertile

soil, the apple blossoms, promises of

lush red fruit in autumn. Snap a petal

off a daffodil—soft as a mother's cheek

and velvety. Now stretch your arms

toward heaven, if you dare, and

let this be your prayer:

Creator,

thank you for my life, which

you make fresh and new, erasing

my mistakes repented and

my sinfulness. The price was

paid, and I, Creator, I accept

your precious gift of innocence.

Unmeriting, I claim the grace

you offer— have indeed beseeched

me in my heart to take so that the

sacrifice will not be wasted and the

deed made meaningless. This day,

the next, I start at the beginning.

I am spring today— the

fertile earth, the bursting bright

green infant leaves, the redbirds

trilling winsome carols long before the

dawn. I am released. This prayer affirms

me clean and pure as at my birth.

And in my freedom I surrender, Source

of Love, Almighty Spirit, to your

wise direction, leading to my highest

good, and ask for your protection

in my journey. I am sure of

nothing but your great and loving

presence, your eternal patience with

my aimless wandering. Now lead me on.

O lead me, Father-Mother, lead us all

in glory to our perfect destination.

May it be thus. Amen.

Luc Viatour GFDL/CC

Country Roads

2011-04-09T12:12:00.001-05:00

'Country Road' — italywallpaper.info

transportcafe.co.uk

YOU AND I

O fellow traveler, you do not have to make your
journey on my path, nor need I follow yours. It
doesn’t matter much today... just now, here in the
gentle sun there is no rush; I’ve no one I must
hurry to, and so I’ll stay with you awhile and walk
a mile or so if you will talk to me, for I would
know what takes you this way and not that, or yet
another.

Be at peace; I mean no harm and would not
condescend to judge your preference, however
we may disagree, nor would I summon all
my armies, had I generals, lieutenants, or a single
PFC to show me deference.

flash-screen.com

I’m practically alone, in fact; my family is

near, a few dear friends as well, and if I ring this

little bell they’ll come to me, but everyone has

separate hills and valleys to explore.

I rattle on, I fear, and I am curious to hear your

story. Where, you ask me, am I bound. The

world is round, my friend, and when we meet

again perhaps I shall be sure where all roads

lead, but it occurs to me to say, before you go

with your companion, who I see is standing near

the wayside, that at journey’s end, we’ll know

each other, I am certain, you and I.

Sunlight

2011-04-07T10:32:00.003-05:00

Sunrise from Pike's Peak, Colorado. Image: wallpapers-diq.com

O God, Make Me a Lantern

Sunbeams and goldenrods, Edwin Warner Park, Nashville
Image: wallpapers-diq.com

O God, make me a lantern... a light and not a shroud. Help
me to sing out loud your praises in a clear voice, crystalline
and bright with joy. Fill me this very day with levity and
laughter, and may everywhere I go be better for my having
been there. Lift from me the heaviness that grows in layers
and immobilizes me. O let it rise like morning fog, dear
God, and float away upon the wind.

O Father-Mother, send your angels here to keep my
lantern clean and clear. The fuel is pure, it is your own
abundance; smoke cannot obscure the flame. But
sometimes I feel small, and fear that I cannot be seen amid
the throng. Then may your angels carry me upon their
golden wings to where the steeples, tall and proud, point to
the endless sky, and keep me strong and bold and
unafraid to hold my lantern high.

Sunrise on Wizard Island, Crater Lake National Park
Image: wallpapers-diq.com

Dear God, I pray that all your children know what flame
they carry, be it hidden deep within or fearlessly
uncovered, shining steadily, the light of love and life, uniting
everyone. Is this too much to ask of you, Almighty God?
Can this thing, call it harmony or peace on earth, be such a
weighty task for your omnipotence? We daily pray “Thy
kingdom come,” so certainly it can be done, dear God, if
you will show us each and every one our part.

O God, your kingdom is not far away; there is no limit to
your generosity. We cannot fail to shine; our lantern light is
infinite. It warms the heart and lights the path that leads
unerringly to satisfaction — in our work, our fellowship, our

Sunrise from Newfound Gap, Great Smoky Mountains
Image: wallpapers-diq.com

service, our communion, gracious God, with you. Now may
my lantern guide me to my place in your Creation, God,
and may it shine not just for me but for the blind whose
prayer, sincere and offered with humility and trust, it is that
they might see. Amen

--------------------------

Big Stone Gap at Sister Alma Rose
Has the Last Word

The Big Prayer on Write Light

Prayer in the Air

2011-04-06T17:46:00.000-05:00

Angel Clouds

I hope you'll subscribe to my prayer podcast once I figure out how to use the software. Meanwhile, you can read about it and pray with me the "inaugural prayer" at Write Light -- The Big Prayer. Many blessings....

Heaven Next Door

2011-04-01T11:41:00.000-05:00

vnwallpapers.com

I Have Freckles on My Back and Other Things I Know

NASA, via VNWallpapers

Ever since my sensible no-
nonsense friend Meg
Meredith saw angels
and I met my own (not
one with feathered wings,
however, as had hers, but
mine was genuine enough
as well), and second, ever
since respected scientists
who are not lunatics, as
far as we can tell, have
shot what they insist are
"quarks" (or else they're
not and it's a hoax) and
other dots of matter through
a particle accelerator and
have counted hundreds of
dimensions (it occurs to me,
this too could be their little
joke, though I'm inclined
to credit it)—since then

NASA, via VNWallpapers

I've thought we ought to find
a passageway through time
and space (not me, per se,
I'm finding-challenged, just
ask anyone) and sally forth
(for fun, for profit, to say
Hey! to Mom) and enter those
no-longer-so-mysterious
adjacent planes, not via
séances and things, they
have their place, and I'm no
physicist or psychic, but
it's logical, I postulate, that
if there are dimensions in
the dozens, we have extra
senses, too, for navigating
them, some inner eyes or
ears, some covered-up
receptors, or some tiny
undulating gold-and-ruby-
glowing clusters of antennae
reaching, finding, holding to
we don’t know what but feel
it must be something like the
hem of the Almighty’s robe

NASA, via VNWallpapers

...and just as surely those to
whom we thus empowered
say, “Stand up and walk,”
shall find their feet, and pain
shall drop from them like
snow, and they shall go about
their day transcendantly, like
slender flames and radiant
as stars; and likewise, those
of whom the claim is made,
“They have passed on,” are
never far away, in fact are
closer than the skin we wear;
and then the senses we don’t
know about will show us
wonders guessed and
dreamed and touched in
prayer, such things are
possible, for we have just
begun to love, and we shall
be together when we choose,

Doorknobs colliding in space
NASA, via VNWallpapers

as one, without the parting—

who's to say it isn't true?

—without the pain and by

the grace of God

Of these things I am certain,

just as much as that I’m

wearing these old stretched

and tattered socks, that I

have freckles on my back,

that sweet peas grow in

spring and bloom in

summertime upon our

little wall, that love's the

reason for it all

Anticipation

2011-03-23T03:39:00.000-05:00

vnwallpapers.com

Spring song; E-mail for music

WHEEL OF THE YEAR

Tiny leaves curl up tight
on the new-greening tree.
Winds blow cold in the night;
you come shiv’ring to me.
In the predawn, a show’r
falls on redbirds in the midst of
their hymn to God’s glory and pow’r—
as purely do I love
this season, this hour.

Crimson cardinals are first
of the birds to return
to my window. They burst
into music they'd learned
in the tropics while we
woke to winter, dark and quiet,
    with nature stilled in dreamless sleep
under the crisp white
of the snow, dense and deep.

