Thursday, May 24, 2012

DREAMWEAVER

Written at Zee's Writing Studio 5/22/12. Inspired by this painting, "Dreamlight",  by Maxfield Parrish and a Laura Nyro lyric, "I love you so, I always will."










I love you so, I always will.  This is my song as I swing back and forth, back and forth, listening to the wind whisper your name, its soft breath tickling my face.  Will just saying it bring you to me?  Somehow I believe it will, if I time my words to the rhythm of the swing it will act as a spell:  “I love you so,” swing forward, “I always will,” swing back.  I picked this dress for you; I know you will love running your fingers across the billowy fabric, letting it slide from your hands.  I know you will love how the breeze causes the skirt to flutter around my hips; it will remind you of our dance under the moon last night.  I call you to me, once again.  I call you to me, here to this place of stillness and reverie.  What will I say when your face peeks above our rock? Will I squeal with delight or just rush to your arms in silence?  Saying anything but your name seems absurd, inadequate.  Will you pick me up and spin me around, nose to nose, eye to eye?  Will you smile and have on your dancing eyes or will your gaze be heavy and reverential?  Will you wear the trousers from last night, leaves and dirt brushed from the seat?  Will you notice my belt, the amulet you gave me dangling from the end?  Will you notice my wet eyes, overcome with relief at the mere sight of you?  I packed us a lunch--I stowed it behind the far rock out of sight.  I was rushed and nervous doing it.  If Mama caught me; well, I don’t want to say.  I tucked away the ends of the bread from last nights supper and took just a shaving from Mr. Webster’s cheese. Plus one apple, 4 grapes and 2 olives.  That’s enough.  If you’re hungry I’ll let you have it all.  Perhaps I’ll be brave and kiss the apple juice from your chin.  “I love you so,” swing forward, “I always will,” swing back.  The air rushes up my skirt as I swing forward and delights my sticky skin.  A twig cracks behind me and I twist around. Is it you?  My heart throbs as I scan the brush for your silhouette, but I catch not a glimpse.  Do you really think I’m pretty, or just plain like Rebecca Black? Tell me again how my face reminds you of the cool, clear water on the other side of the mountain--how you rushed forward and drank with the thirst of a dying man.  Tell me how my hair feels like the silk of the corn you shucked for supper.  How you want to make a shirt of it so it will always be right against your heart, the silky strands tickling and warming at the same time.  Look right into my eyes, unflinching and sure.  Gold flecks shimmering in the sun, dancing and moving to the song only we can hear.  I stole two of Ames’ marbles because they reminded me of your eyes.  Glittering gold and woven with the loveliest of greens.  I picked them up and put them right in my pocket and ran upstairs where I rolled them around in my palm.  I’m not going to tell you where I put them because if they ask then you won’t know.  I have never done such a thing to poor Ames and I pray that he is never the wiser.  What else am I capable of doing in the name of you?  I don’t want to think about it; I won't.  I would follow you out of these woods, barefoot and with utter certainty.  I would never look back; there would be no trail of breadcrumbs to follow.



Friday, May 18, 2012

HOW COULD SHE NOT


And today, a poem...

How could she not love
your kind and glorious
heart,
shooting out sparklers into the dark,
exclaiming
“Here I am!  Come out and play!”

How could she be immune to
your rose petal lips
cutting velvet streaks
here and there and
here and
here

Is she from another planet?
The obvious Mars, or maybe
even Jupiter?
Does she do everything in reverse?
Speak a different language?
Gag at the taste of
Holiday Spice?

Is she mute to the tone of
your voice,
like honey-blossom tendrils
wrapping everything it touches
in succulent sweetness and
whispered caresses?

Does she just happen to
be looking
the other way
when you
suddenly pulse
and glow,
lighting everything in
your wake?

Is she numb?
Or simply unaware
of every sacred moment
that you hold so freely in every
4-hr. conversation?

And in the same breath
that I wonder and
ponder, so
perplexed and bewildered,
I offer up a prayer of gratitude and
surrender;
Oh, thank you, thank you!!
That she didn’t and couldn’t...

Please carry her
to he who calls her singular name
across the Winds of Love.
Let her be healed by his touch;
scooped up and
rocked  to
their own
secret lullaby.
Beloved forever.





