All you need to know about me you will find here in each poem, in a turn of phrase, in a photo. I am a Best Friend and I love one. I am an artist and I am fighting cancer. I'd paint anything that stood still long enough and I have a few cats (no specific number here).
Today Summer was waning and Fall made it's appearance there is always one day, one day when you know a season has passed and another is here In the Spring it's always the day when you can go out without a coat and just by chance a crocus will bloom and you know you won't face another morning of frost another night of whistling winter winds not for awhile, not for a few months, not tomorrow
Today someone who loves me read me a poem I wrote years ago that I couldn't remember writing and even though it made him sad he shared it with me and for a few moments we lived as Uncle Walt trying to find meaning in the trees looking for the one leaf that will convince me fall is here and summer was gone I wanted to hold off frost for just a few more weeks hoping that more of the morning glories would bloom because I think they have become my new favorite flower they teach me patience and I will need that patience when the earth is covered in snow when Superman will look briefly for the green mermaid when the summer bugs stop singing me to sleep
Oh Emily let the winged creatures you loved teach me about hope let them land on my sill and share with me the secrets they keep and I will push fall and winter aside and plan the Spring garden I will be fearless I will paint more I will wrap myself in that cloak of hope and truly believe I will believe in summers that last forever for gardens blooming under winter snows I will believe in sweet men who read poetry to women who cherish them and of course that the morning glories will bloom just another few weeks.
He tells me that in the next life we will find the other sooner in life we will live by the sea in a house full of books and paintings and of course a cat with six toes and when we grow weary of love as lovers often do I will remind him how long it took to know us the last time around and I'll dye my hair red and learn to cook souffle and we can eat it in a hammock under an azure sky full of clouds that look like circus animals
I won't get jealous when women admire your sweet smile and you'll agree I should travel to meet the poets and miss me until I return and we'll meet at the Cafe Du Mond drinking coffee because the first time I saw you, you were drinking coffee and I fell like an autumn leaf sailing happily to it's demise only to be reborn under an autumn sky wrapped in the love of the harvest moon shining in the blue of your eye
I will keep a jar at our bedside table where I an capture that noise you make right before the sigh that whispers to me you'll let go and give up your rib all over again and when we are old the together kind of old and on a park bench near the Seine and you ask me why I have loved you through two lifetimes because it will take me that long to convince you we have loved before and will again I will pull the jar from my bag the jar that looks as though it holds a thousand fireflies and open it to play the sweetest battle cry of desire, a symphony of nights in foreign hotels, in our room by the sea, in the hammock in our garden and even the hotel in Paris
and I will tell you that you fill my head with music that even after two lifetimes my heart beats faster when you are close that you push away the wallow of sadness I tend to swim in and you'll ask me what you ask me over and over so I'll never wonder and I'll ask you back was there Spring before I loved you? Do you really think of me when you put on your socks? Is it forever thine, forever mine not a day less because I'd miss you so just you and I on the river and a jar of fireflies planning for the next time
I was missing my mother all day today as I fiddled around with the idea of fall closing in and putting away some of the garden. Another year turns and I don't miss them any less, those that aren't here anymore. So, I went to find Peter Gabriel and he kept me company while I hung the Halloween witch from a tree and fashioned the giant spider on the side of the house as a Saturday spins by.