Slowly do the signs appear
that spring is genuinely here,
so slowly that you start to think
the sun forgot. Then, in a wink....

There are flowers all ‘round,
every color and size,
and the rabbits we found
tumbled off in surprise.
Comes a cold, rainy day,
and a night when bits of snow fly,
    We do not mind; it will not stay—
The earth is alive
and the creatures at play.

In the midsummer sun,
limbs are heavy with leaves.
In the fall, one by one,
they float down from the trees.
Then the birds too must go.
I say, “Farewell, Robin Redbreast”
    and smile at winter, for I know
the earth needs to rest
‘neath its blanket of snow.

My cozy quilt is filled with down.
Against a draft, I wrap it tight,
awaiting by the fire the sound
I listen for each winter night—
    a wheel creaks on the frozen ground...
      the Great Wheel of the Year goes ‘round.
----------------------------------------------------------

THE WHEEL OF THE YEAR is a Neopagan term for the annual cycle of the Earth's seasons. It consists of eight festivals, spaced at approximately even intervals throughout the year. These festivals ... have historical origins in Celtic and Germanic pre-Christian feasts ... the Bronze Age religious festivals of Europe. As with all cultures' use of festivals and traditions, these festivals have been utilized by European cultures in both the pre- and post-Christian eras as traditional times for the community to celebrate the planting and harvest seasons. The Wheel of the Year has been important to many people both ancient and modern, from various religious as well as cultural and secular viewpoints.

In many forms of Neopaganism, natural processes are seen as following a continuous cycle. The passing of time is also seen as cyclical, and is represented by a circle or wheel. The progression of birth, life, decline and death, as experienced in human lives, is echoed in the progression of the seasons.... —Wikipedia

Terrified of Bliss

2011-02-26T11:53:00.005-06:00

Angels with the Blessed Virgin -- Botticelli

A PRAYER TO MY ANGELS

O ye angels, fly to me
and lift me out to sea, above
the waves that rest but never sleep
while there is work undone.
Perhaps the sea’s an angel too;
it has the timeless job to do
of cleansing this untidy earth
and birthing it anew.

Galatea — Raphael

O ye angels, carry me
upon thy wings, a brief escape,
then stay a bit, I beg of thee,
and help me concentrate.
My mind, it likes to creep away;
in vain I order it to stay
and serve the purpose I’m about;
but it’s gone out to play.

O ye angels, lend thy power
to my responsibilities;
I seek the effort of an hour
before my labors cease.
I have no gold to save or spend,
nor do I want thine, angel friends;
instead I need thine energy
when lethargy begins.

At last, ye angels, when the task
is finished and the cottage neat,
I’ll have but one more boon to ask:
my prayers lay at God’s feet.

THE JOY OF THE LIGHT OF GOD

Alleluias rolled from the east

What are we waiting for? Why do we

hesitate? For here and plain as dawn

when every demon of the night has

fled, we see the joy of the light

of God. We need only step out of

the mist—no odyssey have we

to undertake or foe pursue, no

secrets to discover. There is only love to

be accepted, met with gratitude... now

only happiness to claim. Anxiety, regret

and shame—these were the evils

that evaporated as we watched. No

sooner were they gone than Alleluias

sweet and strong rolled from the east

and would have swept us off our feet

and carried us aloft, had we not clung

to earth, so terrified of bliss we are if it

should cost surrender of the shreds

of skin we still identify as “us.” The

lungs, the bones, contorted hands

and feet; the pain, disease, decay are

us, we say? As if God meant us to be

temporary, having used up our

allotted days, too old and slow to

overtake the measured plodding step

of entropy. But we are woven of a

better fabric, one that grows more

durable with wear and time and testing.

Still we hesitate, though faith has been

replaced by certainty.

St. Francis of Assisi with Al Kamil -- 15th century

With reluctance mixed with fascination

do we draw a little nearer, inches at a time.

We cringe when light falls full upon us

and the unfamiliar frightens us. We are

accustomed to the cold, the dark, and sink

into delirium as we might fall upon a rotting

pallet in a beggar’s squalid inn, when our

soul’s comfort and security, clarity of sight,

the soundness of the body, heart repaired

and spirit whole are certain, not mysterious

as once they were, remote, the whisper

of a promise too ethereal to tempt the

desperate, the wanderers in need of solid

benefits, of food and shelter. Isn’t it more

sensible to hesitate? God isn’t going anywhere.

LOVE STICKS

Love comes later, in the wake of pain,
like rescue after piracy. Sometimes the

buccaneers escape with their ill-gotten
gains and damn the bodies and the sailors
who survived. These are forgotten or
outshone by treasure seized according to the
code of honor thieves and brigands go by.

Guardian angels

I have love. Sometimes I keep it chained but it escapes eventually. The chase is
futile. I pursue it anyway, at
least to see where it alights. I’ve little
hope of catching it but I can sabotage
attachment anyway until it flickers
out of sight.

Both love and I know which of us is wiser,
stronger, and more patient. Truth be told,
I’d really rather give the game up, let love
lead, but ego won’t permit me to, not
yet at any rate, though soon, I’ll wager.
It feeds on my weakness, and I’m weary
now, as one becomes from filibustering.
Its loyalty is oddly given, not bestowed where I would choose. It forms unsuitable
alliances and clings tenaciously. I
win, it says and flashes me a saucy
grin, and so do you. It’s only face you
lose. I’ll get it back to you.

Love is like a tireless suitor, one who
could have gone away for good but stays to
tease me, plays a waiting game. I
wonder if it plans to catch me up in
some transgression. Hardly likely, as it’s
had a million chances. Still it sticks as if to
lure me, which is curious. It surely knows
I don’t deserve it.

Living in a River of Prayer

2010-12-11T16:10:00.001-06:00

A Place Where Prayers Are Answered

Worship-service anthem, solo or 3-part SAB

When I say a prayer, I close my eyes;
my spirit reaches toward the sky, and
then I open up my eyes
to see the wonders of the world
surrounding me

Once upon a time, it grieved my mind
to perceive a universe so unkind, and
so I tried to be the one who cared,
the savior of the world,
my cross to bear

Floating in a river of prayer—
it carries me to where
all things are possible
By the grace of God
there is a place
where prayers are answered

Never could I do enough to change
a world that seemed so disarranged.
Beaten and defeated, in despair,
I sent to God a faint and hopeless prayer

and from the heart of heaven there appeared
an angel of the Lord to claim my fear...
first a spark of hope and then a flame of joy
undimmed by guilt or shame

Now my tethered soul was led to freedom;
on its own, it fled to be with Him

Living in a river of prayer unceasing,
ever renewed, forgiven, baptized.
Now I see the world with
eyes of the spirit,
love undespairing....
Now I live where prayers
are answered

The Happy Gift of a Delighted God

2010-11-12T12:48:00.004-06:00

A Biography Made Possible by
Unlikelies and Improbables

I forgot to say thank you, Steps that
know my feet. For just a moment I
was unaware of being grateful that
you didn’t crumble at my weight or
open up and let me fall into some
not-apparent-from-above dark shaft
that might— though it’s unlikely I
admit but then a tick spent on
remembering will buy a boatload of
unlikelies, a great many more
improbables with just enough
impossibles thrown in to constitute
a whole biography— be lying
underneath the sod that hides the
fragile crust, be wide enough for
such a body as is mine, and slice
through all the strata to the hot
ferrous core of the planet.

