Self Portraits

I have gotten in the habit of painting a self portrait every couple of years.  I try to think of it as an exercise in self reflection.  But sometimes I think I must not have a very good mind/body connection, because when I am working with an image of myself, I really don't identify with it very much.  The process becomes almost one of illustrating abstract shapes and is therefore quite relaxing when I can get really lost in it.

Note:  I had some technical difficulties when uploading the images, so these images are not in the order I wanted them to be.  The first one I painted is the one that is predominantly pink.  The next one is the one with the doorknob.  The third one is the mostly black and white one.  And the most recent one is directly below.

Self Reflection

This self portrait was inspired by my Macbook camera and its special effects.  The dots in this one are much smaller than the ones I usually work with and are cut from magazines with a hole punch.  The dimensions are 24"x24".

Heliotrope 

(from the collection of Donna Maberry)

The frame is made of photographic transfers from photos of me taken at the same time as the one I used to paint the portrait.  The owner of this one swears that the eyes follow her.  The size of this one is about 40"x42".

Portrait of the Artist as a Forty Year Old Woman 

(from the collection of Michael and Catherine Lenz)

This is my first self portrait and one of my very first "dot" paintings.  It measures 42"x42".

Self Portal 

Yes, this was painted when my hair still had some pigment, and yes, that is a door knob on it.  This painting measures about 30"x40".

I married a linebacker...

Notice my hair is a little longer on this avatar...

And for those of you who don't remember, it was Rick Larkin who always said this on the morning announcements.

I'm not sure what it is about the first few days of school when we start back each year, but my feet hurt so bad, I am almost in tears.  I can be on my feet for hours at a stretch when  I am painting and never have this problem.  I think somehow the tension and stress of that first week back on campus goes right to my foundation!

I talked to my grandson today and was reminded that my situation is not so different from that of my students.  I asked Dave if he had a nice teacher (and he assured me that he does) and he asked me if I had nice kids.  I told him that I do, but then I really thought about what he was asking and realized how important to all of us it is that those we are scheduled to be with for 45 minutes at a time are "nice."  I have been told over the years that students don't "care how much you know" until they "know how much you care."  Well, let me tell you, teachers can teach anything to students who are nice.  They will jump through whatever hoops are placed in their paths to make their students successful.  Of course, we all know that our kids bring a lot of baggage to school with them, and maybe some of that stuff makes it really difficult for them to be nice.  So I am reminded how important it is for me to reach those students.  How vital it is for me to be sane and stable for them, even when my feet hurt.

Thanks to all of my student who have been so kind the past two days.  And please be patient with me until I get my legs under me again.  We are going to have an exceptional year.

I also want to thank the football boys who asked me today if I would wear their jerseys on Friday.  You have no idea what it means to a teacher to be honored that way.  I can only wear one jersey each week, but I will have all of you in my heart as you go onto the field Friday night. After all, as I always say, when I write my autobiography, I will title it, "I Married a Linebacker!"

A Day in Twelve Pieces

The painting above is because I am missing my Dave.  The poem below is an experiment in a day's worth of writing.

A DAY IN TWELVE PIECES

6:23 a.m.  From the milk-giving tree

First milk, then butter, then the sun and the moon, then the witch waves her wand, hazel wand and brings luck to the lovers.  These are models from life.  These are models.  From life.  These are… ah, warm elixir of love.  There is no time to start with the small things.

8:45 a.m. Marginal language

Between the in breath and the out, the realization and the smile, a message slumbers revolving around this refusal to be reduced.  Parry, parry, parry, unable to thrust--beyond the necessity for needlework, what do women forgive?  Unable to trust, almost lost in translation, they need music in their hands and dialogue body to body.

9:50 a.m. Small savior

Scantily dressed in worn shorts and striped shirt, I saw you bow ceremoniously to the unseen.  In front of a suitable backdrop, a single peach hangs from an almost barren tree, careful to cling just enough without appearing needy.  “Are you pleased to be the last peach?  Will you die for the answers?  What will the end be like after all?”

10:00 a.m. Further the modern

Chock full and aching, I would like to talk of other matters.

