a lack of an ending

When Nance recommended May We Feed the King, of course I got it right away, and then of course, I spent a lot of the book wondering if this is why Nance had recommended it to me. There's a part where the narrator talks about how people lose patience for grief after a year, and I was fairly certain that was one of the reasons.

But also it is so rich. The sumptuousness of the language is so perfect for the time period and the archival recreation it describes. 

There is a lack of ending in this poetic novel that I feel is me right now... especially today, which seems to be all about waiting for the future.

_______

Pic: A hazy, golden path ahead...
 

Oh, say...

...do you see the baby buck waiting for us by the garden shed at the end of the driveway? Max and Huck sure didn't. It surprises me how oblivious these guys seem to be to the world around them. They're mostly interested in family, other humans, *sometimes* other dogs, and like to chase squirrels and birds for fun. (And they're hilariously surprised when they find them stationary!)

In other silly baby news, I wished everyone a Happy November because that's something my mom used to do every month, and now it's up to me to carry that on.

May it be a happy November! (I won't be having a watch party, because when we moved into this house in 2016, one of our first parties was on election night, and... uh-oh, I might be scarred.)

Pic: Us returning home from an evening walk.

sanctuary

skies always open

they haven't quit in this warm October

their voice in an inaudible present 

clouds are normal

it is wisdom that whimpers, collapses

naming days, trauma, traditions

trees are informal

stopping by, breeze-ruffled, reminding 

me of the hard ringing in my heart 

stars are waiting

like bits of every song you ever knew

not young, not old... eternal 

_____________

Pic: Walking home by myself; feeling sheltered.

all there is

gone as sudden as sound

lost

thoughts and things weep

secret

the debris of years reach  

stretch

out the empty logic of loss 

ruin

time's understudy at the door

______

Pic: A balancing act on the Red Cedar River.

my assumptive world order

I think this photo is from when At committed to Alma, and everyone dressed up in college gear to celebrate. I miss when my parents used to live with us for half the year (I miss when my mom was alive).
 

FB is going to be killing me softly for evermore with memories, I guess.

It's ok; I can take it. I'm glad there were happy times. I'm smiling back at these loved faces.

I can't imagine a world without these loves in whatever physical or spiritual form they are and how lucky am I to always have some part of them. 

externalizations

I shouldn't take photos from the car, but only the brave deserve beauty?

Also, between Amma and my small accident last month, I think I've got a case of survivor defensive externalizing in a way that comes off as arrogance and carelessness.

And also apropos of nothing, on our walk today, JG was beginning to worry all over again that I haven't seen my doc or had any cancer screenings in ages... and then looked at me and called it: "You are never going to get cancer treatment, are you?" Who knows how I will react if confronted with that choice... But as of now, that is the plan. Yes.

Pic: Sunset on The Maple River.

twin (de)lights

Driving Nu back to the dorms this morning, and both of us gasped at the size of the full moon in the morning sky. Nu is very much a "I’m going to take a picture with my eyes and keep it in my memory” person, so this photo is evidence of Nu being so kind to my more pedestrian sensibilities.

Also kind--Nu coming in this weekend to spend time with Max and Huck so Big A and I could go to his college reunion.

I love long car rides and freewheeling chats with this baby. By the time we got to the college, there was a brilliant orange sun behind us, but I knew better than to ask for a photo of that too. I know the limits. Ha.

Pic: That streetlight seems to be giving the moon some competition here, but that wasn't the case in real life.

after fall

It's rich irony then that I feel like a ghost

alive, haunting every hang of time 

asking, if is this all there is

the bruise of the moment

the body sinking down

anchoring absolutely

nothing but me

this is a story I actually don't want to tell 

I'd rather retract into porous sleep 

or silence--providently waiting 

just past the gate the miracle

or watching and loving 

all I ever had to do

was show up

_________________________

Pic: I could barely believe that the orange balls in the dirt were pumpkins... Where are the vines? Why am I such a city bumpkin?
 

flights (of fancy)

BigA and I were driving home from the reunion weekend in Kalamazoo, talking about booking our trip to India, when in the sky this gorgeous bird in the sky...