Well, there you have it. Short story
long, it satisfies me to report the
sidewalk, lawn, and steps and
geologic layers I forget the names of
held me in the sky again. Such
benefits should not be taken lightly
when entire nations tread uneasily
on acres of swiss cheese covered
with a tissue, land mines hidden in
its shallow indentations, people
venturing upon remote paths and
fallow farmland fearfully if they go
anywhere at all. Well, it’s unlikely
that my daughter’s yard conceals
explosives, it’s improbable that
bombs are ticking in the cellar, one
less thing to fret about and so we
get to be a little bit upset about
plaintain among the fescue or
whatever. (Let me recommend the
use of vinegar instead of herbicide
or better yet a kettle full of boiling
water which won’t harm the other
growing stuff nearby.)

Is it so little, not succumbing to the
force of gravity, not becoming Alice
underground, not encountering a
tardy rabbit one might feel obliged
to chase as one approached the
door and thank you God and keepers
of the peace for that and warriors
and heroes too with reasons we’ve
forgotten not to keep it... not to
mention subatomic particles that
whip about their minuscule universe
at speeds with miles of zeros
somehow keeping molecules and
moons, what we call matter,
seeming solid? Is it worth emotion,
tears, and trembling to be still
intact after a mere kilometer’s
journey? Probably... as millions
might attest who hide with rare
success from scary guys with guns,
fanatics with a mission they’re
convinced is holy straight from
heaven, close enough at any rate,
come via their commander so-and-so,
the biggest fellow with the
largest weapon. Safe for now from
him I go into the cheering
lamplight; what I find illuminated
ought to take my breath away if I
had not been sated by this time
with gratefulness, and it is this:

Blessed recognition. I am like poor Lili
from the town of Mira; everybody
knows my name and they have come
to celebrate with such a smooth and
leave-you-feeling-cozy Cabernet
and Mama’s Pizza, eating,
chattering with family and friends
it’s been too long since gathered
thus in easy conversation.

Donald Zolan, Twins Kissing

I walk past a group of children. One says
that’s my grandmother with pride
of ownership. Well, and haven’t I
been lonely for that child’s voice,
missed being Mitch’s with the
emphasis on that apostrophe and S?
And so I change my destination from
the kitchen to the den and sit down
on the floor and play with Legos,
Barbies, children’s toes and noses,
let them style my hair with tiny
combs and make them say with
tummy pokes and tickles how
adorable and smart and funny
Grandma and Great-Auntie is and
wonder, how can this be ought but
the happy gift of a delighted God?

We haven’t any rights, you know.
It’s icing, all of it, that the inanimate
behaves itself and that my daughter
makes a life of love and difference
for she was born to be magnificent
defying entropy whereas the dust,
not being sentient, does what it
does swept up by wind and with no
reason to do otherwise falls
down again

Offered gratefully November 12, 2010

Last Call of the Night Watchman

2010-11-03T14:01:00.000-05:00

Last Call of the Night Watchman

Sundog (also parhelion), the
appearance of bright spots
of light on either side of the sun

Morning bounds out of the black shade... all but taps me on the shoulder... Hey, lady! Big round yellow circle here! I watch it with my back. I like to see what it does more than how it looks. The universe calls out importantly Born again! You there! Her! Him! Everything’s new and everyone has do-overs or at the very least another chance to get it right. All’s well. Night was blasted prettily; it’s skittered off to lick its wounds. A light breeze makes
teasing eddies on a small lake prodding
it awake and petulant it slaps the shore
not fully lucid yet, its lazy waves
like fingers tipped with jewels

It’s not a subtle thing, this exotic transformation, but it’s gotten ordinary to us: night day dark light, a hushed percussion that doesn’t skip a beat but marches evenly, troops on through the seasons year by year. My father never missed a day of work but knew the miracle
of dawn. He was both earth and sky and
then the time came when he couldn’t soldier
on and went where I can’t find him. Ever
since, I’ve felt a bit at sea... adrift like
the small child lost in the department store.
Daddy always found me then. But when he went
away for good, when I waited gripping a stranger’s
hand and he didn’t return, I knew that daylight
wouldn’t be a sure thing any more. The
drum had stopped. I couldn't hear the
marching now

Hidden Lake, Glacier
National Park, Montana

I must have slept. How is it that the early sunlight whispers on my neck?... another chance to get it right I guess. I can’t see the lake from here; I know it’s nearby where it’s always been, the lissome willows with their graceful branches
dangling at its edge; if I were fanciful, perhaps I'd wonder if they laugh to hear it mutter and complain and watch it stumble into wakefulness... and languidly it
swats with jeweled fingertips at merry
breezes; the rhythm settles and becomes
familiar, and I am at ease

All images: vnwallpapers

It Is God's Grace That Feeds Us

2010-10-05T09:00:00.006-05:00

Hymn of praise for use any time, communion, Thanksgiving

We Pray This Blessed Morning

We pray this blessed morning till
our circle is a sacred space,
our church the summit of a hill
above a land where, by your grace
roll fertile fields of corn and wheat,
and once again from them we learn
that though we work for what we eat
its nourishment we cannot earn.

REFRAIN
It is your grace that feeds us
and gives us strength and ease;
your light, O God, that leads us
to love and joy and peace.

Our knowledge is uncertain, thus
we pray for each decision made,
that you, God, will enlighten us
and what lies dark illuminate.
For you can see around the bend,
beyond the scope of sound and sight,
while we are blind to consequence
like searchers on a moonless night.

REFRAIN

No medicine that we invent
can promise that we shall be well
nor can it, less divine consent,
restore the hope of life and health.
Prayers from the heart we offer then
in faith for others and ourselves.
In meditation, we breathe in
the spirit of Emmanuel.

REFRAIN

Upon this hill we wait for dawn,
its promise seen, however faint,
in broken darkness now upon
the eastern sky, where angels paint
in colors ever warmer, streaks
of yellow, lavender, and red.
Now by your artistry made meek,
we humbly break our morning bread.

REFRAIN
*************

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For some of us, a regimen for Daily Spiritual Practice is necessary or at least helpful. This page on Annagrammatica.com is not yet finished but is a resource for Christians, Jews, Muslims, agnostics, and those who are vaguely interested in spirituality but don't know where to start. Free, no signup

My Whole Life a Prayer

2010-09-12T05:07:00.003-05:00

Fra Angelico, Communion of Saints

On the Sermon “When God Doesn’t Listen”

1. The Sermon

A painting by Fra Angelico depicting joy in Heaven

According to the Rev. Mr. Francis Chan, when your prayers aren’t answered, it's because your life isn’t in order. God is pretty serious about what it means to follow him... no matter what the cost.

In prayer (advises Mr. Chan), you must not "just start talking to God, saying what you want to say. You don’t just start opening your mouth and saying careless things before God. You could pray all week and God never hear a word you say. God’s actually disgusted by some of our prayers," Mr. Chan avers.

In support of this contention, Mr. Chan quotes Scripture:

Peter 3:7 -- Husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way... so that your prayers will not be hindered
James 4:3 -- You ask and don’t receive because you ask wrongly, to spend on your own passion
Isaiah 58 -- People pray and fast and then come before God in sackcloth and ashes, and God says, “Is that what I wanted? I want to break every yoke. Share your bread with the hungry.... Then shall your light break forth with the dawn. Then you shall call and the Lord will answer... if you take away the yoke from your midst and take in the homeless.... [Go out and share yourself with the needy; I want you to be givers....]"
The prayer of an unrighteous person avails nothing. (A reading of James 5:16)

2. A Rebuttal or, Perhaps, a Clarification

Jeremiah 31:31-33 "The time is coming," declares the LORD, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah.... This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time," declares the LORD. "I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.”

Angel with cymbals in medieval work--Fra Angelico?

The passage is reiterated in Hebrews 10:16 with the presumption that it was the Christ who embodied the new covenant.