I am my mother's only one It's enough
I wear my garment so it shows Now you know
Only love is all maroon Gluey feathers on a Flume Sky is womb and she's the moon
I am my mother on the wall, with us all I move in water, shore to shore; [ Flume lyrics from http://www.lyricsyoulove.com/p/peter_gabriel/flume/ ] Nothing's more
Only love is all maroon Lapping lakes like leary loons Leaving rope burns -- Reddish ruse
Only love is all maroon Gluey feathers on a flume Sky is womb and she's the moon
The arrival of the Monarch holds us in the reverence of God's design and as we are an audience to his beauty we are reminded that nature is the inspiration for all art and God's Apollonian winged ornament tempts man's torment his want to pluck apart anything more beautiful than himself He is brave he is Mercury taking flight unafraid feeding from and nurturing flowers like the buzzing bee and as I am an instrument of God I stand here gentle reader as his shield and in telling you of his beauty, his sword beauty can after all cause such want, such need and eventually such pain
Then there is the tiger pacing in his diminutive cage man's opportunity to humble such a fierce creature and they will poke him, this pacing calculated feral animal who would if left free tear the spectators limb from limb and with a glance can strike fear even in those who carry guns some creatures after all believe they can conquer anything they are born with that inherent belief that they are Zeus they are of the mighty Gods just walking around us as though we are furniture and for their restraint we put them in a cage trying to capture what we aren't trying to reign in fire trying to push back the ocean bucket by bucket of disdain and of course fear
And as we are reminded we are all human why is it that we take the best of us and try to dismantle them? pluck their wings make them into Godlike creatures, make their presence almost unattainable with doubt and speculation take for example man, a man among the Gods a man that teaches, that guides us that would be a prophet of sorts in an age where prophets no longer exist and in a moment mans design to be whom he is he steals a kiss, a simple kiss we would destroy him, we would take away all he is make him humble, remove from him what is who he is just to remind us that he is of us, human and rather than celebrate the piece of him that was God we would dress him in shame and pull his wings cage his soul poke at him with sharp sticks and tell ourselves we are better for it such is life such is love such is man
******************************************************** I can't think of a better thing to do on the anniversary of 9/11 than listen to Ani DeFranco, she is after all a singing patriot. I love this one:
she says forget what you have to do pretend there is nothing outside this room and like an idea she came to me but she came too late or maybe too soon I said please try not to love me close your eyes, I'm turning on the light you know I have no vacancy and it's awfully cold outside tonight
the rain stains the brick a darker red slowly I'm rolling out of her bed the rain stains the streets a darker black I dress my face in stone because I can't go back
I feel her eyes watching me from behind the curtain of her hair and she says I'm sorry I didn't mean to stare I say I think I really have to go now but oh baby, maybe someday maybe somehow.
Ten years ago I was looking for Best Friend because the Sears Tower seemed such a prime target and I just wanted her close. We waited for Richie to get out of school watching in terror (isn't that what they wanted?) as the city I found myself, the city I love so much go up in flame. New Yorkers would help anyone, that have that kind spirit, that beautiful soul that is unique to New York. So, the three of us held out for a few days, playing dominoes, watching TV when we could, making plans. I think the truly shocking part is that this sort of thing didn't happen here. We were given a window of what it was like to live in Israel and at any moment we get on a bus, we lose everything, everyone we love. Why doesn't it happen here? because you see we live in a place of brave men, men who don't let insane zealots and social misfits light women on fire, refuse to educate their daughters and burn things just to watch it burn. We have brave men here who fight, who write, who do what they do unafraid, bold and for the safety and peace of mind of us all. So rather than dwell on the horrible of the world, I think I will spend the day thinking about the joy of those brave men and how lucky we all are they love us.
One of my favorite things to do is to peruse the bookstore with my Best Friend. We linger there for hours. I always order some coffee thing and she, iced tea and she will always ask me to share and then remind me why she hates coffee. "Tastes like dirt." will always be her reaction. They are all closing those giant mega mall of books. The days of sipping latte and reading a book you wont indulge in at home because $30 for a book you will just read parts of seems obscene are coming to an end, the end of an era. It's not just books, cds are obsolete with the invention of an ipod, with YouTube, with electronics changing our lives, making us just a little less social. I went to look for a Langston Hughes book of prose this morning and I found it on Amazon for $1, explains why borders would struggle to sell the same book for $15.
And while I do love my kindle, I also love the romance of a book. All my books have little notes on the pages, on the inside cover, little pieces of poems, something I was thinking at the time. And I save them, those worn books, the books I've read too many times to count. When I am feeling melancholy about life I want my old friend Pat Conroy to be on my bookshelf so I can read of men who wish for two lives. I have more Bukowski books than anyone should be allowed to own and depending on my moon I want to read his take on women, or shack jobs, or reading Tolstoy while working in the Los Angeles public library as a janitor. I want him at the end of my finger tips and to feel the pages beneath my fingers and my eyes, it's just comforting. Having those old books close is comforting like having church on Sunday morning and coming home to the scrambled eggs and black currant tea. It's comforting like old photo albums and calling my Best Friend to see what she is reading which I will do in a few moments.
As for the Langston Hughes poem I was looking for?
Droning a drowsy syncopated tune,
Rocking back and forth to a mellow croon,
I heard a Negro play.
Down on Lenox Avenue the other night
By the pale dull pallor of an old gas light
He did a lazy sway . . .
He did a lazy sway . . .
To the tune o' those Weary Blues.
With his ebony hands on each ivory key
He made that poor piano moan with melody.
O Blues!
Swaying to and fro on his rickety stool
He played that sad raggy tune like a musical fool.
Sweet Blues!
Coming from a black man's soul.
O Blues!
In a deep song voice with a melancholy tone
I heard that Negro sing, that old piano moan--
"Ain't got nobody in all this world,
Ain't got nobody but ma self.