11:40 a.m. Precarious and uncertain

I blend colors to make brown, but the light changes, and the red shows through.

2:00 p.m. Loquacious Woman

Behind lacy incidentals and boiled credentials, she cracks nuts with her teeth to boot.

 

3:19 p.m. Red on black

Observe these grit-tempered wares impressed with fingernails… Probably made by a pupil, or perhaps a poetess occasionally employed.

 

5:50 p.m. Anticipating Carravagio

Ecstatic dancers and half-seated figures… “In this position?” you may ask as I take off my mask.  You may ask, or you may say, “Bravo!”

5:53 p.m. Utterly indeterminate

Perhaps love is a cliché, but if you can get an actor Meisner has trained…

 

5:54 p.m. Lady of light

When the water drips from my hair, I would be a streambed.  When I look in the mirror, I would have a silver back.  When steam rises from my legs, I would be the cool above the tub.  Where there is friction, you are the vine joining earth and sky.  When you smile at me, I shine beauty above the waterline.  If you touch me, I will shatter into a million shining droplets of deception.

 

7:36 p.m. Too far gone by Tuesday

Colors can push you over the edge, and I really prefer the sketchiness of the pencil sound, the way the round, undefined housing shelters me from the lead.  I prefer to live with the promise of eras ability, so ironically decisive, yet I still cross things out (out of habit).  You must realize that even this writing is not without some danger.  The friction can become tiresome, can become needy, can become divisive, and I might get caught up in the reflection of that shiny metal piece that ties eraser to wood, that little connector so needlessly intricate and cold.

 

9:20 p.m. Double bind

The sun, the moon and the earth have aligned themselves but the belt hangs low on the left and no adhesive holds this image aloft.  “Here I could love you,” you say as we lie in the grass, but my arms have fallen asleep and machine noise loads the sky.  Still, you sing.  If I could hear you, such tunes might move me.  If I could lather away these fumes, I would breathe you in that you might soothe me, but the city is deep, and no bridges cross the mystery.

 

 

Burning Away the Blues

With school starting back, this painting seemed like an appropriate image to share.  And I guess the poem I have chosen to include today, which is one of my older ones, could be considered a back to nature piece.

Then, if you haven't already, be sure to scroll down to my previous post and click the play button.  I made this avatar at www.voki.com.  I have a lot of fun using my "talking head" to tell my students things for which I don't want to take responsibility.  I already have one waiting to tell them about the upcoming test on their summer reading...

BURNING AWAY THE BLUES

The best cure

is to sit bare-assed

on the porch

 

before the reds take over,

before the yellows burn away

the fog from dependable fence lines.

 

As the bottom of your coffee cup rises

wet and shimmering like a full moon in degrees,

learn the secrets of the morning…

and hope the neighbors understand.

 

From the Conversations

The painting above is titled "Mary Looks at the Future."

A couple of years ago I started a series of poems and stories titled "Conversations with the Virgin," based on my peripheral attraction to the ritualism of the Catholic faith and my connection with the feminine.  I am including a couple of poems and a story below which are from this series.

FORMATION, REFORMATION & THE SUBSEQUENT MELTDOWN

Lady of Longing, 

I have learned something

about the way days fall into place

like ideas, preordained packets,

not cube-like by necessity,

but illuminated and interconnected.

To allow life to fall away

gracefully

must be the greatest gift.

And if there was not enough touching,

I fear there were never enough days.

So the sequence remains.

The pieces will fall.

And when they've all dropped,

the falling will stop.

There will be no lightning

and no rain

or thunder.

Hardly fodder for the tabloids,

yet off the scale 

in unexpectedness.

FULL PARDON

Lady of Luminous Laughter,

I know you must look down on me

and wonder at my stupidity,

that you surely marvel at my inability

to appreciate the wonder that saturates my life.

Prone to melancholy, sometimes

I pretend that my tears are born of glee

and that the sudden lurching snap

that jerks me predictably toward the earth's hot core

is natural and even desirable.