Here is “Matthew Henry's [1662-1714] Concise Commentary”:

[Regarding Hebrews 10:11-18] Under the new covenant, or gospel dispensation, full and final pardon is to be had. This makes a vast difference between the new covenant and the old one. Under the old, sacrifices must be often repeated, and after all, only pardon as to this world was to be obtained by them. Under the new, one Sacrifice [on the cross] is enough to procure for all nations and ages, spiritual pardon, or being freed from punishment in the world to come. Well might this be called a new covenant. Let none suppose that human inventions can avail those who put them in the place of the sacrifice of the Son of God. What then remains, but that we seek an interest in this Sacrifice by faith; and the seal of it to our souls, by the sanctification of the Spirit unto obedience? So that by the law being written in our hearts, we may know that we are justified, and that God will no more remember our sins.

Hieronymous Bosch, 1450-1516, of St. Jerome at prayer

Is it true that “the prayer of an unrighteous person avails nothing”? This pronouncement is inferred by some but by no means all commentators from James 5:15-16: And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him. Therefore confess [your] [[faults]] sins one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.

And what of the unrighteous woman who is sick to death of herself and asks only that God lift her from despair? Out of such prayers have come uncounted victories over pain... lives renewed and dedicated to building the kingdom of God on earth.

Who among us is righteous? And who is there who does not doubt? Even Jesus thought that he had been forsaken. If you doubt, you doubt. You can’t pretend for God; he knows your heart. You can’t pretend to yourself; you’ll crash and burn. You can only pray, “Lord, I believe. Help thou my unbelief.”

Jesus gave only two laws: Love God, love your neighbor as yourself. He came to fulfill the law, to preach the truth that makes us free. Yes, we should pray for God’s will to be done in us. We have wants, needs, and inclinations that, by the grace of God, point us to our reason for being alive. But that realization often comes through prayer and meditation, and until it does, wouldn’t God rather we turn to him, warts and all, than not approach him because we are flawed? Doesn’t he forgive seventy times seven and more?

ISN’T THAT THE GOSPEL -- THE GOOD NEWS? That if we open our hearts to God, he will cleanse them, renew them, incline them toward the “creative good”? And our mistakes become, as the wonderful English mystery writer Dorothy L. Sayers wrote some seventy years ago, “compost” to nourish the seeds of eternal life we carry... mistakes to be atoned for but not borne as an unshakable burden.

All roads lead to God, but there is much to be discovered along the detours... wisdom, compassion, humility... and perhaps a better sense of direction.

Praying is the one thing that is always right. I love the Jewish practice of giving thanks and asking blessings for just about everything, from handwashing to having a conversation. “Just as I am,” I talk to God and listen to him whenever I am moved to do so. I do not yet "pray without ceasing," but that is what I aim toward. I would like to have my whole life be a prayer.

3. The Rhythm of the Day

To wake at five a.m., and pray, assess
the day— it rains— and smile and say,
“Good morning, Jane, and many thanks,
how does your little Kylie?” to the maid
who brings my customary coffee, very
strong, and toast and berries, and to truly
feel relieved when she replies, “Why, Kylie’s
better, finally! Her fever’s gone; she’s even
been outdoors to take the air.” To say,
“Thank God!” and mean it....

Kate Greenaway

Now alone again, indulging in my
love affair with coffee for the moment,
savoring the scent, remembering the
humble bean that with its cousins starts the
hearts of millions in a ritual repeated
‘round the globe, those spirits kindred to my
own for whom a cup of tea is most
ungenerous indeed with flavor and
caffeine— A little note to Jane: “I need your
recipe, my angel; I can’t make the
coffee zing the way you do. Perhaps you
might give me a lesson.”

Then to bless with all my soul the baker
of the bread, the picker of the berries,
not forgetting all the others— growers,
drivers, bankers, clerks— whose work is
to ensure that Jane has fruit and fiber
on my tray at five-fifteen a.m.... There
is no condescension here; I merely
try to not take anything for granted
and to wish them well and hope that they’re as
glad I purchase what they grow and sell as
I am that they’ve done it, and I add a
blessing for the ones whose bosses lack
compassion; as an afterthought, repentantly,
I bless unpleasant bosses too.

Arising then, I wash and dress, then
meditate, or the reverse, whichever
has become my habit— that’s the point: to
be methodical and thoughtful, too; and
then the mitzvah: This one is for ritual, the
first I’ll do today, but not the last. Perhaps an
aspidistra for my aunt Elizabeth,
recovering from shingles, such an awful
case of them, will cheer her up. I’ll visit
her this afternoon but send the florist
with the plant ahead.

Alas! The cook is on vacation, so I
put the chicken in the crock pot with the
carrots and potatoes and the broth and
set the dial to “Low”— my nemesis is
that I usually forget to turn it on— Oh,
that all nemeses were as innocuous.

Kate Greenaway

I plan my day permitting spontaneity and
set aside some time for company— I’m
such a hermit otherwise— but there is
much to do domestically, professionally, and
once I would have looked askance at all the
tasks, especially the nastiest, the ones that
I despise (in my case, it's the telephone),
and I would have moaned and gotten back in
bed, but now I’m swept along by plans made
in advance and by the rhythm of my life.

There is no Jane, no coffee brought to me in
bed, no cook, no florist whom I can afford,
it seems; this isn’t even my routine. I
have no servants, wish I did, but first things
first:

To have such discipline, to think ahead, to
do what’s necessary with attention,
joy, humility, but in addition
to have time and energy for many
chosen things to fill my calendar— this
is all my aspiration, this my dream; but
to bring order out of chaos somehow,
to have an easy chair, one overstuffed and
slipcovered in, I think, white linen;
visitors — I need to love...
these are what I wish for,
these would be
enough for
now--
order, chair, and
friends; these
three are
ever
in my
prayers.

How Late It Is

2010-08-05T15:57:00.011-05:00

The medieval city of Carcassonne (France); ©Luc Viatour GFDL / CC

Nebraska August

What is August but a kind of wandering,
unwelcome interruption, like a drunk who
trips into a deacons’ meeting? Summer in
Nebraska waxes temperamental—cross,
unkempt, and trigger-happy after tossing
through the night, or kind and gentle if she
slept surrendered to the early portents
in the wind; becoming smug and cheeky
in the afternoon, enraged by evening,
giving vent to fits of fury, still resisting
her impending impotence.

Unpredictably she spits out lightning
though the day came in so sweet. She isn’t
having any of it, wants to get her
licks in. Watch her pick a fight: She needs
the stimulation if she has to
soldier on.

The days are blistering, the nights are cooler,
noticeably longer now. At two a.m.
you wake up cold and add a quilt against
the wind. A surly storm is riding in,
dispensing random lashes in a burst of
petulance that drenches shrub and lawn. The
tempest is so quickly gone you wonder
if you dreamt it, but come dawn the evidence
is everywhere: The sodden air is thick with
scents of ripeness edging toward decay —
apples fallen, left behind, and trodden
on, tomatoes, cucumbers, and pomegranates
that have split their skins, admitting
hummingbirds to feast in unaccustomed
excess. Plump and sated, they veer drunkenly
away to rest wherever hummingbirds
recline in lazy satisfaction. Tidy
lines of ants make haste to haul away the
banquet’s residue (in nature, nothing
goes to waste).

It might be said that summer dreads the coming
autumn; she regrets her wanton ways,
forgets her manners, and abandons her
decorum. August never gets her full
attention. In July she was a gleeful
dancer, vain and self-indulgent, soaking
hill and plain in sun and shower, cultivating
for herself a pretty carpet as a
cushion for her toes when pivoting, a
bower for her leisure, brief as it
might be.

