Whirlwind

I've missed this. I've missed waking up at 4 a.m. and starting my days with a good coffee and a long train of thought. The quiet world all to myself before it blazes awake. I feel I am barely keeping my head above water and the longer you keep from doing something the easier it is to keep from doing it. I listed my house for sale by owner 3 weeks ago. The next day I was contacted by my old work asking if I would help out with a project and if I could put in 40 hour weeks. The day after that someone contacted me with interest in the house. It sold in less than a week. Meanwhile I spent every spare moment working. And every other spare moment going back and forth to spend time with Matt. Last week was our 6 month anniversary--it seems we just met yet at the same time it feels like we've known each other forever. We have big dreams, and these dreams start with getting a house together. I'm talking urban farming. Chickens. Goats. Orchard. Grapevines. A tree house for the kids. We put in an offer on a house with 2 acres a while back and we are still unsure of the closing date. It was supposed to be last week, but the absentee sellers have not made it easy, have not done anything to facilitate the sell, have been impossible to get in touch with. Our own realtors said they have never had an experience like this before--it's been that frustrating. So we keep our heads down and forge ahead, waiting for something to happen. I keep telling Matt this--life changing things happen overnight. One of these days it will finally happen, it's just this interim of wait has us feeling detached from the quiet inside each day and also quite anxious. Come on already! If you have the notion, we'd sure appreciate some positive prayers/vibes/energy sent our way--that our future becomes a solid thing. And I can get my brain back to doing what it wants to do--writing.

It's the start of National Poetry Month

Because the weather can't make up its' mind and today marks the start of national poetry month, I'm including one of my favorite weather related poems from my time in Iowa City. Here goes...

Infestation

The week the ants came,

you learned what mercy meant—

woke to find them braiding a path

crossways in the bathtub from a hidden rift

near the faucet,

so many black dots, they assumed Monet,

each one a kind of living.

March was uncertain, windows drawn

open, then shut,

even the sparrows lost their minds--

ridding their nests too soon of wrappers,

bits of blue string.

A hundred ants that did so little,

and you without a heart

ruined enough to kill them. A hundred

too many to keep. You played roulette,

closed your eyes to the swift work

of killing. Washed the blood

from your hands. Said you were sorry.

Outside, the world pitied northern weather,

bushes collapsed in their thoughts,

and wind chimes forgave over and over.

Somewhere in town, a man you could love

eyed the bending column of a tree and wondered

how it belonged.

Casey Lord

The Hawks

Matt and I witnessed over 50 some hawks flying en mass above my house last evening. It was if all the the hawks in the city decided to rally right before us--circling in speechless waves. Neither of us had ever seen anything like it, and chances are it was a one time view. Matt said that it was as if they were having some spiritual gathering up there. To see it was like witnessing a hundred sunsets. Within 20 minutes they were gone, nary a sound carried from their black beaks. I couldn't help but think they were ushering in a new season--one mild and peaceful and heartfelt after the longer season of cold. I couldn't help but sense it as a sign of my present and future with Matt, that our coming together was written in the sky, and it is a sweet, sweet thing to marvel.

Because a lot of folks I know are struggling these days...

Here are a couple of poems by Mary Oliver that offer a kind of hope...

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting-
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Morning Poem

Every morning

the world

is created. 

Under the orange 

sticks of the sun

the heaped

ashes of the night

turn into leaves again 

and fasten themselves to the high branches ---

and the ponds appear

like black cloth

on which are painted islands 

of summer lilies. 

If it is your nature

to be happy

you will swim away along the soft trails 

for hours, your imagination

alighting everywhere. 

And if your spirit

carries within it 

the thorn

that is heavier than lead ---

if it's all you can do

to keep on trudging --- 

there is still

somewhere deep within you

a beast shouting that the earth

is exactly what it wanted --- 

each pond with its blazing lilies

is a prayer heard and answered

lavishly, 

every morning, 

whether or not

you have ever dared to be happy, 

whether or not

you have ever dared to pray. 

God Bless America - Frank's Speech

I came across this movie on Netflix last week: "God Bless America", a dark comedy that critiques America's fascination with pop culture and the cruelty of media and reality TV. This scene here is the spine of the film's message. With so much weight, so much attention given to the likes of the Kardashians and Paris Hilton's of the world--people who are famous for being famous--when everyone tries to be the most shocking in order to be known and the media just panders to that strive for fame, what do we lose? For one, we miss out on real honest to goodness talent. And more importantly, we lose our civility. The film isn't for the squeamish--there's a lot of blood and violence, but the message should hit home for everyone.

Some Long Days

Yeah, it's been a few weeks since I've posted anything here. In those few weeks I've been sick, working every spare moment I have every single day scoring SAT essays, caring for the kids, the dog, the fish, the house (which I'm trying to get ready to sell). I've tasted spring and then winter and spring and then winter again. I've gotten one step closer to getting a new house. Essentially I have not had the balance my mind needs in order to write. And who wants to read about all the things I have going on that are making me feel exhausted? This isn't a space for complaining--it's a space for questioning and discovering and striving, a place to make something beautiful known, to be thoughtful. And life isn't always easy and even flowing. There are times that become way off balance and your only goal is to keep on and wait for the hectic to subside. Sometimes you just have to keep your head down and pluck away, have to hold your breath and follow through. Because there is always a point at which it evens out again. Despite the feeling that I haven't been able to relax, to just breathe, every day I am grateful. It is that gratefulness that makes it easier to get through those long days. Whenever I'm stressed I just think this--it means I'm alive. Who can complain about that, really?

Pics and Poem on a Monday

What can I say--I saw my best girls and we had a famous time, captured here in some photos:

 Taking in the St Patty's festivities in Oak Park

 Bagpipers.

 Lots of walking

 After dancing downtown for 8 hours we waltzed home only to keep going with our fancy moves,

And since I'm always the first to fall asleep and sleep so hard that nothing wakes me, this is the kind of stuff they like to pull. 

In recognition of our famous times, here's a beauty of a poem by Naomi Shihab Nye:

Famous

The river is famous to the fish.

The loud voice is famous to silence,   

which knew it would inherit the earth   

before anybody said so.   

The cat sleeping on the fence is famous to the birds   

watching him from the birdhouse.   

The tear is famous, briefly, to the cheek.   

The idea you carry close to your bosom   

is famous to your bosom.   

The boot is famous to the earth,   

more famous than the dress shoe,   

which is famous only to floors.

The bent photograph is famous to the one who carries it   

and not at all famous to the one who is pictured.   

I want to be famous to shuffling men   

who smile while crossing streets,   

sticky children in grocery lines,   

famous as the one who smiled back.

I want to be famous in the way a pulley is famous,   

or a buttonhole, not because it did anything spectacular,   

but because it never forgot what it could do.