Sometimes I confuse you

with the young Cambodian woman

who runs the cash register at the liquor store,

so determined to pull from me

some detail of my day, yet always willing

to pay me for my reluctant patience

with her boundless exuberance

and with her predictable reassurance,

those four simple words, "You are so beautiful!"

Sometimes you remind me of my friend Kat,

you know, the one with the tumor,

and the way she looked at me that day

and how with a smile that lifted only

the left side of her face, she said simply,

"You have a beautiful life."

Sometimes my face turns hot

and my shame grows unchecked.

It blossoms uninhibited in my chest

until almost no oxygen remains and

all I can think is that I should have 

visited Mamma before she died.

I imagine you there, in that otherworldly place,

with your arms crossed serenely over you breasts,

your veil held softly against your face.

There you float toward the ceiling, laughing,

raining peace and understanding from the rafters.

JUST WANTED TO SAY

So, listen, Lady of Unlimited Wisdom, I have curled around your leg like a cat, overcoming my aloofness, shedding the burden of my loneliness, driven by the bone deep wish just to be scratched.  I have snagged your hems intentionally at times and been dragged down the same melancholy path unnoticed by the masses for days and weeks and years.

I admit I have been greedy in my quest for love.  Like water thrown wasted on the floor before a thirsty beast, my faith spreads thin and in the end evaporates.  But I will settle for the dregs of last morning’s dew, for I have been told by those who know that you have always been the one who holds the answers.

Thank God your gaze is elsewhere focused, for to face your vision under the gravity of such sight would surely signal the end of life as I have known it.  And I have known it.  I have learned that pain contained can be diluted, allowed to seep from day into night, night into day.  And I’ve grown tired, yet I cannot sleep… 

                                          * * * *

I went to a funeral yesterday, and after only moments in the church, I was snared by the organized beauty of religion’s patterns. Admiring even the placement of the choir chairs in the loft, I became confused, as usual, by the difference between aesthetics and grace, as I was transported to that childhood place where light once shone so sweetly from a promised shore.

I was twelve, the age of accountability, and the church still held substantial mystery for me.  But promises were followed too closely by demands, so, growing cold, I turned deliberately toward the pursuits hinted at by the new boy four rows back.

No cushions on the seats made squirming inevitable, and the wooden pockets on the backs of the benches were always empty of visitor cards.  Since we didn’t do that introductory thing, (where visitors remained seated, and regulars, like falsely reassuring, if somewhat curious aliens, stood, turned in all directions, and sought reluctant hands for the shaking) I knew I was on my own when it came to making contact.

I’m not sure what happened to the boy’s real mom, but he had a nice new one with blond hair and soft, petal-colored clothing, perhaps a little too polished to be proper for church, but her husband was an usher and their family always sat near the back.  I think I was drawn to them, because I, too, was shiny.  Having buffed myself almost raw,

I thought that taking off the rough edges would somehow make me less visible.  In effect, I had developed a patina that screamed for the whole world’s attention.  

But back to the boy.  Eddie.  More precisely, Edgar Howell, and how he looked at me covertly  in the beginning.  But then he made friends with the other guys and when they all sat together, they looked at me from what seemed like all directions at once until I felt like a compass, spinning slightly from side to side as though vibrating from unseen forces.

We went on, content with this pattern for a while.  But things change.  As Eddie grew tall and handsome, he acted more interested, especially when his friends fanned the embers of our smoldering infatuation.  And at least once every Sabbath evening that fall, he issued me a personal invitation to accompany him behind the church.  I blushed and half-pretended not to hear or understand, until his taunting demands for attention pushed us both off a bit off center and I said, “Okay.”

The audience, astonished, withdrew. 

It was November and the wind was cold, and though I think what he really wanted to do was escape to the safety of the sanctuary, he had to follow through on his implied threats of what he would do to me if he got me alone.  So he got me alone.  And he kissed me with what would surely be described as expertise, until we were both a little breathless and immediately giddy with our newfound guilt.  (I like to think the reality was too much to share with his friends and that no one has ever mentioned that moment until now...)