Exhausted now, she sees her labors are
unfinished. August always finds her unprepared,
bedraggled, spirits sagging as the heavens
pay no heed to her authority, now
that she has the greatest need to rein them
in. Experimenting with their freedom,
Saturday they sizzle, Sunday whip up
clouds of dust, and Monday tease with distant
thunder, scant precipitation, not enough
to stiffen drooping leaves or keep the grass from
yellowing.

August is a long-neglected child who
hungers for attention. Summer can’t
oblige. Her energy is spent and she has
little interest anyway in this
unwished-for daughter. Gathering her strength to
battle destiny, she won’t admit that
the conclusion is ordained and so she
lies in wait and August goes undisciplined
again. But Nature’s pity saves the thirsty
stems grown dull and brittle though the atmosphere
is sultry and the surfaces of leaves
are damp.

August in Nebraska is an edgy
interval that never settles; it would
resurrect the past, the month of May
perhaps. It cannot have its way, and so it
takes as its revenge the little water
that remains and breaks the steady rhythm
that was fixed when green and growing things
began their slow emergence under icy
winter skin. Nature knew what she was
doing when she planted cottonwoods and
sycamores and hardy hedges giving
shelter to the crickets and the katydids
who sing with no idea what the lyrics
are: “How late it is. How late it is. How
late it is.”

Fresh Paint, Same Old Wood

2010-07-09T02:24:00.003-05:00

Outside Again

I dreamed of the farmhouse—outrageously
Victorian, the white frame house with tall-skinny
windows and fresh-creamy paint on a Nebraska
hillside, snug against a stand of trees just now
turning, just this minute in the boisterous
dawn... the color of limes and luxuriance at the
cusp of ripeness. It's enough to give me breath, the
rolling farmland mated now with spears of
corn cascading in quivering arches to the
brown river lined with cottonwoods and
shrubbery, where the rabbits live. It is August, the
cruelest month, and the sun is just now brushing the
broad east porch, dispatching the chill with a
small, easy sweep.

Bleached oak floors in the front hall gleam now, but
yesterday was better. Then the seasoned planks
cowered under plump wriggling baby bottoms and
chubby knees attached to a clump of ridiculous,
chuckling mopheads, fumbling with their cotton gingham
blocks or clutching soggy bears to bulging bellies. Polly
twists a silky yellow curl and with it strokes her
upper lip, now loosely bonded to her thumb. My heart
breaks a little bit from love too big to fit there and
from missing mommyhood, the minimalist existence
relagating war and pestilence to so much static behind
the urgency of locating the other pale-pink bootie
sock as the sole condition for returning equilibrium.

A small scream is instantly aborted and comes out a
squawk an octave higher than two smallish whimpers;
after just a tick — ah, there it is: a whine
of protest abandoned mid-wail. How easily I can
recall the rhythm of it, fall back into it. They fought
and lost and now are gravity's willing captives,
eyes drifted shut, squat bodies tipped like lazy
bowling pins... motionless now, but warm and
limp, trusting angels to come and lift and carry
them to waiting cribs and cradles.

Siblings, cousins, and the odd adult wore
stiff and proper faces over smirks and a few
eyebrows twitching in amusement. It was, don't you
know, High Tea, and we sipped from air cups beneath
twin walnut trees that shade the south porch. Drifting
out the door seductively were scents of bubbling
cheese and buttery onions, just-sliced watermelons and
come-hither chicken in the oven, wrapped in cloves and
peppers and my precious herbs, fresh from the broad
south window and the Herbert garden (my Dad’s term,
back when Mom started it with lemon mint), lush now
and abundant, giving off delicious hints of flavor;
clever and artistic, tucked among the granite
rocks that someone must have meant to be a
casual tumble of them strewn along a berm.

The chairs and hammocks on the lawn filled quickly,
bliss for those who got there first. The siesta is, I
think, both self-indulgent and essential. And not
nearly long enough. The katydids' slow crescendo
was our signal to stand alert, and none too soon, as,
rested, rinsed, and powdered, a herd of toddlers
lurched from the doorway, fanned out, then landed
on my blanket. Books were thrust and lap space
claimed and tales invented on the spot. We played
bears and practiced taking turns until I got it right. I
talked like Papa Bear and Mama Bear and Baby Bear,
squealed in terror as I imagined a scared young
Goldilocks would do. Sweet faces creased in
smiles, soprano giggles warmed me to the toes. I
learned, not for the first time or the last, how large and
generous the hugs of little arms could be, and then they
watched respectfully as if I were a sorcerer while with a
stick whose tip was sharp enough I scratched their
names in that one shady spot that’s always a bit
muddy, even on the driest days.

I went inside to make pies from fat pumpkins
that only yesterday lay by untidy vines behind the
ranks of cucumbers, tomatoes, and a second crop of
carrots, thriving still because I am the mighty enemy of
aphids and red spider mites. The pies are sweet with
honey from my beehives, and molasses, just a blob, for
bite. Oh, Lord, we ate as if we’d lived till then on bark and
bugs. We laughed because we could, we were so
loose with nothing dreaded hovering. There was a
reverential silence when I whipped sweet cream (from
someone else’s cows, for now, at least) — more magic as
thick sugar clouds materialized to crown the gold-brown
pumpkin slabs, and I don’t skimp because nobody likes the
pie left over when they’ve gobbled up the cream.

Presently the cousins scrub the pans and
plates and rub the glasses to a high shine in the ancient farmhouse sink, white enamel comfortably mottled with a small chip in the drainboard; and someone sweeps the crumbs that fell and skittered underneath the table. It could tell some tales, that old, thick, serviceable oak, from six generations past. You’d think you could just flip a switch and all the conversations that have slid into the grain would bubble up again.

Now the children murmur secrets to their

books and bears and blankets, and the grownups

have a glass of light, clear Sonoita wine, or

coffee, rich and black from steamy southern

mountainsides where sun and shade are plentiful in

equal measure. A breeze hiccoughs, whispers

messages from heaven: “joy” and “bliss” and “peace,” so

why am I afraid, a little? Why is there a pulsing vein

beneath the skin of happiness, which, however, doesn’t

break when night falls, nor even when the children and their

parents have gone home?

This morning in the dawn the house is far too quiet,
unnaturally tidy — that, at any rate, won't
last. Respighi's Ancient Airs and Dances doesn't
fill the space, just glides like film along the surface.
Now I long for yesterday’s parade of sandaled
feet or bare ones, slipping up and down, up and
down the stairs on solemn errands of importance—
fetching paper and crayons, this trip, it seems. I miss
the laughter and the voices muted by old oak, the
cheerful clink of forks and dishes. Then I smile; today
I might prune roses and clip hollyhocks for lush
bouquets, and try to find a way to coexist with
aphids, and write stories, and select the
best pumpkins for the
gold-brown pies for
next time.

But I wake up in the
dark, alone, and wonder,
who am I to dream such
dreams?

Edwina

2010-06-09T23:40:00.000-05:00

EDWINA, I REMEMBER YOU

Edwina, I remember you as small
in size and great in character, with
all the dignity a queen commands,
but not imperious. You seemed to
need so little, lacking nothing, only
now and then, because your self-
sufficiency was alien to me, I gave
awareness that you were.

Never Gone Splat Yet

2010-06-09T23:19:00.000-05:00

1927 illustration. 'Knock, knock," pain calls unconvincingly,
as if it were a neighbor, bringing cake

THE GREAT AWAKENING

When you have friends and they are just a little
crazy, history can slip into complacency and,
there! See? Already you've forgotten to walk
warily, led on by memorable minutes, stretching
even into days, and you begin to think that life
will always be this way and the dilemma is to
choose among the infinite supply of wonders to
investigate.