I's gwine to quit ma frownin'
And put ma troubles on the shelf."
Thump, thump, thump, went his foot on the floor.
He played a few chords then he sang some more--
"I got the Weary Blues
And I can't be satisfied.
Got the Weary Blues
And can't be satisfied--
I ain't happy no mo'
And I wish that I had died."
And far into the night he crooned that tune.
The stars went out and so did the moon.
The singer stopped playing and went to bed
While the Weary Blues echoed through his head.
He slept like a rock or a man that's dead.
******************************
That poem is so beautiful it is a work of art, it's a song, it's pure art. Hughes was related to the first black man to ever hold a public office. You can find his prose of I wonder as I wander at Amazon for $1. I purchased a copy today and will be here soon. I like the idea of wandering with him a little during an autumn afternoon while leaves are flying, so I am preparing for that.
Being caught in the rain as a child is a rarity
you aren't allowed to play in the rain
and when I was wandering home and caught a rain storm
I would walk very slowly in watery dreamland
This summer afternoon was covered in rain
a honey dripping August afternoon
and as I was out walking when I turned the corner
there he was
it wasn't Yeats' glimmering girl
it was my shinning boy
his eyes gleaming in the rain
his hair plastered to the sides of his head
his shoes full of water
and that sweet smile that puts women at ease
"Is it five?" he asked
I whispered "Not yet."
and with that he pulled me under a tree
fashioned into an umbrella
and there we whispered the things lovers do
we were the bathing sparrows
drip dropping into fall
Lovers have an umbilical each to each
to nourish their souls and that cord is twisted
and snapped by life's every day this and that;
the moving of the world, the pursuit of our passions
other than the flesh
and on the days that are good
the soft peach days of summer passing into fall
you are certain that you are always taking more than you give
when the conversation is finished like a storm
and everything feels clean
and smells like linens hanging to dry
Those lovers, these lovers pause for just a moment
in the rain
and begin again to want for "hello baby"
and under the tree with the drip drip dripping
of nature singing to us he sat with me and we begged
time to move slower
like when we were children and the summer afternoons seems to last forever
when we held time in our pocket
next to the compass that led us to that place no one knew of
where we shared childhood thoughts of nothing ordinary
I'd like to find that secret tomb and find that unafraid girl
the girl who never looked before crossing
who never crawled
and share her with you
When I tell you of my life there
I will tell you that no one ever told me they loved me in the rain
their shoes full of water
no one ever told me they loved me in the rain
before today
a day like this can change your life
God teaches us that love changes everything
He has changed my heart
he of reasoning and science and romance
I had to ask
"Why are you out in the rain?"
"I was looking for you." he said
and then went on to explain we are born in the water
like the fish
when I am full of emotion, caught in the moment
my eyes are always covered in tears
the rain of my soul
and when he is on top of me moving
that intimate friction will turn to rain
until his skin is fused with mine
and we are one
one soul in two parts, two orbits, two lovers
twisting and holding and pushing one against the other
and both into God and out again
Nobody ever told me they loved me in the rain
you can't buy it or wrap it
you can only sing it or make it into a poem
and hope that long after you are gone someone finds it
and sings it for you
the song of two lovers who find the other in a twirling universe of stars
and who find the other again and again because without the other
life goes on but together there is an undeniable magic
that changes the world
the same love magic that teaches the sun to shine
that fill plants with foods for the harvest
that teach the ants to march
and birds to fly
it's the restrained strength when he holds me down
and and I could stay there forever and listen to his breathing
and the rain
listening to the water wash the dust from the world
and my heart
This is truly lovely:
It's hard to listen to a hard hard heart
Beating close to mine
Pounding up against the stone and steel
Walls that I won't climb
Sometimes a hurt is so deep deep deep
You think that you're gonna drown
Sometimes all I can do is weep weep weep
With all this rain falling down
Strange how hard it rains now
Rows and rows of big dark clouds
But I'm holding on underneath this shroud
Rain
It's hard to know when to give up the fight
Some things you want will just never be right
It's never rained like it has tonight before
Now I don't wanna beg you baby
For something maybe you could never give
I'm not looking for the rest of your life
I just want another chance to live
Strange how hard it rains now
Rows and rows of big dark clouds
But I'm holding on underneath this shroud
Rain
Strange how hard it rains now
Rows and rows of big dark clouds
But I'm holding on underneath this shroud
Rain
Strange how hard it rains now
Rows and rows of big dark clouds
But I'm still alive underneath this shroud
Rain
Oh Rain
Oh Rain
