Grief

Carved in Stone 19 & 20

19

The Spanish Civil War –
one brother pro-Franco, and the other,
imprisoned for a quarter of a century.

They locked him, with two dozen men,
in a deep cell below the convent
of San Marcos de León.

All save him were executed.
He spent our time together
telling me how guilty he felt
because he survived.

20

So many died standing blind-folded
with their backs to unforgiving stone walls,
because they refused to believe
what the enemy told them to believe.

Nobody spoke for them.
Who can speak for those who carry
the candle or board the tumbril,
or see the hooded executioner draw near?

The axe approaches. The gallows draw closer.
The guillotine falls. The single eye of each rifle
stares at the victim’s chest.

Commentary:

I find it hard, very hard, to talk about these two stanzas (19 & 20). I remember two of Goya’s paintings, The Second of May and the Third of May. The Third of May says everything that I cannot say. So, I will just leave you with two paintings to google and one photo of an unforgiving stone wall, with the gateway filled in. Pax amorque – we all need peace and love – I can say that, for we all need it.

Angel

Angel

Oh yes, I have been with them, the lost folk, the tramps, the homeless, the bag-women, all the gente perduta. I have stepped on their fingers as they sprawled on the sidewalk. I have trodden on their toes, tripped over their legs, bumped into their stiff, stumbling bodies and stepped in their wasted body fluids. I have stayed out all night, shared a pack of cigarettes, producing another pack or a bottle from the pouch beneath my wings. Such stories they tell, and they tell them in that antiquated language that I first heard hundreds of years ago. They know me now. I won’t say they trust me, but they tolerate my presence, a Jacques Cousteau voyeur, looking into the sea-depths of their despair.
            Garbed in garbage bags, thin trickles of wine and vomit slipping over their lips and cheeks, bloody bandages wound around needle wounds, they have scars at elbow and foot. I hear the warmish blood whistling its snake song through their arteries and veins but death shall have no dominion, not while I am on watch.
            I enfold myself in my wings and weep as these people, my people now, pillow their heads on bloody bandages. Their world is a world of vomit and reek, yet the edges of their shattered lives rip chunks from my hands and fingers, pluck feathers from my wings, tear holes in my heart. Needles I have seen and touched, blunt, shared between three, five, and twenty-five. Round and round, they go, slipping the thin threads of drug-dreams and tainted blood from friend to friend while the blunt points stab at bruised flesh and leathery vein until the freed blood oozes through fingers and hands clenched tight to hold and staunch.
            Night after night I have watched them searching for something just beyond their fingertips. As the late-night diners emerge from their opulent restaurants, I have seen my people fortifying shop doorways with cardboard castles. I have watched them climb inside, shut down the portcullis, and enfold themselves in the plastic that will keep them free from wind and rain. They all crave the bottle’s warmth. They fight and scratch for that which will hold them together, body and soul, that spiritual glue that binds the spirit before setting it on its drunken dreams of freedom. Kings and Queens, tumbled from their earthly thrones, they dream of the paradise they lost, yet think they can find again at the sharp point of a needle or the bottom of a bottle.
            Oh bird-on-a-wire dreams held captive in a skull-bone cage, how you yearn to grow wings, like me, to soar, to fly, to be released from the body, to at last be free …

Commentary:

This book, All About Angels, is available online at Amazon.ca. Click on the link below to purchase the book.

All About Angels
Paperback edition

Carved in Stone 8 & 9

8

Primeval places,
both light and dark,
surround us.

Dark depths inhabit
the human heart,
and woe betide us if we forget
that eternal darkness
and allow it to thrive again,
for what we believed dead,
will surely rise once more,
and return at night,
to haunt our dreams.

9

One day I abandoned
the temporal quest and left behind
mindless quarrels, bitter strife,
and envious, petty jealousies.

Surrounded by light and trees,
I now confront fall’s splendours,
harvesting golden days,
collecting and storing them,
safe from ravaging storms.

I seek a distant, but honest truth,
that moves, relentless,
through time’s mists.
It sometimes reveals itself
in the low sun’s spotlight
and each enlightenment
lends meaning to many good things
I thought had been lost.

Yet they still linger,
their shadows flickering
across the walls of memory’s cave.

Commentary:

I spoke to a good friend tonight, he shall remain anonymous, just like Anonymous Bosch, and he encouraged me to continue with my blog and my commentary.

Dark night of the soul – yes, we all have them. We question ourselves, our worth, our place in the world and we ask ourselves the five Ws – five W’s – West Indies only had three Ws – Worrell, Walcott, and Weekes – so we add another two, just for ourselves.