And then a clap of thunder ushers in a great
awakening and you are Wile E. Coyote being
thrust by his momentum off the cliff into thin
air, defying seven laws of physics, glancing at his
paws and seeing nothing underneath, at last, and,
seeing, plunges twenty thousand feet and crashes
on the desert floor, gets up, intact, shakes off the
dust, and when you see him next he’s had a
shower and he wears two Band-Aids on his
forehead crossed to form an X. He must have
bones of
Styrofoam.

My bones— Where are you, Great Physician?
You must know my bones are burning like the
sparks above a bonfire that has just caught,
flared; and my hair hurts. The weight of air
hurts. I am in a flannel nightgown. This was not
my plan for Saturday, to go nowhere, not even
down the street, the sky so redolent with
blooming things and sweet, clear sunshine, and
I’m in my room, confined to bed. I couldn’t
manage stairs and I so wished to see the pansies,
lemon balm, and meadow sage just planted
yesterday, already thriving in Elaine’s wee
fairy garden.

I have shingles, is the thing, and I suppose I’m
meant to find the lesson in it but my brain’s been
disconnected. I have not made friends with pain,
but it’s persistent. “Knock, knock,” pain calls
unconvincingly as if it were a neighbor bringing
cake. “Oh, you must embrace it,” people say
when they are well, implying that they’ve faced
the awful self-absorption and unmasked the lie
that nothing else exists, or ever will, except you
and your wish to die and get it over with. My
mind says, “This will end.” I know, and I intend
to shoo it toward another victim straightaway
with any luck. Forgive me, Lord. But
Mindfulness says, “Live today. Be present with
“this moment.” Even though this
moment sucks.

Bombed Mom on a Summer Afternoon

2010-05-20T10:04:00.004-05:00

Still Trying to Get Comfortable

Before I learned to walk or talk,
I knew when all was well. It had to do with
certain smells: The best was aromatic pipe
tobacco—that meant Dad was home, content,
and settled in. I wouldn’t have to turn my face
away when Mama picked me up and held
me. Other times I did; the nauseous odor of
her breath repelled me when she’d had too
many cigarettes and too much wine.

There were reliable well-being and a
tasty lunch and hugs and kisses in the
smell of just-pressed shirts. I
could find Alma if I crept downstairs to where
we kept the mangle iron. (She bunched the
dampened sheets, all clean and white, into
the pillowcases, placed the bundle in the
freezer overnight, and said it made the
ironing go at twice the speed.)

If I smelled something in the oven in the
middle of the day, I thought that Alma might
be baking me a cake. It wouldn’t be my
mother’s flaky biscuits, not so early. Now I
know they were delicious; then I wanted
batter from the bowl to taste and frosting to
lick off my fingers.

I had learned to tell the comfort smells from
inauspicious ones, which made me get a
stomachache. I felt the fisting of my gut begin
when certain of my mother’s friends came by
for lunch. These were the ones she drank
with sometimes in the afternoon. I must have
found it terribly confusing, since I loved these
women too—they were sophisticated,
beautiful, and no doubt bored, since they
were overeducated for their mommy jobs, or
so they thought. They should have
volunteered more.

I adored them, even when
the air grew thick with stale wine and fetid
smoke and no one noticed when I went to
bed without a word and if I cried nobody
heard, and so I learned to be afraid of other
things because I couldn’t bear for it to be my
mother’s irresponsibility I feared, and even
then I knew that it was more than that, a
gnawing at the core of sanity. The day would
come when I would love and trust her more
than anyone on earth, but not until I’d
suffered as she did and saw her as a daughter
sees a mother still, but through a mother’s
eyes. More than forgiven, she became my
inspiration and my anchor. I thank God for
that. But some things one cannot forget; a
child who hasn’t had her second birthday yet
should not have been expected to be wise.

Sometimes, if it were one of Alma’s
afternoons, that dear good woman, who
had taken on the raising of her eight
or nine grandchildren, would put aside
her vacuuming and come into my room and
rock me in her arms and sing like a piano out
of tune, but she had such a soothing manner,
she was Mother Earth. I’m sure she weighed
two hundred pounds; I heard she wasn’t
even half that when she died.

One evening at the dinner table—I was still a
few months shy of four—our mother told us
Dr. Anderson had warned her, no
more alcohol. I cried for happiness. I
wish someone had said to me,
“Don’t count your chickens yet.”

A week raced by, and every night was better
than the one before, with games and books and
roasting marshmallows, The Shadow on the
radio. Ten days, two weeks had passed. I
finally let myself relax, an hour or so before
the sucker punch that caught me napping.

Pabst Blue Ribbon in a can—I saw it in her
hand as we were tidying the dining room,
and I began to protest,”Mom, the doctor
said—“ but then she brushed me off: “He
didn’t say I couldn’t have a little something
now and then,” defensively. I lost my
innocence, you might say, in a quarter-
minute’s condescension. I don’t think she ever
saw it as betrayal, even through the troubles
that still lay ahead. The gates clicked shut
that day. I’ve long since lost the switch.

Disappointment is a fact of life that proffers
lessons every child must learn eventually,
but not with such insidious brutality, not
a child of three, illusions dropping
like the tears she shed, and never, dear God,
never at her mama’s knee, with her the

object lesson: “Here’s what
not to do, my dears.”

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Native Soil

2010-05-19T21:34:00.001-05:00

There She Is

Karen was a woman who wore stylish
linen suits to work and chunky turquoise

jewelry sometimes or a string of pearls

and navy T-shirt dress whose hem would

skim the floor, but for the three-inch

heels she wore; and she adorned her
office and herself with clever pieces from
boutiques — a long silk scarf in pink pastel

tossed on with casual elegance, one turn

around the neck above a crisp, white
cotton shirt and Levi’s... plain clay
saucers, different sizes, meant to set your
plant pots on, were coasters,
paperweights, and places to put odds and
ends... and sturdy woven baskets, long
before the world discovered them, wore

large, neat labels: “Out” and “In.”

She always took the summers off — her
husband was the Dean of Men — they had
“a little place” somewhere in Ireland, it
might have been a castle or a pub. She
loved it, that was all I knew, and though
she lived with such élan and dressed with
flair and ingenuity and didn’t care what
anybody thought, and was so kind and
always took me to the symphony and then
for drinks at Hickory’s to celebrate my
birthday, and adored ballet and was a
friend of Balanchine and once, at least, I
know she went to Moscow for a
weekend... not that she was ever sickly, I
don’t think she missed a day of work in
fifteen years, but toward the end of May
she’d summon up, from God knows where,
this superhuman energy and raucous joy,
and, “There she is,” I’d think, though I
could not have told you what was missing.
It’s as if you’ve never seen a flower, and a
coral-tinted rosebud shows up one day at
your door;
you’re overcome;
you vow to
treasure it forever,
and the morning after,
all its petals have unfolded and you stare
in wonder at it: “There was more?” you
say in bafflement. And that was Karen, all
at once unfolding like a rose.

There are those who never grow quite as
they should except in native soil, and I
suppose when Karen first met Ireland,
there was sudden recognition, something
like immediate addiction to a sense of
place she’d not have felt the lack of till
she had it. I confess I’ve felt the tug of it
myself, from elsewhere, who can say? I’ve
yet to learn. It happens when the sun is at
a certain slant, the trees throw shadows
out, just so, and something beckons in the
wind, a scent, a sound, except I don’t
know which direction it would have me go,
but, oh, I yearn for it and grieve as if I
know the thing I’m grieving for, and all this
in the time it takes to breathe one breath,

inhale, exhale, and while you’re at it have

a brief encounter with a universe outside

of time and space where words are

weighty and irrelevant. But it’s the poet’s

job to make the poem speak if not the

words, and so: There is a place I’m meant

to be and it will find me or I’ll stumble

over it, and then I’ll know that I’ve come

home.

