The Fingers Type Into Tomorrow
Sometimes it just hits me upside the head so hard I am brought to my knees. The Death of James.
I don't know what to do when I'm blind-sided by grief that quick, that...without warning except that once my knees hit the rug, the hard wood floor, the garden walkway, the lane onside the house under a copse of Flowering May hanging down, drooping like tears, like a great gush of tears over the path until the damp earth is mud again even though it, the planet of this region, had almost stopped raining a week ago and the neighborhood had begun drying out, just enough to make weed pulling easy.
Once my knees hit the earth, it is nothing to allow the gravity of grief to pull my chest into the damp wet of the mud where I am held up only by the points of my elbows and then, my elbows slip and I am down, face into the clean mud where I cry and cry and cry. I can't help it. It is the way of grief, it is the way of loss and there is no map to guide me. I am hit by the grief, I fall, I am in the mud, I cry. It's that simple, it's that agonizing.
And there's the sorrow of my ex-husband, the father of my oldest son. It is a more subtle kind of remembering good little moments of living in the two room Depression cabin and all its rube-goldberg-put-togetherness. It was filthy when I moved in alone and I cleaned and scrubbed and painted and almost wished I could live alone that he wouldn't come up from Berkeley, that he would get lost, because the schizophrenic behavior was so difficult to live with until I discovered a plan of healing that worked until his brother the other schizophrenic came up with the oz of coke and destroyed all our hard work, all of John's newly acquired sanity, that even our doctor said was clear and pure as a bell. Him, I have intimate from the Other Side conversations with that are both frustrating and intimate in their shyness. You see, I have come to know more than him now. I am older than him now. I was a teen and then early twenties wife and then I had to take the baby and run and he remained still, always nine years older than I. But with his death, he stopped and I grew. I know it hasn't been long enough to acquire years of growth toward I am older than he is now, but there is a certain amount of he-has-stopped-on-the-planet and I keep moving on in my growth, aging and perhaps one day I shall be older, wiser than him. When we divorced, he was thirty-one and I was twenty-two and now I am fifty four, soon to be fifty five in late June and he will always be sixty. I wish I had gone over to his studio flat and brought a chicken, a book, a bouquet of flowers during those last almost twenty years. He couldn't couldn't hurt me psychically any more and I don't believe he would have hurt me physically any more. He was tired. He was ready, in many ways to leave the planet I am sure. His pain was beyond redemption, and yet, I read and I understand that with Y'shua, there is always redemption, if he had only known how. His father had poisoned his mind so greatly is why I believe there was the feeling of no redemption for him.
All this grief. I am so tired. Is this the Winter of my Discontent? Will joy come in the morning?
I have spent the last three days sleeping most of the day and most of the evenings, waking in the middle of the slow cold burn toward dawn where I ache with the chill as I sit at my old beautiful desk and write in my diary, or this electronic diary that it appears only one person reads and that grieves me. I had to let my space.com go, oh, it's still there, but it was so bound up with James, a damn fine friend and no lover, but not needed, our words and poems shared were far and away enough to make us lover of a kind. But it was that seeing his old posts and poems after he hit the carpet of heart attack or stroke, no one knew, that made me have to come here to a foreign land Blogspot, so the pain of loss and separation would not burn the skin from my fingertips. Solace comes when I sit and talk about him to my now-husband, his genius, kindness, his awfulness, but one ought not expect one's husband to keep alive the memory of another man. And it appears only one person deciphers the scribblings of the scarab's feet across the sand that blow with the wind and disappear in this pathetic place called Diary of a Magpie Woman.
This studio was beautifully laid out , little boxes and drawers and tiny shelves in Chinese cabinets, floor to ceiling shelves with labels on the front and through the maelstrom of an artshow after James' death and the whirlwind of my desperate anger and grief, it is a terrible mess now and i don't have the strength nor the money to hire someone to help me re-organize it. It's these moments that fill me with madness. I am crazed by what if I died in my sleep, or like James, fell to the rug with the heart pain of the world. I made my will years ago based on an immaculate studio, which no longer exists. How could Dan find the little suchnsuch to give to sonso in this mess of all messes. And as I get ready for another art show first week in June , (or is it the second?), I plunder the mess and realize I am out of titanium white acrylic paint. When James first died, his daughter asked me what I would like to remember him by and I replied, a good paint brush and a tube of cadium red because that red is so expensive and I just can't afford it, little knowing I was out of white because of the mess. There is a part of me which would like to give away all art materials and stick only to poetry, but unfortunately, art makes more money than poetry and we are now even out of short grain brown rice.