Who am I? What am I? Where am I? When am I? Why am I? How many of us ask ourselves those questions and how often do we do so? Like many of us, I am afraid, and I ask myself those questions more and more often as I age. We all do, unless we are non-sentient beings and just waffle along from show – click -to show -click- to show click – to show!

So, if you are reading this – ask yourself the 5 Ws. Who am I? What am I? Where am I? When am I? Why am I? If you can’t be bothered, click to another blog. However, if you are willing to be engaged, send me a snail mail or a husky mail, by sled, via the north pole. I am sure it will get here quicker than Canada Post.

Clepsydra 41 & 42

41

… fire flares on the water
     rivers and lakes blaze
          that sound is a monster
               a dragon descending
                    breathing fire

so swift so powerful
     come sudden
          from nowhere
              yet another disaster
                   with its ravenous roar         

the dragon refuses to move on
     until sated
          but who could satisfy
               that monster
                    destroy its will
                         defeat its power

will Lac Megantic
     ever be the same
          after all these years
               of grief and tears

will fading memories
     be all that remain …


42

… a stillness between words
    tranquil movements
         the world suspended in space
               soundless the night
                    drenched in silent light

 Aurora Borealis
     draws gaudy curtains
          across the night sky

I can hear my heart beat
    as time softly sifts

a celestial hour glass
     this sky filled
          with unimaginable light
               breaking coloured waves

lit up
     with mysterious flowers
          so graceful
               when decked out
                    in light

 the moon returns
     turns into a mirror

          its silver boat
               suspended in space

silent its light
     enlightening
          the heart’s dusky craters

dawn’s silent glory
     will be here soon
          pointing the silent path
               to even more light …

Commentary:

Ten years or so since the disaster at Lake Megantic. I am sure it affected everyone who followed the news, saw the pictures, and bore witness to the power of conflagration. Moo offered me his painting called Burning Birbi. A Birbi is a Koala Bear in one of the Aboriginal Languages. When the fires hit New South Wales, the Eucalyptus Trees started to fire. When in danger, the Birbi climbs the eucalyptus trees, higher and higher, followed, of course, by the fire. A fate inescapable. Just like the Megantic Disaster. Word has it that it could, and should, have been prevented. I cannot (will not) comment on that here. I will just stress the fear that we all have, those of us who live in a drought stricken province (New Brunswick) surrounded by trees.

The closest wildfire to us, in Island View, was about 31 kilometres away. The closest trees are about 30 feet away from the house. Much too close for comfort. Curtains of flame and smoke, rising up to stain the skies. And the smell of burning also inescapable. Stay indoors, I say. Shut the windows. And hope that nothing comes your way!

Fire, controlled, brings heat, warmth, light. The Northern Lights bring spectacular light flooding down from the skies, not rising up. You can almost hear the sky crackling as the light curtains shift and shimmer and dance their way across the horizon. Fire and Fire Light – beautiful when we can control them, but oh-so-destructive when they flame and flare, out of control.

Do not despair. Just remember we need each other, all of us, each one of us. Together we can overcome most things. Isolated and alone, like the lone koala at the top of his tree, it is much, much more difficult to survive. Select your friends carefully. Maintain contact with them. And be there for each other in times of need, for, as we say in Wales – “a friend in need, is a friend in deed.”

Writing in the Red Zone

Writing in the Red Zone

The Red Zone:
it’s a familiar concept.
Monday Night football
talks about it all the time.

“Success percentage
in the Red Zone,
offense and defense.”

It’s not just football.
Other sports, soccer, rugby,
have their red zones.
So does life, my life,
for better or for worse,
and now I know I’m in
the Red Zone.

I can see the goal line.
I can feel the tension rising.
I know the clock’s ticking down.
I can sense it, but can’t see it.
I no longer know the score,
and I don’t know whether
I’m playing offense or defense.

They tell me it’s a level playing field,
but every day they change the rules,
and today I wonder what the heck’s
the name of the game I’m playing.