(And no, it isn’t death or heaven, not as

strong as premonition, not as vague as

funny feeling, not an ache but more a sort
of itchiness, as if I were a migratory bird,
instinctively aware of season, storm, and
course; a kind of magnetism, I suppose,
and only wish I knew which way is north.)

Of Men and Mice

2010-05-15T10:53:00.003-05:00

Of Men and Mice

I.

I know that men exist
who treat their women well
My father did
My husband didn't
This was more his
courtly style:
I: Good morning!
Husband: Go to hell

II.

When I was depressed and didn’t recognize
myself, and getting dressed was unrewarding,
hardly worth the effort...
When I was full of emptiness and had cried
till there was nothing left for tears...

When my spirit never rested, so beset was
it with fears— of now, or of the next five
minutes or the next five years...

When I believed that I was less substantial
than a puff of wind (I underestimated wind
back then), and I deserved to be neglected
and ignored, and being castigated publicly
became a small reward— at least it indicated I
might still be me, however small and
unimportant—

And when there came a time when I was sure
I could no longer bear to live but didn’t wish
to die (Who knew what terrors waited in the
afterlife, and wasn’t I already dead inside?), my
soul cried out, “If I should rise from this unholy
pit, so deep that I can't see the sky, I’ll know that it
was nothing less than God who saved me, and I'll
praise him (her, or it) each day and never be
afraid of anything.”

And then I found myself above the
pit, on solid ground, where grass grew thick
as hedges, green as emeralds. The sun was
shining then, a gentle benediction, and I
lived again.

So I have kept my promise, for I know it
was not I who climbed to freedom, gleefully
poured sunlight on myself, restored
my soul. Could I have blessed myself with
more than I had known of, more of what
is necessary, comfortable, or lovely, or
perhaps all three?

It isn’t quite the fashion now to holler,
“Praise the Lord,” but rather to consider
God a “concept” or “projection
of our need to be protected.” Well.
Whatever. I, too dense and heavy for a
concept to haul up, was lost in Hell.

It’s immaterial what name you give the
Savior; if you want to call him “her” or
“Spirit” or “Creator,” I don’t mind. But a mere
“construct” didn’t find me, heal me, wrap me
up in joy like a warm towel wound around
a just-washed child at bedtime on a winter
night.

Our Creator is more real than speculation
as to his or her extent and capability. I might
just holler “Praise the Lord” with jubilation till
the day I die and after, at the Pearly Gates or in
the earthly incarnation that
awaits.

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Pray It Well

2010-05-14T12:11:00.001-05:00

Old Pat
(A spiritual)

I’m sitting pretty by my window, Lord.
My, that sun feels fine to me.
It’s been raining, it’s been raining hard.
Thank you, God, for variety.
Indeed we’re living in a wondrous world—
Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord!

Saw Miss Caterpillar creeping by,
Slow as syrup, plain as pie.
Now she’s shouting to me, “My, oh, my!
“Look, Miss Mary, I’m a butterfly.”
Indeed we’re living in a wondrous world—
Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord!

Old Pat came calling, brought his tattered heart
And a long, sad tale of woe to tell.
“Pray,” I told him, “that’s where you start.
“Pray it strong and pray it well.”
Indeed we’re living in a wondrous world—
Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord!

Next day, Pat, he came back again.
“How many minutes do I have to pray?”
“Can’t tell you where, can’t tell you when,
“But the Lord never turned an honest man away.”
Indeed we’re living in a wondrous world—
Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord!

“Pray for the kids who’ve got no shoes;
“Pray for the sick and the mournful, too.
“Pray for the folks who’ve got no food.
“That’ll keep you busy, I promise you.”
Indeed we’re living in a wondrous world—
Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord!

Where’d all these flowers come from, Lord?
From those itty-bitty seeds, you say,
And the power of your word
Given to them on Creation Day.
Indeed we’re living in a wondrous world—
Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord!

There’s Old Pat, smiling at the sky,
Grateful in his heart at last.
“Look, Miss Mary, my, oh, my,
“See the butterflies sailing past.”
Indeed we’re living in a wondrous world—
Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord!
Indeed we’re living in a wondrous world—
Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord!

==================

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My Martyrdom

2010-05-13T14:15:00.000-05:00

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Why Wait?

I read about some research: “Getting Children to

Delay Gratification.” As if that were a Virtue. As if
there weren’t a glut of such delayers, those who

have forgotten how to play. As if there were no

mothers.

Yes, we knew that comatose we would be useless to
our families, and faced with that, as fact and not
a nervous relative's conjecture, and because it was
a duty, we could be persuaded to protect our
health, relax, and learn to balance the demands
upon our time... and maybe even (gasp!) let go, let
God. Perhaps.

I started practicing in college: work first, recreation
later. If at all. I got so good at it, I couldn’t quit.
There must be something onerous to do, I’d tell
myself, and stall before agreeing to a movie or a
long and lazy weekend at the beach. I can’t have
finished everything repugnant. And I hadn’t.
No one ever
does.

And thus it was that always I could find a reason
not to be available for fun. Perversely (it occurred
to me), the drudgery was what I had begun to try to
not delay.

Gratification has become
my martyrdom.
==================

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Love Has Its Own Energy

2010-05-13T12:14:00.007-05:00

Claude Monet (1840-1926), "Camille Monet at her tapestry loom," 1875. Camille Doncieux married Monet in 1870 and gave birth to two sons before dying of cancer or tuberculosis in 1879. They had been a devoted couple, and the painter— a founder of French Impressionism— was devastated by her death.

LEFT: Édouard Manet (1832-1883), "Girl in the Garden at Bellevue"

BELOW RIGHT: Jean-Honoré Fragonard (1732-1806), "The Swing," oil

on canvas, c.1767, "considered... one of the masterpieces of the rococo era....

The painting depicts a young man hidden in the bushes, watching a woman

on a swing, being pushed by a bishop. As the lady goes high on the swing,

she lets him [the 'hidden' man] take a furtive peep under her dress.

As a symbol of the loss of virginity, the lady has let one of her

shoes fly into the air. Although women wore bodices

and the like during this time period, they did not

use underwear...." Wikipedia

Lazy Heart

When there’s something in the air that weighs
it down—that enervating water-pollen mix,
perhaps— when the barometer has risen, or
it’s fallen, at the moment I’m afraid I don’t
remember which— and when the sky’s opaque
and dull, and even chatty cardinals don’t
communicate; a robin can’t be bothered to
investigate a sign of subterranean activity within
her territory, though it would likely yield
a meal—

and I suppose they’re healing from frenetic
spring, which, once awakened, rubbed its eyes
and surged to life, demanding that its
denizens fall smartly into place, and now
they’re taking mental-health days; we should
pay attention, for they put our human pace
to shame—

on days like these my heart is lazy. It would

love to lie about and gravitate toward

yesterday when it imagines that it didn’t have

to labor so to be engaged with people, places,

occupations. “Ah, if only now were then,” it
teases, tempting me to give it space for

wallowing, and all too soon the rest of me

would follow, and I’d wish to have my lively

children back who at the time I’d hoped

would hurry and mature at twice the normal

rate. It’s true there was contentment that

eludes me now, when I have time to brood

and notice small tears in the lacy
drapery.

