Everything changes, I guess. I had a rhythm and I made a vow. It appears that a phase of my life has finished, and that its finish is sourced in energy or its lack. I was driven by forces as I often am. I will surf along the tops of the waves and learn the gracious moves if I can so that I appear in control of things but really I am waiting for the surf to subside and then will wait for something else to come. In the meantime I will discover what remains.
Just about this time last year I began writing rapidly with drive behind it. I now have just over 900 poems written in 365 days. I don't know why it started and now that the cycle is over I don't know why it has ended. It is obvious that I cannot now hold myself to the two poem a day ideal. I don't need to know the why of it, I need to celebrate the gift of it.
I just spent a weekend more like the ones I spent more than a year ago. For no particular reason at all I had no computer time on Saturday, and the minimal required time today. As a behavior new to my life, I took two naps Saturday and one today. I accept. I believe these changes are necessary. When the new phase comes in some future moment, whatever it is, then I will do that. In the meantime, I am still writing poetry but more like one a day and since I had the whole weekend off this weekend I guess it may turn out more like a few a week, maybe none eventually.
This is nothing new for me, to spend a year or two intensely involved and then move on. Sometimes I return. Sometimes I do not. Each time I behave as if this is timeless, will go on forever. It never does, though some things do return again and again, like music and like poetry has. Even if I completely stopped writing poetry today (and I won't) I still have something like 200 days of postings to come.
That's a lot of time for something else to happen.
But even gods are left behind.
Coyote
I was a god once,
maybe not so graceful then
but definitely
clever, maybe not
so compassionate my heart
but definitely
needed. Now you chase
me, shoot me, feed me only
by some accident
and I'm wandering
in search of someone who will
dance the old dances.
February 3, 2009 8:08 PM
*************************************
It is said of alcoholics and other dysfunctional people that they do not have relationships, they take hostages. I hope I am better than that. I am now living as alone as I ever have. Even my old girl cat is gone.
She was once this amazing kitten, so amazing that I took a photo. It was really good. