The Journey
by Mary Oliver
One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice--
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do--
determined to save
the only life you could save.
Mobtown sent me this poem in an email, which I know, but have never really owned before. I am back from the last leg of the harrowing journey to put an offical end to a terrible, hateful, grief-filled chapter in my life. Another thirty days before the weight lifts all the way off my shoulders but I'll never have to pass through this particular tunnel again. Now I can settle down to the task of rebuilding that I've already been at (with amazing amounts of support) for several years.
Amen!
Of The Best Stuff, but Cracked
Tuesday, October 03, 2006
Monday, October 02, 2006
Today was filled with unexpected blessings. Alone in a strange city, I was dismayed to find that I couldn't get to Meeting as I had planned--the train does not wake up until eleven in the morning on Sundays. I sulked in the lobby over lukewarm vending-machine coffee and a syrupy blueberry muffin, annoyed that I'd turned in my room key too quickly. But dear Mr. Mobtown Blues, whose blog is a favourite, still managed to make conact, and I was treated to a drive around Baltimore . . . it is a lovely city, and I found myself unable to harbour hard feelings against it despite the unpleasantness of my errand. Mobtown and his wife, the lovely Meerkat, took me to brunch in a colourful and funky cafe full of prints and paintings of the Last Supper and skinny hipster waiters with braids and messenger caps. We talked about Meetings and music and starvation over plates heaped with lox and fried dough. I talked a lot, and they listened a lot, and they had a lot to share. Meeting Friends in such a sweet and unexpected way warmed me to the core. I'd gone to bed expecting a few cold days of unrelenting dreariness, but woke up to find friendship and sunshine. It was a beautiful day here too, the sun was warm, and there was a steady, cool, clear wind. I got to listen to a tape of Shape Note Singing for the first time, and in that abbreviated taste of the sacred music I could already hear the space it contained for heartbreak and hope: music into which one may empty an overburdened heart.
After I took my leave of the Mobtown-Meerkats, I strolled through the streets. I scrolled the ipod to Johnny Cash and drank a fresh, bitter, expensive, and exceedingly refreshing gingerale and I walked, smiling at the strange film mundane city life made when watched to the soundtrack of "So Doggone Lonesome". I called up a friend I've known since I was fifteen. We've never been close, but we shared a love of ninjas and Diablo II and fart jokes, and stayed up way too late together with my brothers, playing Risk or Warcraft, back in the day. He and his wife have recently moved to Baltimore and they took me in for the night. I made them Mexican food and scones for dinner, and we laughed at all the stupid internet videos that have been making us laugh since 1997. I was afraid it might be awkward after several years, but I slipped back into old times like an old coat, and it was immensely cheering to be transported back to easier, sillier days. Other friends, and family, called and texted and emailed, weaving a solid net of comfort to hold these long intervening hours. Now everyone is asleep and I am on the couch, pondering what is to come, wishing prayer would arrive a little more easily. But today has been a prayer: a breath of thankgiving to find myself falling into open arms and a sense of awe when I realize the expected shock of hard and rocky ground has not reached me. I am afraid to pray about tomorrow, but emboldened by the blessings of today, I will try to face it with a clear heart and a measure of trust.
As usual I am trolling my poetry for comfort, and Emily Dickinson knows all about tomorrow:
A darting fear -- a pomp -- a tear --
A waking on a morn
To find that what one waked for,
Inhales the different dawn.
~Emily Dickinson
After I took my leave of the Mobtown-Meerkats, I strolled through the streets. I scrolled the ipod to Johnny Cash and drank a fresh, bitter, expensive, and exceedingly refreshing gingerale and I walked, smiling at the strange film mundane city life made when watched to the soundtrack of "So Doggone Lonesome". I called up a friend I've known since I was fifteen. We've never been close, but we shared a love of ninjas and Diablo II and fart jokes, and stayed up way too late together with my brothers, playing Risk or Warcraft, back in the day. He and his wife have recently moved to Baltimore and they took me in for the night. I made them Mexican food and scones for dinner, and we laughed at all the stupid internet videos that have been making us laugh since 1997. I was afraid it might be awkward after several years, but I slipped back into old times like an old coat, and it was immensely cheering to be transported back to easier, sillier days. Other friends, and family, called and texted and emailed, weaving a solid net of comfort to hold these long intervening hours. Now everyone is asleep and I am on the couch, pondering what is to come, wishing prayer would arrive a little more easily. But today has been a prayer: a breath of thankgiving to find myself falling into open arms and a sense of awe when I realize the expected shock of hard and rocky ground has not reached me. I am afraid to pray about tomorrow, but emboldened by the blessings of today, I will try to face it with a clear heart and a measure of trust.