So we met halfway, two rows up for him, two rows back for me, where every Sunday, we shielded each other from friends and family, as we held hands religiously.

But things change.  Even memories.  And I wonder if I’ve remembered the truth.  Maybe I’ve dropped important sensory data along the path on my way to today.  And over-edited reality has taught me there are truly moments that should not be taken for granted.  So I thought today about that kiss, and how it made me late for Bible class…

I thought about the teacher named Birdie, and how I remember liking her because she loved her husband, tall and quiet and slim…  She seemed afraid of the rest of the world, but I could tell she had no fear of him.  She was a tiny, dark woman with finger-waved hair, and I liked to watch her, not because she was spectacular, but because she had no need to watch me.

They had the most beautiful daughter in the world.  I decided she was a model maybe, because she almost never came to church.  I assumed her job kept her busy, you know, traveling the globe, tossing back her glowing, golden hair, shoulder length, and gray-blue eyes that moved calmly from face to face never moving away too quickly.  She had a small dark mole beside her pouty mouth, and she was tall, with nice ankles and soft hands.  I remember pretending she was a mirror reflecting the real me.

I grow sad thinking of Birdie and her husband and her kids.  I remember one Sunday in particular, when Birdie’s die-cut felt Zacheus refused to stick to her die-cut Sycamore tree.  She tried over and over to make it work, but the fourth time he fell to the floor, she started to cry. Very quietly.  And somehow I knew that her son, whom I had never even seen, would not be coming home from Vietnam.

I wanted to touch her hand that day, but I didn’t, and since I was developing the habit of living without words, I couldn’t tell her that somewhere, someone knew how she felt.  All I could do was pick up the felt pieces, lay them neatly in their precisely cut storage places, and hope they would be ready to stick the next time she pressed them on the sturdy tree.

And, Lady, I have to admit, sometimes when I talk to you, it’s really Birdie’s face I see, and well, I just wanted to say, how sorry I’ve always been about your son.

Bridging the Chasm

·          Art is a struggle to communicate.  And I don't mean that in a negative way.  The poem below perhaps explains what I am trying to say better than I can say it in prose.  Note:  Broca's aphasia, also known as expressive aphasia, is caused by damage to the anterior regions of the brain.  Sufferers of this type of aphasia have difficulty initiating speech and writing.  Both are often labored and halting.  This poem was inspired by the trash truck that wakes me up every weekday morning as it empties the dumpster across the street at the school, proving that poetic inspiration can come from anywhere!

AS THOUGH SUFFERING FROM BROCA'S APHASIA

Five a.m. brings the roar, the bump,

the backing up of the truck

that dumps the trash across the street

as I slip from sleep to memory

and catalogue events since

yesterday's waking.

Silently I call to you as all around us

bodies fall through the dark

hoping to be caught by another's surprise.

I imagine collective shadows as they

dive--choreographed, practiced, perfected.

Joined by mystery, they strive for divinity

and struggle to speak without words.

Because I cannot say, I stumble through the day

refusing to take sacred images at face value,

and I strain to remember, when

as plentiful as pain,

as coincidental as night bugs

smeared on glass,

the ties between future and past

were most clear in that sharp intake of breath--

when I was severed from my wings.

Words fail, systems fail, 

still we are soundlessly bound

by these golden connections.

Compulsively examining each link of the chain,

ever hungry for the comfort of noise,

we need an endless stream of illusion,

a believable dream of grace

and the certainty of imaginable sequels.

“Bridging the Chasm” the painting that accompanies today's blog, has a story behind it.  My studio is located in a century old building a block off the town square.  A couple of years ago, one of the old drug stores on the square was demolished to make way for a new coffee house.  I observed the renovation process and was intrigued when the original brick walls were uncovered and the cigarette ads that had been painted on them several generations earlier were revealed.  Before the new construction began, I assisted a photographer friend of mine with a fashion shoot set inside the shell of the old drug store.  The model was a young woman who had designed her own line of clothing.  The canvas, which was inspired by the photos taken that day, shows the model looking back into the past as she launches herself into what she hopes will be a bright future.  The irony of the piece is that she turns her back on the observer instead of turning her back on the past.  The resulting pose is indeed one of confidence bordering on arrogance.  Set against the backdrop of the turn-of-the-century cigarette ads, the modern iconic model is seen potentially as an all-conquering giantess.  Due to the viewer’s angles, however, the female figure is also simultaneously objectified.  Note:  The dimensions of this painting are 72"x48", making it a bit bigger than life.

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Trying to Find the Words

As the photo above illustrates, I am feeling a little negative...  Sometimes feelings are very difficult to put into words.  Often it is our strongest feelings that are the most difficult to translate into a language that lets others experience what we are experiencing.  I say this because I am discouraged today and a bit at a loss of how to explain why. 

After a week of school in-service, I am left feeling like an old, white woman, and evidently this is the least valued subgroup in the world of education.  I know this was not the intent of the speakers I listened to during the past few days.  I know I am a pretty good teacher and a kind person who strives daily not to discriminate against any minority.  I know also that I have not reached every student in every class that I have ever taught.  I am hoping that next week will lead to some strategies for curing my shortcomings.

I suppose you could say that psychologically I have been somewhat broken down and am ready to be rebuilt in the image of a super educator.  After a weekend of rest, I will approach next week with an open mind and a willingness to do whatever it takes to be a better teacher.  At least this is what I desire.  And that’s an important step.

With regard to writing, as well as painting, sometimes desire is everything.  The desire to create can become even more important than the message behind the creation.  Sometimes when I really have the urge to paint, I am left not knowing quite what my subject should be.  When this happens I usually build canvases and prep them. Though that is not a very creative process, it does usually free up my mind to think about what I want to put on the canvas when it is ready.

When I haven’t written in a while, I try to break the silence by writing in my journal or my blog.  I also read a lot.  And usually before I know it, I have connected with something and the words of a story or a poem just come.  One of the best ways I know to get into writing is through found poetry.  For those who have never tried this, a found poem is created by simply taking a text and using the words, phrases and even whole passages from it to create a new text.  This is done by changing spacing, lines and meaning.

            The poem below was “found” in a book titled The Land and People of Turkey by William Spencer, written in 1958.

 

IN THE UNIVERSAL FASHION

 

When the innermost sanctum is locked up,

a seeker must be satisfied

with a look at the walls.

Glimpsing houses packed tightly together,

we stroll down streets

where men greet each other warmly,

where they kiss on both cheeks,

where horns are forbidden,

and where women,

like old costumes,

follow suit

as children are brought forward

to kiss lightly the hands of the sultan.

 

No glass in the windows.

No gardens in yards.

But the desert blooms

and the peach tree clings

to a crag, a sort of blessing

where nothing is wasted.

 

In the universal fashion,

grown men walk the streets

holding hands, a curious custom

to those with no closeness.

But don’t tease them;

they are made and unmade

according to mood.

As elegant as a new slaughter,

they send up flares of believability

like naked light bulbs

offering the first rays of hope.

 

Heads, legs, backs, smooth skin—

it all sounds so romantic.

 

So let’s pick poppies

and be properly inspired,

like bricks set in plaster

at weird angles to the beam.

The Core of the Matter

Every day I think about my struggle with technology.  I rely on my computer for everything it seems these days.  I use it to communicate, to create, to write, to edit, to teach, to play... and yet I still struggle against it.  Maybe it is just my generation.  Maybe connectivity just doesn't come naturally to me.  

The painting above is titled The Core of the Matter.  Obviously it is a stark still life.  What is not readily obvious, however, is that many of the 1,200 plus dots that make up the surface of the painting are tiny images (or if you prefer, pixels) related to technology.  In a way I see my struggle as being similar to the universal struggle for knowledge and the resulting dissatisfaction.  As a curious child, one of my most profound intellectual moments was when I was about ten years old and I realized that no matter how hard I tried, I would never be able to acquire all human knowledge!

I have always been fascinated with the quest for knowledge and the loss of innocence that is inevitable.  That is why I chose to base this painting on the symbol of the apple.  In a way, the poem below also springs from this theme.

A MACHINE FOR MAKING GOD

How do I interpret these desires?  The I is incidental, the sky blue.  Chromatic aberration explains how we fall repeatedly into the crime, refracted and persistently seeking refuge.  Stay. Stand.  Study understood.  Obstinate.  Static.  Prostrate.  Vision restored.

Personal language shatters dualism, appropriately transcending other and self, human and divine.  So I am the prism, and every moment is a different condition.  Every moment the image changes, every moment simultaneously... and as always at the center is idolatry:  no image maker worships the gods--he knows what stuff they're made of.

So, I am the ocean.  And I am lit from within.  Break the surface.  Reflect the universe.  The angle is critical.  Fall here.

Where'd that come from?

Getting back to work this week has created a real division of emotion in me.  I have had the pleasure of spending a lot of time with my grandson Dave this summer and suddenly I don't get to see him at all.  When I went home for lunch today, he was swimming.  The photo above is typical of the view I get of him!  He has gone from being afraid to put his face in the water at the start of the summer to being able to not only swim, but also able to do five consecutive flips underwater and, as evidenced above, a pretty good handstand.  I am thankful that we had so much time together to make memories.  And watching him overcome his fears, actually turning them into joys, reminds me that I must do the same in my own life.

I know I am not the only one who has time juggling the various aspects of my personality.  I am proud to be a teacher, a wife, a mother, a grandmother, an artist and a writer.  Some days I am overwhelmed.  But then I realize how very lucky I am to have such a wide range of ways to vent my frustration.  The poem below resulted from such a search for peace.   The title was inspired by a statue I saw in the Louvre.  

CROUCHING APHRODITE

I can't do this today,

this brilliant juggling of gibberish

when no sounds express my longing

and I need you to help me walk.

Hold me loosely like a gifted doll,

putting first one foot and then the other,

until nothing fills my toothless pumpkin head

but endless iambs heel to toe

and we're embedded

in the sway of left to right.

I know God loves me.

How that breathless hip hop moves me!

But I need to push this pale orange air

that heats my skin past ripeness, 

need to cover the same line

over and again

until my footprints can be tracked

on this sandy, shifting path.

I need the background of chimes

to help me feel

that ambient steel sound

down my spine,

so like that unexpected tingle

when I first saw your eyes shimmering

at the bottom of the lake.

I need to know...

what does it take 

to learn to sink like that?

Inspiration comes from lots of places.  The poem below was inspired by a couple of articles in a Scientific American  magazine.

THE DISTANCE BETWEEN

At any given moment

thousands of lightning bolts bombard the planet,

phallic symbolism in action,

small miraculous impregnations...

Last week people were claiming again

to see faces on the surface of Mars

hoping the far-out landscape

might hold clues from the past.

Did they imagine alien urban wonders

where only dirt mound flukes existed?

Or was their vision the brainchild

of some Gestalt field completion theorist?

What does it matter if it made them look?

Every time I see you, I wonder

about that loneliness behind your smile.

I wonder, if I asked, if you would look at me

with first one eye and then the other

(a simple trick to make me dance).

Look at me quickly then off to the side,

and if you've been crying,

or if you squint just right,

perhaps some lightning bolts will fly.

To determine the distance to the strike,

divide by five the number of seconds 

between the flash and the thunder,

then report the distance in miles.

Right Thinking

Well, I started back to work today, to inservice.  And though it was hard to get up and go earlier than I had all summer, I was thankful to have a job in today's economy when so many are looking for work.  The day was filled with thoughts and theories about the direction the school year would take.  I am always optimistic as the year begins and was reminded of the story below.

RIGHT THINKING

One day as I was headed home after having dropped a friend off at his house, I had to go through the four way stop at the corner of College and Prairieville Streets.  Anyway, just as I got there, three other cars arrived simultaneously.  We all stopped at the exact same moment. So, none of us knew what to do.  Within seconds you could see the confusion and irritation begin to simmer.  I imagined each one of us trying to remember what the driver's education manual said about the vehicle to the right having the right of way... and thinking from which corner does "right" commence.

Then all at once we realized that all four of us had turned on our turn signals and that we were all making right turns!  It was like a chair reaction of relief.  I saw the tension leave the shoulders of the other drivers in a kind of visual sigh.  No one had to be first.  No one had to be faster.  I couldn't keep from smiling a little.  No one could.  It was a beautiful small moment, and I was reminded that many of the things I worry about never come about at all.

Off Route 66

These three short pieces were written for a journal called Route 66 (unfortunately now defunct) in which every piece was exactly 66 words.  It is an interesting challenge to set a scene, create a voice, or tell a story under such strict limitations.  It also reminds me how important a title can be in preparing the reader.  Try it.  And post your results in the comments.

 

OR WE COULD PUT TINFOIL ON THE WINDOWS…

            Mamma wasn’t listening.

“Or maybe I need one of those satin sleep masks like the movie stars wear…”

            I stretched out on Mamma’s bed, corpselike, and began to snore like a stooge.

            “Of course, there’s always the danger that I could forget to take if off, and wander out of my room, out of the house, into the street, and…”

            “Okay!” she snapped.  “Forget the nap!”

 

 

BACK ON THE SHELF 

Raindrops reconfigured and lurched toward the clouds.  Modern poetry leapt from the parking lot’s neatly end-stopped, asphalt spaces back into Clara’s bag as the lengthy rip mended itself like a closing zipper.  Her car doors locked and she shouldered backwards through the double doors of the bookstore where the bored clerk accurately returned her money.  Seeing Sam so unexpectedly was crushing.  Clara systematically returned the books.

           

 

STREETLIGHT BLINDNESS

Later, in my street-lit white room, I pulled the sheet over my head, and very still, wondered what it was like to die, whether people would line up and look at me some day, a motionless mound held down by a clinging sheet.  I tried to imagine the people who had died that night, but I could only imagine their tiredness… their sudden willingness to sleep.

Reluctant Memoir

The poem and memoir below both resulted from a journal practice that begins with "I remember" then switches to "I don't remember."  This is a great way to tap into memories that are not readily accessible.  The painting above is of a cemetery angel in the old Fredricksburg city cemetery.  It is based on an Elizabeth Nee sculpture.  

HOW TO GO ABOUT UNDERSTANDING, WITHOUT STEPPING ON IT DIRECTLY

I remember developing breasts,

(it was the same year the Russians launched Sputnik)

and going with my aunt to buy my first fully-trained bra,

and learning from the lady at Tots-to-Teens

how important it would be someday

to bend over at the waist when I put it on

 

and the first time I bent over.

 

I remember learning that there were men in the world

who wanted to teach me about the men in the world,

and how the faint strong smell of bleach

tinted my sheets last week after I washed the colors

with the whites and left them on the line to dry

 

bleeding happily all together.

 

I don’t remember learning I would die,

but it must have been like stepping casually

into a freshly laundered dream,

like stepping into a white tulip skirt

trimmed round the hem

with crimson quatrefoils and tears. 

 

I wonder if I cried,

and when the flowers will start to bleed.

NOT EXACTLY DYING TO KNOW

I remember my first boy-girl party, how I dressed up in a new gray sweater, and since my breasts had become substantial enough to hold some sway, how I inspected my reflection from side to side predicting a world about to change.  I remember arriving at my boyfriend’s house and, like an honored princess, descending the steps to the basement where my new friends were already divided into small, gossip-sharing groups.  Too nervous to eat or drink, I wasn’t sure I wanted to play the games I knew we’d play.  Then the lights went out.  And I found myself grabbed from behind by a boy too big to be Bobby.  Supported by his hands on my breasts, I was goose-stepped across the floor and dropped in the middle of the room The lights came back on. 

He said, “See, I told you I would do it, and man, is she…”

And I knew even before I saw familiar fingers on the switch that I had been set up.  In that moment of illumination, Bobby’s mother came down those stairs with frumpy shoes, starched white apron, brownies mounded on a tray, and a scowl on her face.

She said, “Robert, do not play with the lights when people are on the (pregnant pause here)… stairs.”