Friday, May 11, 2012

50 THINGS I KNOW ABOUT LOVE, RIGHT THIS MINUTE, BASED ON THE PAST FEW WEEKS BUT, MORE PARTICULARLY, THE PAST FEW DAYS



  1.  It really does sweep you off your feet.
  2.  It leaves you shaking your head, waiting to “come to.”
  3.  It’s best when it shows up in someone you would never expect.
  4.  It’s best to take it slow and savor every moment.
  5.   Then again, what could be bad about letting it have its way?
  6.   It refuses to be controlled.
  7.   It’s so delicious that lust, loneliness and desperation try it on as a costume and go out trick-or-    treating.  They eventually get caught red-handed.  
  8.   There is no forcing it.
  9.   It has no rhyme or reason.
  10.   It makes even the dreariest of Ithaca days irrelevant.
  11.   It challenges me to stay present to the moment.
  12.   It challenges me to stop analyzing.
  13.   It’s cause for great celebration.
  14.   It challenges my sense of worthiness.
  15.   It can really only be experienced, not described.
  16.   It tells me to make a beeline to Victoria’s Secret.
  17.   It inexplicably causes me to revert to acting like a 15-yr-old.
  18.   It allows for minimal sleep.
  19.   It's the essence of life.
  20.   It's all that and then some.
  21.   It brings my various issues right up to the surface.
  22.   Which is a good thing, really....
  23.   It's necessary to take breaks from it to discover subversive talent on YouTube.
  24.   It’s complicated.
  25.   It’s simple.
  26.   It provides for hours of playlist making on iTunes.
  27.   It craves expression.
  28.   It causes the windows of creativity to fly open.
  29.   It’s best to write a poem about it when you wake up at 3 a.m. and can’t go back to sleep.
  30.   It’s in the details.
  31.   It says there are no details, it is just that which it is.
  32.   It is philosophical.
  33.   It's inane.
  34.   It's hysterical.
  35.   It's the agony; it's the ecstasy.
  36.   It can make those around you want to vomit.
  37.   It’s an elevation of consciousness.
  38.   It goes against “The Rules.”
  39.   It laughs in the face of “The Rules.”
  40.   It’s better for your heart than a bowl of oatmeal.
  41.   It’s a disco dance.
  42.   It’s the cha-cha, a waltz, the charleston.
  43.   It’s being moved to tears on a regular basis.
  44.   It’s driving in the car with all the windows rolled down.
  45.   It’s like a million iridescent butterflies alighting on your heart all at once.
  46.   It can’t be saved up for a rainy day 
  47.   It’s sitting for hours on the couch and realizing that you would be blissfully happy to stay there for  days.  
  48.   It really is the end all and be all.
  49.   The Beatles were right.
  50.   It’s all I’ve ever wanted.


Friday, May 4, 2012

BONUS QUOTE OF THE WEEK



“I put this bra on because my French teacher was coming over and my nipples were sticking out and I didn’t want that.”  Really??

             --spoken to me by a stranger, in an even stranger town, in an unknown neighborhood on a non-existant porch    

                         
‘Nuff said! What could I possibly say after that? Enjoy the day; bras, nipples, French teachers and all!

LABOR AND DELIVERY: PART 1


I made elaborate plans to ensure that the happiest day of my life was to be the day my daughter was born.  While it was nothing short of a blessed miracle, I somehow connotated “happiest” with blissful, rapturous and being fully present. Ha!
Off to the hospital her father and I went, at 7 a.m. on July 10, 2003, so that I could be admitted and induced, at 38 wks, due to a development called polyhydramnious, or, in layman’s terms, excessive amniotic fluid.  Why this happened late in my pregnancy remains a mystery, but I was told that if my water broke “unexpectedly” that it could present an emergency situation. Like what, I wondered? A flash flood? No, more like the pressure of the fluid could cause problems with the umbilical cord.  My midwife used words like “choking” and “strangling”.  Enough said.
So, already Phase 1 of my plan had been seriously mis-managed. Didn’t the Universe know that I was supposed to go into labor naturally and deliver my girl soothingly and all Enya-like into a warm bath at the Birthing Center?? For crying out loud!  Instead, I found myself in the hospital, hooked up to monitors and whatnot.  I was tethered to the bed but comforted myself with the fact that at least I was laying on some crisp, white sheets.  Oh well, just go with the flow I told myself. Really, it’s up to me to create the environment that I want. I had brought my Enya and Stevie Nicks CD’s, lavender-scented candles and favorite pillow and jammies.  Sounds like Girls Night In to me!  How about we order a pizza? What? No food? Oh, okay...
I glared at the smiling nurse as she followed monitor cords and I.V. lines with her fingers, braiding and unbraiding them. Her hair fell in crispy curls, obviously the victims of too much styling product.  A few rogue strands scraped my face and I bit my tongue.
I was told that the Pictocin used to induce labor would cause my contractions to be even more intense and, well, painful than “normal” ones.  I was encouraged to have a walking epidural.  Well, seeing as I was trapped in bed, what was the point of the “walking” part?  Not to mention the fact that I thought I had been perfectly clear in my request to not have an epidural because I was going to deliver my child naturally and Zen-like.  Again, I was informed that given the “gravity” of my “situation” I would need to have an epidural needle in place, just in case, God forbid, I needed to go in for an emergency C-section.  Okay, I’m going with the flow, I reminded myself, as I swung my legs over the side of the bed while the nurse parted my gown in the back, exposing my extra-wide derrière.  What a bitch, I thought, as she poked at my spine.  Oh my God! I thought. Where is this hostility coming from?  Followed by: What’s wrong with you; stop being so hateful! Then: If you’re going to be hateful, get a load of J. over there, snoozing. What the hell is his problem?
My baby’s father was curled up in a chair in the corner, snoring shamelessly. No surprises there, but somehow, in my elaborate planning of how the day should unfold, he somehow miraculously transformed into an attentive, capable, take-charge, mind-reading Johnny-on-the-spot.  Bummer.  Major bummer.  That glimpse of him in the chair was the last time I recalled seeing him until after our daughter was born, although he insists he was “right there.” I remember the midwife being right there, massaging my back, feeding me ice chips and smoothing my furrowed brow, but him? Not a trace. Did I mention that we’re no longer together?
So, I was sitting on the edge of the bed, curled into a “C” shape, bracing myself for the needle that sent my brain into electric freeze as Crunchy Curls squeezed my hands and, all of a sudden, my water broke! It was as if someone has upturned a 5-gallon bucket onto the floor.  A flash flood indeed!  An “Oh!” escaped Crunchy Curls lips as water splashed up over her white Danskos and splattered her nauseatingly cute pink-with-multi-colored-teddybear print scrubs.  She dropped my hands and jumped back, knocking over the tray table and spilling even more water onto the floor. I looked behind me as a river of water wound it’s way under the bed and toward the bathroom in a stream.  “Holy shit!” I exclaimed.  Little did I know that those words were to become my new Zen mantra over the next 12 hours....