I tell my heart it doesn’t need to drift in

gravity’s deceptive ease, or shiver in the

clammy air, or rid itself of insubstantial
burdens. Little effort is required to ascend the
gentle path to love. The poor heart merely
must present itself and can be certain of
success, for love has its own energy, and does
the rest.
===============
ABOVE: Marie Spartali Stillman (1844-1927), "The Enchanted Garden of Messer Ansaldo" 1889. Stillman was was "a British Pre-Raphaelite painter of Greek descent, arguably the greatest female artist of that movement. During a sixty-year career she produced over one hundred works, contributing regularly to galleries in Great Britain and the United States." Wikipedia

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Life Recycled

2010-05-11T11:39:00.005-05:00

I Would Not Live This Life Again

I would not live this life again, or not without more

information. Seems to me it's better unrehearsed,

and wouldn't most of us prefer not knowing what's

ahead: the problems, which are how we learn; the
pain, which, after all, is transient and makes the joy
beyond so much the sweeter? There are moments
I'd repeat, but all I'd really need would

be the feelings that went
with them.

Where would be the
risk in life recycled? Who could wish for
nothing to be unexpected, no surprises — no
defeats, of course, but then no victories; no whims
to act upon for self-indulgence; never going out
upon a limb, the senses sharpened, heartbeat like
a tympani— not when everything that came
before would be the same

again.

If I could make a different choice this time — but

that could happen only once, for from then on,
the premise would have
changed.

God’s system (shall we say? though I've no way of
knowing who devised it) is, in any case, less apt
to bore one, with, as I'm convinced, successive
lives and spiritual progression toward the heights to

which we all are drawn, in spite of what we seem
to want. My level's humble yet; I’m far from ready
to become a monk, nor yet contemplative full-time,
forgoing pretty things. I have no wish to cure my
shopping habit at the Thrifty Mart for second-hand

appliances and satisfactorily tattered overalls. But

when it’s time, I don’t suppose I’ll mind the lack of

bric-a-brac or crisp white cotton shirts with small

pink bows. Already I am too ascetic for my comfort;

since I struggle with it, I deduce my selves are out

of sync, and I could use a very warm Jacuzzi
and an alcoholic drink— a cold Corona
or a dry merlot with brie on Melba

toast—and yes,
this minute,

please.

==========================

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Thomas Merton (1915-1968) was a Trappist monk of the Abbey of Gethsemani, Kentucky, well known even during his lifetime as a writer and poet. He spent long periods alone in his hermitage on the abbey grounds. In most photographs he looks quite thoughtful, which is why I appreciate the image at right, in which he appears almost jolly.

A Balanced Life

2010-05-10T16:27:00.001-05:00

The Rhythm of the Day

To wake at five a.m., and pray, assess the day— it

rains— and smile and say, “Good morning, Jane,

and many thanks, how does your little Kylie?” to

the maid who brings my customary coffee, very

strong, and buttered toast and berries, and to truly

feel relieved when she replies, “Why, Kylie’s better,

finally! Her fever’s gone; she’s even been outdoors

to take the air.” To say, “Thank God!” and

mean it....

Now alone again, indulging in my love

affair with coffee for the moment, savoring

the scent, remembering the humble bean that with

its cousins starts the hearts of millions in home-or-

office ritual around the globe, those spirits kindred to

my own for whom a cup of tea is most ungenerous

indeed with flavor and caffeine— A little note to

Jane: “I need your recipe, my angel; I can’t

make the coffee zing the way
you do. Perhaps you
might give me

a lesson.”

Then to bless with all my soul the baker of the bread,

the picker of the berries, not forgetting all the others—

growers, drivers, bankers, clerks— whose work is to

ensure that Jane has fruit and fiber on my tray at five-

fifteen a.m.... There is no condescension here; I merely

try to not take anything for granted and to wish them

well and hope that they’re as glad I purchase what they

grow and sell as I am that they’ve done it, and I add a

blessing for the ones whose bosses lack compassion; as an

afterthought, repentantly, I bless unpleasant

bosses too.

Arising then, I wash and dress, then meditate, or the reverse,

whichever has become my habit— that’s the point: to be

methodical and thoughtful, too;
and then the mitzvah: This one is for ritual,

first kindness of the day, but not the last. Perhaps an

aspidistra for myAunt Elizabeth, recovering from shingles, such

an awful case of them, will cheer her up. I’ll visit her this

afternoon but send the florist
with the plant

ahead.

Alas! The cook is on vacation, so I put some breast of

chicken in the crock pot with a bunch of carrots and

potatoes and the broth and set the dial to “Low”— my

nemesis is that I usually forget to
turn it on— Oh, that

all nemeses were
as innocuous.

I plan my day permitting spontaneity and set aside some time

for company— I’m such a hermit otherwise— but there is

much to do domestically, professionally, and once I would

have looked askance at all the tasks, especially the nastiest,

the ones that I despise (in my case, making phone calls) and

I would have moaned and gotten back in bed, but now I’m

swept along by plans made in advance and by the rhythm of

my life.

There is no Jane, no coffee brought to me in bed, no cook, no

florist whom I can afford, it seems; this isn’t even my routine.

I have no servants, wish I did, but

first things first:

To have such discipline, to think ahead, to do what’s necessary

with attention, joy, humility, but in addition to have time and

energy for many chosen things to fill my calendar— this is my

aspiration, this my dream; but to bring order out of chaos somehow,

that would be

enough for

now.

Photo, blue sheer curtains: VNWallpapers
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My Hair Hurts

2010-05-08T22:19:00.001-05:00

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The Great Awakening

When you have friends who tend to be

a little crazy (that's your preference in

friendships), there are many memorable

minutes, stretching into days and even

years, and it appears that life will always

be this way (but you are young) and the

divine dilemma is to choose among an

infinite display of wonders.

And then a clap of thunder ushers in a great

awakening and you are Wile E. Coyote being

thrust by his momentum off the cliff into thin

air, defying seven laws of physics, glancing at his

paws and seeing how they lack support; at last,

he plunges twenty thousand feet and crashes

on the desert floor, gets up, intact, shakes off the

dust, and when you see him next he’s had a

shower and he wears two Band-Aids on his

forehead crossed to form an X. He

must have bones of

Styrofoam.

My bones— Where are you, Great Physician?

You must know my bones are burning like the

sparks above a bonfire that has just caught,

flared; and my hair hurts. The weight of air

hurts. I am in a flannel nightgown. This was not

my plan for Saturday, to go nowhere, not even

down the street and back, the sky so redolent with

spring, with blooming things and sweet, clear

sunshine— and I am in my room, confined to

bed. I couldn’t manage stairs and I so wished to

see the pansies, lemon balm, and meadow sage

just planted yesterday, already

thriving in Elaine’s wee

fairy garden.

I have shingles, is the thing, and I suppose I’m

meant to find the lesson in it but my brain’s been

disconnected. I have not made friends with pain,

but it’s persistent. “Knock, knock,” pain calls

unconvincingly as if it is a neighbor bringing

cake.

“Oh, you must embrace it,” people say

when they are well, implying that they’ve faced

the awful self-absorption and unmasked the lie

that nothing else exists, or ever will, except you

and your wish to die and get it over with. My

mind says, “This will end.” I know, and I intend

to shoo it toward another victim (someone we

don't care for) straightaway (forgive me, Lord)

with any luck. But Mindfulness says, “Live

today. Be present with this moment.” Even

though this moment

sucks.

Wile E. Coyote — http://www.greatamericanink.com/
All other illustrations — http://www.vnwallpapers.com/

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