She seemed to understand why everyone was laughing, why I stood alone center stage, and why her oldest son, cupped his hands toward his own chest as though they were still filled with my angora.

For years I imagined not that my prince would appear, but that his brother would return, the one who breathed so heavily in my ear that day, the one who had grinned as he rotated his guilty hands into a universal palm-up gesture of innocence.  I would pretend that he wanted to apologize for my grave disappointment.

But he never came.  And the damage remained.

I don’t remember when my heart stopped, but they said it was about thirty minutes into a tube-tying surgery the afternoon of my third child’s birth as my blood pressure slipped dangerously low and was unable to right itself.  It was as though some unknown traitor had flipped the switch off and left me stranded in the dark.

I tried not to wake, enshrouded as I was by a cold so intense it made my shoulders shake as though with uncontrollable laughter at some hysterical practical joke.

“Well, look who’s back!”  The post-op orderly pried open my eyelid with her thumb and said, “Now, Mamma, don’t squeeze that girl so tight; you might just pop them stitches loose!”

Instantly lucid, I struggled to escape the heat against my back before realizing it was Mamma who’d crawled into my bed to spoon her warmth onto me.  Trying to focus on the face of the nurse checking my vital signs, I was drawn instead past her to the vintage black and white images on the TV.  Over her shoulder a camera panned the crowd as a flag-draped casket moved past, then stopped on a small boy offering a salute.

I was in kindergarten the year JFK was killed, and I’ve watched those grainy films so many times the blood spatter has become matter of fact.  But that day in the hospital, I saw the horror unfold as artistically as if it were an origami dove smoothed out before me.  And when the complexity was deconstructed, my drug-relaxed mind found between the resulting lines an elemental truth:  the anniversary of Kennedy’s death was now the anniversary of mine.

Since then I’ve grown to think of dying as a process initiated on the day we are born.  Having been in the dark a couple of times, I have learned the importance of living in the light, and I try not to worry so much about who controls the switch.

 

Buying Time

Have you ever noticed that in advertisements for watches the hands are almost always set at ten past ten?  Check out a few ads and you will see.  Anyway, this just proves that inspiration for a poem can come from anywhere.

Note:  Timex says the hands on the timepieces are placed at the ten-ten position so the company logo on the face will be framed and not blocked by the hands.  The industry standard used to be eight-twenty, but that looked too much like a frown and created an unhappy look, so they changed it.

BUYING TIME

from the Falling Bodies series

Pointing northwest and northeast,

all new timepiece hands

are set at ten past ten.

(Its an internationally supplicating posture

based on market research,

subliminal message,

and the appealing gesture

of the raised hands.)

In a life filled 

with such trivial manipulation,

some days I am tempted

to identify, classify and name

all of my demons.

Some day you save me.

You push against me 

as gently as a breeze.

As surely as a blood thrum

that accompanies a potent brew,

you coax from me

incantations,

bright sounds springing

from the same root

as birdsong.

Through mystical language

I am bound to be set free.

When I was a victim of self-forgery,

you compelled me to see

I could never have been born

under the hands of another.

When I lost my feathers,

you offered music 

and opened my ears.

If I could have brought forth,

one by one,

all the fish in the sea,

I would not have found

the magic salmon

on my own.

In small tribute, I lift my hands,

I touch your mouth,

for to dive into such honey

is to be born into sweetness,

pure sunlight, 

again and again.

More Than Corduroy

(I am posting this poem from the series Falling Bodies at the request of Rachel Tobes.  I thought I had lost it in the ether, but it finally surfaced.  I guess this is appropriate for a poem based on accidental discoveries.)

MORE THAN CORDUROY

So, maybe you were right,

you know, about corduroy,

about it not being accidental,

not like post-it notes, assumptions and electricity,

and about how the push-pull

of such a two-way fuzziness

could come between two people

with so little surface tension.

 

And maybe you were right,

you know, about this other thing—

this escalating dance,

this shattered calm, and how,

more than corduroy,

it makes my fingers move

in trancelike patterns,

makes me bite my lip,

and giggle,

and cry.