Break

We put the puzzle together piece
by piece, loving how one curved
notch fits so sweetly with another.
A yellow smudge becomes
the brush of a broom, and two blue arms
fill in the last of the sky.
We patch together porch swings and autumn
trees, matching gold to gold. We hold
the eyes of deer in our palms, a pair
of brown shoes. We do this as the child
circles her room, impatient
with her blossoming, tired
of the neat house, the made bed,
the good food. We let her brood
as we shuffle through the pieces,
setting each one into place with a satisfied
tap, our backs turned for a few hours
to a world that is crumbling, a sky
that is falling, the pieces
we are required to return to.

Dorianne Laux

Red Shoes, cont.

"And then she confessed all her sin, and the executioner struck off her feet with the red shoes; but the shoes danced away with the little feet across the field into the deep forest. "

Hans Christian Andersen

*

Ahhh, good old fairy tales. So uplifting.

I read a rather interesting book about the
meaning (collective unconscious/Jungian meaning)
of fairy tales by Bruno Bettelheim--The Uses
Of Enchantment, I think it's called.

As a child, I remember thinking how frightening many
of the stories were (the trolls in the Three Billy
Goats Gruff, the witch in Hansel & Gretel,
the wolf in Little Red Riding Hood, etc.)

Didn't hear the story of the red shoes when I was
a child. The only Andersen stories I remember
are The Princess And The Pea, The Snow Queen,
The Little Mermaid, The Emperor's New Clothes,
and The Ugly Duckling.

Here's to red shoes! And weird stories! And great movies!
And imagination!

*

Had my interview today. I think it went well,
but who knows. They may have met many good
applicants today.

If it's meant to be, it's meant to be.

Our deepest fear...

is not that we are inadequate.

Our deepest fear is that we are powerful
beyond measure.

It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.

We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant,
gorgeous, talented, fabulous?

Actually, who are you not to be?

Marianne Williamson

Stuck Inside of Madville With The Headache Blues Again

Should write a poem about it, this headache,
all these headaches, but my head hurts
too much to do much.

*

Busy week and a half. Spent last Friday
thru Monday in Lexington. Kept Isaac
for the first time Friday night while
my son and daughter-in-law went out
to dinner. I have to admit it was a bit
scary. He got choked when he taking
his bottle (as babies do) and I was
so scared. I know mine did the same
thing--choked when they were nursing--
I only bottlefed the firstborn as I had no info
about breastfeeding when he was born, but I did
some research and found a breastfeeding support group
before I had my other two and enjoyed every
minute of the experience(well, maybe not every
minute--wasn't fun to wake up with your bed
soaked when baby slept through a feeding), and my
daughter-in-law is nursing too, but she pumps
so others can help out and have that bonding time
with Isaac as well, but it's been a while since I've
had a baby and one forgets these things. Then I worry
about tripping and falling with him (my mother
used to call me grace--I was so clumsy!). He just
seems so fragile, but I know that babies are quite strong.

Overall, things went well, but when I couldn't calm
him down and he started crying so hard that I thought
he was going to stop breathing, things got a bit hairy.

So, I walked outside in the front yard with him and he
got easy, and then about 5 minutes later, his mommy
and daddy got home and he was fine.

*

This week, my daughter called to say she and a friend
of hers were coming to stay the night and would I please
cook dinner and that she would help me when she got
here, so they came in on Tuesday night.

We invited Jake's mom over as well. I was glad
that she accepted the invite.

We had dinner and then sat outside under
the carport until well after midnight talking, laughing,
crying.

She talked a lot about Jake's death, but she also talked
a lot about his life.

There are just no words I have to give her
except I am so sorry, and so I give those,
and I hug her.

*

On Thursday, my son, daughter-in-law,
and baby Isaac came here to visit. It was
their first trip here. He did very well
on the drive and very well with his
Gramma (me) that night when his mommy
and daddy went to an interview. He also got
to meet two of his great-grandmas, his only
great-grandpa, his Uncle Wes (my baby),
and his second cousin, Elizabeth.

That night, he didn't want to sleep, and
my son came across the hall to my room
with him. He said, Mom, could you just rock
him a bit and then let him stay in here
with you for a little while? He said he and Jess
were so tired and had had so little sleep, and I know
they needed sleep, so I took him and rocked him
and then put him in the bed next to me, like I once
put my others, and he slept until 5:30 that
morning. So his mommy and daddy got about
6 hours of sleep and were most happy, and I had
my sweet grandbaby there next to me all night
making sweet little baby noises. It was more than
worth a night of no sleep, but I am playing catch-up
and have been in bed most of the day.

*

Reading Those Who Save Us--a story about
the German women of World War II and their
stories of what life was like for them as they witnessed
the atrocities of the concentration camps and the madness
of the SS.

Also reading Mark Strand and James Wright.
The intro about Wright (written by Donald Hall)
is quite interesting. And I have found a number
of poems I've never read to be so worth the price
of the book. Many of the pages in the book are
now dogeared, ready to be returned to again
and again.

*

It's such a beautiful day, but I don't think my head
is going to let me take a walk. Molly will have to wait
for hubby to get home to take her. She started obedience
training last Tuesday and did well that day and the next,
but it's been all downhill since. I am largely to blame
because I haven't had the time to work with her.

*

Some James Wright (this one I had read before and was
glad to read again):



Lying in a Hammock at William Duffy's Farm in Pine Island, Minnesota


Over my head, I see the bronze butterfly,
Asleep on the black trunk,
blowing like a leaf in green shadow.
Down the ravine behind the empty house,
The cowbells follow one another
Into the distances of the afternoon.
To my right,
In a field of sunlight between two pines,
The droppings of last year's horses
Blaze up into golden stones.
I lean back, as the evening darkens and comes on.
A chicken hawk floats over, looking for home.
I have wasted my life.

Revisiting Kane


Shortly after I watched Rosebud
blaze and then turn to full burn
in the flames, I pinched my hand
on a do-it-all mop I had to use
to clean up puppy piss, and I thought:
Wait a minute and what the hell?
Who gets a moment of fame
and recognition, who is remembered
and for what, how many times did who
scrub a damned toilet, make a bed,
launder the clothes of the beloved,
cook food for the three and twice
as many who may show up, callus
knees in the labor of nurturing
herbs and peonies, sweat buckets
beneath the glaring lights of the birthing
room, bruise and bend and bruise again,
how much did who know what it is
to simply feel alive and be part of the picture
that will never be a picture?

Night Visitors

All night, they visit,
these lost ones in their
yellow shirts and blue jeans,
their hemp bracelets and favorite
hats, their hair freshly permed
and glowing like the blue
of the t.v. screen, their earlobes
sporting handmade Navajo jewelry,
their faces the way I remember them,
not like they were before the casket
closed but like they were before
there was a casket to close
them in, their smiles unwavering,
their arms doing any number of things:
filling a laundry basket, holding
a newborn baby, wrapping around
the waist of a lover, reaching to get
a can of soup from the shelf, opening
wide enough to be filled with the pain
of the living.

I wake and look around
the darkened room for some
proof of their existence,
but there is only my husband
asleep beside me, a cat at my feet,
my pounding heart, the arthritic
shadows of the nearly bare
dogwood, the splintered light
of a retreating moon, red numbers
glaring from the bedside table, assaulting
my senses with their truth: 2:45
a.m., the silent phone, that bearer
of such bad news, nestled in its
cradle, the soft light
beaming from beneath
the closed bathroom door,
my son asleep in his room:
me--feet now touching the floor,
pacing the rooms of this old
house, prowling around alone again,
waiting for the dead to come.