Friday, September 7, 2012
The Mourning Doves
There are two ring-necked doves in the Cypress tree in the back garden. They are mad with sex. Soon they will start building a nest when the female feels her uterus fill with eggs. I am not sure they will stay though, because the neighborhood cats are relentless in their pursuit. This twilight I heard the cry of a bird in the holly underbrush. I couldn't see anything in the gloaming. But I have a feeling something is dead or injured. In that hour of twilight, I saw in the back garden, one robin on the fence, one unknown small brown bird with a speckled chest in the bird bath and the doves.
Sometimes the culprit is my cat and I hate him for awhile. And in a way, it all comes back to mankind. You can say, "But you feed them well" and I can reply, "yes, I do..." even though the cat lived here when we moved in and after seeing mouse scut in the silverware drawer, I understand why the people before us had a cat. Still, I love birds and hate the death element. But the cat food sold in America is by and large made in China and just plain bad for the cats my vet tells. He tells me, in particular, "Don't feed them the fish flavors." And so I don't. But we are not well-off and do our best to give him good food without poisoning him. None of the cat foods seem to be healthy for cat. I have given him chicken's livers cooked in butter. No better luck. And when he makes a kill, he doesn't always finish it, I suppose because he is used to...I don't know what. Lately he eats the new flavor of dry cat food my son brought over when we were out of any.
It is the beauty of the doves that make me cry when I hear the small cry and the heavy silence. I can find no answer. I told my husband, when this cat dies, I want no more cats. No more "fall in love with the fur against my cheek in the night and the little paws pushing against the heat of my belly in delight." I am weary with grief. Too many men, too many cats...
Sometimes the culprit is my cat and I hate him for awhile. And in a way, it all comes back to mankind. You can say, "But you feed them well" and I can reply, "yes, I do..." even though the cat lived here when we moved in and after seeing mouse scut in the silverware drawer, I understand why the people before us had a cat. Still, I love birds and hate the death element. But the cat food sold in America is by and large made in China and just plain bad for the cats my vet tells. He tells me, in particular, "Don't feed them the fish flavors." And so I don't. But we are not well-off and do our best to give him good food without poisoning him. None of the cat foods seem to be healthy for cat. I have given him chicken's livers cooked in butter. No better luck. And when he makes a kill, he doesn't always finish it, I suppose because he is used to...I don't know what. Lately he eats the new flavor of dry cat food my son brought over when we were out of any.
It is the beauty of the doves that make me cry when I hear the small cry and the heavy silence. I can find no answer. I told my husband, when this cat dies, I want no more cats. No more "fall in love with the fur against my cheek in the night and the little paws pushing against the heat of my belly in delight." I am weary with grief. Too many men, too many cats...
My Lady & The Morning; My Lady Becomes The Dawn And Then Rises
My body and mind are completely upsidedown. I sleep all day, or until between 4 pm and 5 pm and then I'm awake all night until 5am when I take my heart meds, some pain meds and go to bed. Starting at 4 or 5pm, I get up, wash my face, comb my hair, put on fresh clothes or change from pajamas to clothes and I start cleaning after several cups of coffee and sometimes an english muffin.
I've tried getting in bed early and sleeping, but I just lie there, bored, worried about disturbing my husband...Like now, it's 11:01 pm and I'm on my side of the bed with my MacLap and I've got my roses jammies on, but right below the side of the bed, are my grey slippers Danny bought me because he knows if I hear the cat, I will go and let him in or let him out and I have a thing about wet sox or even worse, crunching snails with bare feet or plain sox. I hate the creepy feeling on my skin of damp or wet sox. I don't know why, but it feels dirty, especially if it involves aforementioned snails. I could be working on Donna's graphic novel , but I'm still searching for a theme. I know she wants Pre-Raphaelite and that's a go for me, but I need a dialogue. I always have to have a dialogue with self when I make my books. I have researched the time period and it feels medieval, not that Rossetti and Waterhouse were painting in the 8th to 15th century, but their themes were depicting those people, those places and I need to stay true to my text.
Right now I am infatuated with the architecture of the those times: the castle keeps, the flying buttresses, the arrow slots, the roofs and gargoyles and even more important: the very shape of Woman as an architectural form of beauty that I can fit into the castle. Her hips as portals, her collar bone as the arch the knights ride through... Billowing in the wind are the banners and regalia that She gave him at the onset of the journey and now is battered, weather-worn, frayed, while his heraldry once filled with brave bright colors and his armor glistened like the magical, silver salmon in the rivers. She lifted his foot into the stirrup and handed him the cup of wine that would send him on the journey to Far Away and Far to Go Land in search of damosels needing rescuing, old kings replaced to their rightful throne, young princes returned to their kingdoms where they will grow up and one day rule, and eventually when all the stars are aligned properly as a tarot cross and only then, can he kneel down in front of his Lady, lift her tattered token given at the beginning of the Journey and now, mud-stained and wind-worn, kiss her, enter her, and if she is new to court, if she has been convent-educated and kitchen-taught, when he does enter her, she will bleed like the virgin she is. Her skin will stain like a fresh cut pomegranate and she will wonder what it all means.