Can you see the swallow up there, I asked?

I can see a bird, he said.

I remembered that I don't think I've seen a real swallow either.

Pic: Sunset on a road trip.

caught

A poem should be motionless in time   

As the moon climbs,

Leaving, as the moon releases

Twig by twig the night-entangled trees,

Leaving, as the moon behind the winter leaves,   

Memory by memory the mind—

___________

Some of my favorite lines from Archibald Macleish's "Ars Poetica"

covering

I wore my best clothes to your funeral

I know I won't ever wear them again

nor can I give them away

they are locked to me 

as I wish you were

still  

 

Candide/Candied

"Anyone who can make you believe absurdities 

can make you commit atrocities.” Voltaire

imagine this tree 

knows our names

whispers it back 

in a few  weeks

in falling leaves

such  absurdities 

uncertain atrocities

encased in amber

the rain brings messages

you are beautiful the world is young
the world is young and you are beautiful

a mother on this side, a daughter on the other

it's the rule of this world: days capped by night 

_____________

Pic Sanford Woods... it's that amber time of the year!

Wherever you are I want to find you and talk to you

From "Nightfall" by Jeannie Vanasco

"Are you in the autumn-wood air that rises from the lake?

How was your summer, how is your autumn?

Are there seasons where you are? I have often thought of this.

Here the rain comes and dark strips of land lighten. I cannot explain it. You must see it for yourself.

This evening the sky feels as big as silence, as big as the silence between us, not disquieting but dissolving the day into long threads.

Clouds pass by and by nightfall all thoughts of you pour back into my hands and the rain is pouring now.

Are you thinking of me? I am thinking of you. What strength I give away comes back again. I have already forgotten what to do with it."

__________

Pic: Commute pic... Sunset, farmland, alone-ness. 

love is so easy

Nance and Jules have filled my life with so much support and love and chuckles (even off-blog via group texts and chats and cards and books and presents and whatnot) that today was the easiest day, basking in their banter, tasting Nance's famous pesto at her beautiful lake house, being silly, being serious, being together.

I felt some anxiety undertaking a long road trip by myself (because of the accident last month) but it was time to get over that anyway. And I spent the hours getting there and back reviewing the portfolio I have to turn in on Monday. 

Pic: Jules and me. That gorgeous lake is a stand in for Nance; Pic by Rick who was awesome in all the ways.
 

training days

(she said)

dancing, the floors churned

under our feet

fists beating time as lustily

as our stomps

open throats, closed eyes

ecstasy and trust

the sudden arrival of a parent

a call to attention

_______________

Pic: Maple River Sunset

fall's well

I have dreamed the walls of my heart

my lunatic mouth sucking at words

sitting inside and beside thoughts

the chest, the breast, the heart

the heartbeat of my mother

it is considered natural

here no one notices

________

Pic: Somewhere on Farm Road, a random fruiting tree.

finally, willing to say

I think of all the people I know who lost their parents too early...

or all the kids in Gaza and elsewhere whose wails sound like my own, except they are two and three and five and don't even have enough memories

or I think of people like Diane Keaton and Dolly Parton who died last year, the same age as my mom, rich women, in the first world, who did not even put their bodies through childbirth, and I think ok...

perhaps we had a good run after all... she hated medicalization and did not want to be an invalid, and the end was so sudden, it would have been painless (BigA explained that during a stroke, the CO2 in the brain basically acts as a pain suppressant). We were happy together, our last words were "Love you," what more could I ask? (More time.)

______________________

Pic: A balancing act. Red Cedar walk by myself.
 

still...

The other side says, "we're still here."

That's how I feel too...

________
MSU Spirit Rock; walk with BigA

waking up to try again

YO/LO,  if life is short then 

why are all our stories long

I'm still... and  maybe will 

always be writing our story 

this journey now so timeworn 

one I've tarried on for too long

it seems I must have forgotten 

where I was meant to be going

__________

Pic: Red Cedar walk with BigA