Clepsydra 37 & 38

37


… now I am absent from myself
     but can an absence
          be a presence

 I guess it can
     like when I lose a tooth
          I lament the loss of its presence
               and run my tongue
                    around the tender gum

a space where my tooth once stood
     where the candle flame
          once flickered and flared
               before it disappeared …

38

… I grieve for my mother
     standing in the garden
          her magnolia bleeding
               ivory petals
                    as soft as spring snow

some settled on her head
     crowning her
          with youthful beauty
               as she walked towards me
                    eyes shining arms held out

yet when I try
     to recapture that scene
          I only see a winter garden
               with withered blossoms
                    on a leafless tree …

Commentary:

“Can an absence be a presence?” Good question I asked Moo that and he showed me several paintings of trees in winter and vacant faces that he had knowingly filled with sorrow. But I preferred the image of “I only see a winter garden with withered blossoms on a leafless tree.” So I chose my own photo. Moo was very upset and asked me to put in one of his winter paintings anyway, so here it is.

Now Moo is very happy, and he needs to be, because he has had a bad day. I am so glad I am not Moo when he has a bad day. His cardiologist wanted Moo to wear a Holter. Moo didn’t want to wear one. But he listened to his specialist, and obeyed. He was very stressed when he went into the hospital. The acquisition of the Halter was meant to take 15 minutes, maximum. Moo sent 75 minutes sitting in a cold room with no shirt on, terminals attached, and no Holter available. “Can an absence be a presence?” Indeed it can. And Moo is still very upset and very stressed. Nobody’s fault. Things happen. “The candle flame once flickered and flared before it disappeared.” Now you see it, now you don’t. And Moo laments the absence of what should have been a presence and then became a delayed presence. Oh fickle life and times!

I still grieve for my mother, standing in the garden, her magnolia bleeding ivory petals as soft as spring snow. I remember that some settled on her head crowning her with youthful beauty as she walked towards me, eyes shining arms held out. Yet when I try to recapture that scene I only see a winter garden with withered blossoms on a leafless tree. Maybe Moo, with all his stressed out Moo-ds saw that scene more clearly than I did. So, Moo boosts me, and I boost Moo, and that’s what best friends always do. So you go out and boost your best friend too. Blessings and blossoms. And may you all help each other to fare well.

Clepsydra 35 & 36

35
… to save myself
     I must grasp it firmly
          as I would a nettle
               not with my hands
                    but with my teeth

but my hands are tied
     behind my back
a cloth is bound
     over my eyes         
          and I cannot see … 

36

… I struggle and squirm
     until released
          I float ashore
               and stand on the sea wall
                    calling out to the moon
                         begging her not to hide
                              her scarred face


I entreat the ebbing tide
     to carry me with it out to sea
          past the island
               beyond the lighthouse
                    into deep water

waves stronger than any

     thing I have known
          thrust rough fingers
               under my arms
                    lift me up
                         then drag me down

to the depths
     where I can finally rest
          in peace …

Commentary:

Mors omnia solvit – death solves everything. But does it? What about the crossword, the jigsaw puzzle, the unsolved ? What about the problem of life itself? What is it? How does it function? And what is that poor bird doing lying on its PEI beach half-covered in sand? What problems did he have solved?

” my hands are tied behind my back, a cloth is bound over my eyes and I cannot see” …  so how can I tell where I am going and why I am going there? Simple questions – yet there are no answers, none that are given to me anyway. And who am I to reason why? Is my detiny, as always, to just do and die?

I do not know. The bird on the beach does not know. The ebbing tide doesn’t know, or care what it carries out with it. And what are we anyway? Why do we search for meaning in the meaningless? For answers in the absurd? And why does Sisyphus roll his rock up the hill, release it, then walk back down, pick it up and carry it up again? And why must we imagine that Sisyphus is happy? Our daily work – ce boureau sans merci – why should we be thankful for it?  Because there is nothing else? Because otherwise we would be abandoned? Or just because?

Oh, ho-ho-ho-ho, tell me if you know, who the… where the … why …. the what for … where did that one go? Even poor old Alf and dear old ‘Erbet, somewhere on the Somme, didn’t know the answer to that one. And they had their little dugout made a mess of by a bomb. Well, at least they found another hole, but when that other shell went over, it left them still wondering! And don’t we all?

Memories

Memories

All that remains of you: memories
and these swift-flowing rivers of blood
embodied within my flesh and skin.

A lifeless kite, each word I write,
too heavy to rise. Each sentence,
a wasted movement of lips and tongue.

And you, a black and white snap-shot,
of blooded washing hanging on the barbed
wire fence we grew each day between us.

Today, sunlight streams through stained
glass windows of the house you no longer
inhabit. Dust rises from artificial flowers.

Your poinsettia’s dry silk leaves, now mine,
brush a taut, barren kiss against my face.
I dream of the drowned lying cold on a beach.