As usual I am trolling my poetry for comfort, and Emily Dickinson knows all about tomorrow:
A darting fear -- a pomp -- a tear --
A waking on a morn
To find that what one waked for,
Inhales the different dawn.
~Emily Dickinson
Sunday, October 01, 2006
Sleepless in Baltimore.
Jeff lent me his beloved Ipod for this trip. It was a great comfort and an agile companion as I hurtled through the skies. Belle and Sebastian played on...
"I'm lucky, I can open the door and I can walk down the street
Unlucky, I've got noplace to go and so I follow my feet
A choice is facing you, a healthy dose of pain
A choice is facing you as you stare through the rain
A choice is facing you but I choose to refrain for today
Tomorrow we'll be back in trouble again...
Why is this happening to you? You are not a child
Why is this happening? You've too much on your mind
Things creep up on you when you are fast asleep
You are dreaming, you are sleepy
You are stuck to the sheets
In a town so small there's no escaping you
In a town so small there's no escape from view
In a town so small there's nothing left to do"
The sunset clouds from the plane were infinitely forgiving and welcoming, tipped with light: a pink and fertile field. Come to me, all you who are weary . . . I listed to The Postal Service sing a familiar song and realized with a sudden rush
of understanding and a flush of stupidity that it had always been about airplanes.
Knuckles clenched to white
as the landing gear detract for flight
My head's a balloon
inflating with the altitude
...
I watch the patchwork farms' slow fade into the ocean's arms
And from here they can't see me stare
The stale taste of recycled air
I watch the patchwork farms' slow fade into the ocean's arms
Calm down, release your cares
The stale taste of recycled air
I imagined the plane was going to crash, and I looked at the sleeping young man beside me who was shedding years with every moment he slept until he looked almost new-born, and I started to cry, and Sufjan Stevens sang.
"Oh the glory that the lord has made
And the complications when I see his face
In the morning in the window
Oh the glory when he took our place
But he took my shoulders and he shook my face
And he takes and he takes and he takes"
The clouds grew thicker and warmer and pinker, and I began to cry a little harder, good hot tears. I'd upgraded to first class, for the first time in my life and thirty dollars, so I had a lot of room to bury my face, and extra-deluxe napkins for my tears to go with my complimentary mint cookies. I woke up the sleeping innocent beside me and when he looked frightened I scoffed away my tears. It was Bright Eyes when I really wanted Simon and Garfunkle, but it did the job.
"if you swear that there's no truth and who cares
How come you say it like you're right?
Why are you scared to dream of God
When it's salvation that you want?
You see stars that clear have been dead for years
But the idea just lives on...
We are nowhere and it's now
We are nowhere and it's now
Like a ten minute dream in the passenger's seat
While the world was flying by
You haven't been gone very long
But it feels like a lifetime "
Now I am sleepless in my hotel. I floated in the hot pool in boy shorts and a tank-top, not having bought a bathing suit since my teenage years. The room was close and empty, and the heavily chlorinated steam stung my lately dried eyes. I went up to the cable TV and every channel was murder, save one, which had the Osbornes unintelligibly swearing at each other and dogs. I plugged my dying cell-phone into the wall and woke up a couple of friends and a sister for the company and drank a glass of wine. Billy Bragg sang.
"Thank you for the things you bought me--thank you for the card
Thank you for the things you taught me when you hit me hard
That love between two people must be based on understanding
Until that's true you'll find your things
All stacked out on the landing, surprise, surprise..."
And then I read my favourite poem again. (if you've been reading this blog for long, you have likely read this poem.)
The Only Animal
by Franz Wright
The only animal that commits suicide
went for a walk in the park,
basked on a hard bench
in the first star,
traveled to the edge of space
in an armchair
while company quietly
talked, and abruptly
returned,
the room empty
The only animal that cries,
that takes off its clothes
and reports to the mirror, the one
and only animal
that brushes its own teeth
somewhere
the only animal that smokes a cigarette,
that lies down and flies backward in time,
that rises and walks to a book
and looks up a word
heard the telephone ringing
in the darkness downstairs and decided
to answer no more.
And I understand,
too well: how many times
have I made the decision to dwell
from now on
in the hour of my death
(the space I took up here
scarlessly closing like water)
and said I'm never coming back,
and yet
this morning
I stood once again
in this world,
the garden
ark and vacant
tomb of what
I can't imagine,
between twin eternities,
some sort of wings,
more or less equidistantly
exiled from both,
hovering in the dreaming called
being awake, where
You gave me
in secret one thing
to perceive, the
tall blue starry
strangeness of being
here at all.
You gave us each in secret one thing to perceive.