These concepts will slowly enter her mind the way a water lillie opens in the sun-warmed pond and she will let her imagination turn into a faery tale. And it will only be the true beginning of Once-Upon-a-Time and they will live happily ever after.
That's the story I want to tell for Donna's book. Her husband is my dentist and they worked out a trade that I would make one of my collage books in exchange for thousands of dollars of work on my teeth. This book is just full of jewels and glitter and lace and of course, The Story.
I've tried getting in bed early and sleeping, but I just lie there, bored, worried about disturbing my husband...Like now, it's 11:01 pm and I'm on my side of the bed with my MacLap and I've got my roses jammies on, but right below the side of the bed, are my grey slippers Danny bought me because he knows if I hear the cat, I will go and let him in or let him out and I have a thing about wet sox or even worse, crunching snails with bare feet or plain sox. I hate the creepy feeling on my skin of damp or wet sox. I don't know why, but it feels dirty, especially if it involves aforementioned snails. I could be working on Donna's graphic novel , but I'm still searching for a theme. I know she wants Pre-Raphaelite and that's a go for me, but I need a dialogue. I always have to have a dialogue with self when I make my books. I have researched the time period and it feels medieval, not that Rossetti and Waterhouse were painting in the 8th to 15th century, but their themes were depicting those people, those places and I need to stay true to my text.
Right now I am infatuated with the architecture of the those times: the castle keeps, the flying buttresses, the arrow slots, the roofs and gargoyles and even more important: the very shape of Woman as an architectural form of beauty that I can fit into the castle. Her hips as portals, her collar bone as the arch the knights ride through... Billowing in the wind are the banners and regalia that She gave him at the onset of the journey and now is battered, weather-worn, frayed, while his heraldry once filled with brave bright colors and his armor glistened like the magical, silver salmon in the rivers. She lifted his foot into the stirrup and handed him the cup of wine that would send him on the journey to Far Away and Far to Go Land in search of damosels needing rescuing, old kings replaced to their rightful throne, young princes returned to their kingdoms where they will grow up and one day rule, and eventually when all the stars are aligned properly as a tarot cross and only then, can he kneel down in front of his Lady, lift her tattered token given at the beginning of the Journey and now, mud-stained and wind-worn, kiss her, enter her, and if she is new to court, if she has been convent-educated and kitchen-taught, when he does enter her, she will bleed like the virgin she is. Her skin will stain like a fresh cut pomegranate and she will wonder what it all means.
These concepts will slowly enter her mind the way a water lillie opens in the sun-warmed pond and she will let her imagination turn into a faery tale. And it will only be the true beginning of Once-Upon-a-Time and they will live happily ever after.
That's the story I want to tell for Donna's book. Her husband is my dentist and they worked out a trade that I would make one of my collage books in exchange for thousands of dollars of work on my teeth. This book is just full of jewels and glitter and lace and of course, The Story.
THE PERMANANCY OF LOVE
For months I've been designing a new tattoo, that my sons want to help pay for for my birthday. I just recently saw my son's girlfriend's latest of some Japanese artist sparrows and it gave me a great idea. I had planned on having a magpie tattooed on my chest where my breast used to be (see post Ink long time dried) but that's only a part of myself and kind of vain anyway. What I came up yesterday is in my mind, is not mine, but the Lord's. I want to incorporate those sparrows with some tiger lillies I also have pictures of and let them swirl over the skin with the 'wind' being shown/blown in the form of either Hebrew or Aramaic lettering of the part in the New Testament about how the lillies never toil nor spin and the sparrows do not fall, but are caught by God. I've been looking for a half an hour for the right text, but I have been so involved lately in the Sermon on the Mount, that I have forgotten where that part is and darn it, but that's embarrassing. I think this is a good ministry, because I have 16 tattoos and people always stop and ask me about them. This time, when I am asked, I can tell them the text in English and explain it and that's opening a door to talking about God and His glorious creation, the planet earth and how we should take care of it. We are the stewards of the planet. Just waiting til it's time to go home to Heaven, a place of course I can't explain or describe to anyone, but to be able to tell people about Christ's life, well, that is of interest to me. I remember dreaming of walking behind the Twelve and Y'shua in serial dreams when I was eleven and when the dreams stopped, I cried and cried.