Fresh memories pound through my head.
Waves on a rocky shoreline. Each word
a grating grind of shingle and sharp stones.

Commentary:

Moo calls it going Bodmin but the idea comes from Doc Martin and Porthwen. People lose their minds, their directions, and end up ‘going Bodmin’. This means they wander about, lost, on the Bodwin Moor and can’t find their way home. As we age, it happens to many of us. Not only do we go Bodmin, but our memories betray us. Sometimes we remember what we did as children, but forget what we did a few moments ago.

WWI – my grandfather told me all about it. “We’ll hang out our washing on the Siegfried Line, have you any dirty washing mother dear?” Or worse, “If you want to find the Sargent, I know where he is, he’s hanging on the old barbed wire.” Unbroken wire, covered by enemy machine guns, we who die like cattle – such bitter memories. And the French, walking to the front, baaing like lambs being led to the slaughter, decimated, one in ten (10%) being shot for cowardice or insubordination. “If you want the whole battalion, I know where they are, they’re hanging on the old barbed wire.”

And now you must think of the barriers, the fences, that we grow between us, day after day, as we grow old, and older. Artificial flowers, houses we no longer inhabit, dust motes floating in the air through rooms well-remembered, but no longer open to us. “Each word, each memory, a grating grind of shingle and sharp stones.”

Look at them, those lost people, those forgotten faces. You may even recognize one or two of them. Listen – well-remembered voices, bugles calling from sad shires, and every night, a drawing down of blinds.

Clepsydra 30

30

… but before all that
     did I emerge slowly
          from the grain
               of a granite heart
                    as a sculpture
                         emerges from stone

I broke out of a silent world
     left the flesh-and-blood house
          where my mother lodged me
               abandoned that amniotic silence
                    broken only
                         by my mother’s heartbeat

my own heart
     responded to that rhythm
          until I materialized
               and slipped into
                    this waiting world

only to be held at the hips
     trapped
          a climber in a cave
               half out
                    yet not able to break
                         completely free

and me
     visited all my life
          by the nightmare
               of that pincer grip
                    until the doctor
                         forceps in hand
                              pincered me
                                   and drew me forth
white meat
     from a reluctant lobster’s claw
          silent
               dangling upside down
                    a special lobster
                         blue at the bottom
                              red at the top
                                   breathless
                                        motionless

until that first slap
     broke the silence
          and wailing
                I came into
                     that waiting world …

Commentary:

Nice painting, Moo. I like that. Its original title is Walking on Air, and I guess that’s what it might have felt like, dangling up side down, held by my feet, trying to walk on my hands, and look at all those suggestive colours. Colors / colours – English or Canadian? Does it matter? Red is still red and a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.

“Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.” Ecclesiastes, if I am not mistaken. “Great knowledge brings great grief; for in much wisdom is much grief, and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow.” So, we live and we learn, but what do we learn? Only the wisdom of all the wise people who walked this way before us. “In my beginning is my end …” – T. S. Eliot – “and in my end is my beginning.” In blood we begin our days, and in blood will we end them, just as the day begins with the spilling of the sun’s blood and ends in an evening of glory. Except when it’s cloudy, and then, of course, we have to guess what’s happening.

Guess-work – we guess how it began and we guess how it will end. And there’s the Clepsydra for you – drop after drop of water and people gathering knowledge, only to know how little they know, for, as Erich von Richthofen said, in the Medieval Course at the University of Toronto, a long time ago, in the 60’sixties of the last century which was also in the last millennium – “The more I know, the more I realize how much I don’t know.”

Empty Nest

Empty Nest

X marks the spot
where the energy ran out,
the moment when the tide turned
and water ebbed, and refused to flow.

A place… a time…the sudden scent
not of presence, but of absence.
The absence of movement,
noise, of that other body
that once walked the rooms,
opening and shutting doors,
windows, like a robin’s whistle,
a thrush’s trilled song…
gone now, gone, all gone.

We drift through silent sadness,
avoid each other’s eyes,
sit with our heads in our hands
or knit our fingers together
in desperate gestures
that express our emptiness,
the emptiness of an empty nest…

Commentary:

The poem speaks for itself, as a good poem ought to. Even bad poems speak for themselves sometimes. Amazing how empty the house seems when we sit in separate rooms, work at different computers, read in silence, or do the crossword or sudoku, miles away in time and space. And those little feet have gone now – not that they were that little this past visit. But holidays end, child and grandchild depart, the house returns to its former silence, and we are left to contemplate the emptiness of an empty nest.