Furless now, upright, My banished
and experimental
child
You said, though your own heart condemn you
I do not condemn you.
In gratefulness for the tall blue starry strangeness that is me, and gratefulness for Jeff and ipods and clouds, and turning my face to the morning, now I'll try to go to sleep.
"I'm lucky, I can open the door and I can walk down the street
Unlucky, I've got noplace to go and so I follow my feet
A choice is facing you, a healthy dose of pain
A choice is facing you as you stare through the rain
A choice is facing you but I choose to refrain for today
Tomorrow we'll be back in trouble again...
Why is this happening to you? You are not a child
Why is this happening? You've too much on your mind
Things creep up on you when you are fast asleep
You are dreaming, you are sleepy
You are stuck to the sheets
In a town so small there's no escaping you
In a town so small there's no escape from view
In a town so small there's nothing left to do"
The sunset clouds from the plane were infinitely forgiving and welcoming, tipped with light: a pink and fertile field. Come to me, all you who are weary . . . I listed to The Postal Service sing a familiar song and realized with a sudden rush
of understanding and a flush of stupidity that it had always been about airplanes.
Knuckles clenched to white
as the landing gear detract for flight
My head's a balloon
inflating with the altitude
...
I watch the patchwork farms' slow fade into the ocean's arms
And from here they can't see me stare
The stale taste of recycled air
I watch the patchwork farms' slow fade into the ocean's arms
Calm down, release your cares
The stale taste of recycled air
I imagined the plane was going to crash, and I looked at the sleeping young man beside me who was shedding years with every moment he slept until he looked almost new-born, and I started to cry, and Sufjan Stevens sang.
"Oh the glory that the lord has made
And the complications when I see his face
In the morning in the window
Oh the glory when he took our place
But he took my shoulders and he shook my face
And he takes and he takes and he takes"
The clouds grew thicker and warmer and pinker, and I began to cry a little harder, good hot tears. I'd upgraded to first class, for the first time in my life and thirty dollars, so I had a lot of room to bury my face, and extra-deluxe napkins for my tears to go with my complimentary mint cookies. I woke up the sleeping innocent beside me and when he looked frightened I scoffed away my tears. It was Bright Eyes when I really wanted Simon and Garfunkle, but it did the job.
"if you swear that there's no truth and who cares
How come you say it like you're right?
Why are you scared to dream of God
When it's salvation that you want?
You see stars that clear have been dead for years
But the idea just lives on...
We are nowhere and it's now
We are nowhere and it's now
Like a ten minute dream in the passenger's seat
While the world was flying by
You haven't been gone very long
But it feels like a lifetime "
Now I am sleepless in my hotel. I floated in the hot pool in boy shorts and a tank-top, not having bought a bathing suit since my teenage years. The room was close and empty, and the heavily chlorinated steam stung my lately dried eyes. I went up to the cable TV and every channel was murder, save one, which had the Osbornes unintelligibly swearing at each other and dogs. I plugged my dying cell-phone into the wall and woke up a couple of friends and a sister for the company and drank a glass of wine. Billy Bragg sang.
"Thank you for the things you bought me--thank you for the card
Thank you for the things you taught me when you hit me hard
That love between two people must be based on understanding
Until that's true you'll find your things
All stacked out on the landing, surprise, surprise..."
And then I read my favourite poem again. (if you've been reading this blog for long, you have likely read this poem.)
The Only Animal
by Franz Wright
The only animal that commits suicide
went for a walk in the park,
basked on a hard bench
in the first star,
traveled to the edge of space
in an armchair
while company quietly
talked, and abruptly
returned,
the room empty
The only animal that cries,
that takes off its clothes
and reports to the mirror, the one
and only animal
that brushes its own teeth
somewhere
the only animal that smokes a cigarette,
that lies down and flies backward in time,
that rises and walks to a book
and looks up a word
heard the telephone ringing
in the darkness downstairs and decided
to answer no more.
And I understand,
too well: how many times
have I made the decision to dwell
from now on
in the hour of my death
(the space I took up here
scarlessly closing like water)
and said I'm never coming back,
and yet
this morning
I stood once again
in this world,
the garden
ark and vacant
tomb of what
I can't imagine,
between twin eternities,
some sort of wings,
more or less equidistantly
exiled from both,
hovering in the dreaming called
being awake, where
You gave me
in secret one thing
to perceive, the
tall blue starry
strangeness of being
here at all.
You gave us each in secret one thing to perceive.
Furless now, upright, My banished
and experimental
child
You said, though your own heart condemn you
I do not condemn you.
In gratefulness for the tall blue starry strangeness that is me, and gratefulness for Jeff and ipods and clouds, and turning my face to the morning, now I'll try to go to sleep.
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