The idea to have a "way in", I do not want to be one of those cracked people who get in people's faces and say, "Do you know the Lord?" Mainly because people turn and run in the opposite direction. But to interest them in a manner that is excessable today in today's language would give me the opportunity to open up the Living Word and share it with strangers as I have never had the courage before. I think I just need a "hook", a way in to speak to curious people. I know there are plenty of people who DO NOT want to hear about God in any shape or form and I have to let them go until maybe someone else can reach out, but I am sure there are some who are curious if they only knew how to listen to what is said. There must be someone I can interest in what makes me so content and so happy. Both sides make a difference.
And speaking of happy, the Western Flycatchers have found the water fountain. Before it was just one and the rufous-sided towhees, but now there are jays, flycatchers, and towhees. I am hoping for flickers like last year and robins. He was so miraculous in His creations; so in the giving of His son when we just wouldn't listen to His love, he was showing how deep and abiding His love is for us.
The idea to have a "way in", I do not want to be one of those cracked people who get in people's faces and say, "Do you know the Lord?" Mainly because people turn and run in the opposite direction. But to interest them in a manner that is excessable today in today's language would give me the opportunity to open up the Living Word and share it with strangers as I have never had the courage before. I think I just need a "hook", a way in to speak to curious people. I know there are plenty of people who DO NOT want to hear about God in any shape or form and I have to let them go until maybe someone else can reach out, but I am sure there are some who are curious if they only knew how to listen to what is said. There must be someone I can interest in what makes me so content and so happy. Both sides make a difference.
And speaking of happy, the Western Flycatchers have found the water fountain. Before it was just one and the rufous-sided towhees, but now there are jays, flycatchers, and towhees. I am hoping for flickers like last year and robins. He was so miraculous in His creations; so in the giving of His son when we just wouldn't listen to His love, he was showing how deep and abiding His love is for us.
Gardening the Wrong Way with my Body
I couldn't sleep last night and so around three a.m. I found myself outside in one of the herbaceous borders pruning, watering, raking up my messes as I went along, grateful that our bit of land is set away from the rest of the neighbors, otherwise I would be thought thoroughly mad as I did my chores, delicately sniffing the clean cool air and just plain enjoying myself. Oh, I knew I would pay for it in the morning, which meant, whenever I woke up, but it felt worth it because of the cleanliness.Whenever I woke up, I knew I would be refreshed and happy. (I hadn't counted on the sore cramping muscles if I stayed in one place for too long, which is exactly what I did.) So all day I've had to practice getting up and down and generally moving in new and practical positions. And I'm still not comfortable, just sitting here typing. It' s a trick learning how to move in ways which will make it easy to move around in.
So I take a hot shower when my muscles cramp up and remind myself that I'm the mother; I'm supposed to think wisely first before moving around. My right arm's nerves are not as strong as the whole of me due to the cancer and the mastectomy, but each day I get better and the columbine and foxgloves went to seed and now I have a lot of plants where before were just a few I cherished. Soon, the garden will be something new, just like me...
So I take a hot shower when my muscles cramp up and remind myself that I'm the mother; I'm supposed to think wisely first before moving around. My right arm's nerves are not as strong as the whole of me due to the cancer and the mastectomy, but each day I get better and the columbine and foxgloves went to seed and now I have a lot of plants where before were just a few I cherished. Soon, the garden will be something new, just like me...
Long Time The Ink Has Dried
It's been years it feels like since I've written in here. I had the foolish notion to contract breast cancer and go through a mastectomy and healing. I stole my own title here "Diary of a Magpie Woman" and I've been writing an almost daily journal about the experience in the hope of making a book to share with other people in the same situation.
I'm much better now, though I've lost all that three feet of gorgeous red hair with the old silverware in it and most all of my eyebrows. My legs and arms are as hairless as a ten year old girl. So, my hair went from three feet to, well, it's finally grown out to touch my shoulders.
I had the journal entries public for about a year, but a woman on the east coast suggest I take it down and clean it up and send it around for publication, so that's what I'm working on now. And yes, I still garden, but I neglected it so badly for most of a year, I am digging things up, changing the contour and looking at what it will turn into to. That's all for now, I'm tired already.
I'm much better now, though I've lost all that three feet of gorgeous red hair with the old silverware in it and most all of my eyebrows. My legs and arms are as hairless as a ten year old girl. So, my hair went from three feet to, well, it's finally grown out to touch my shoulders.
I had the journal entries public for about a year, but a woman on the east coast suggest I take it down and clean it up and send it around for publication, so that's what I'm working on now. And yes, I still garden, but I neglected it so badly for most of a year, I am digging things up, changing the contour and looking at what it will turn into to. That's all for now, I'm tired already.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
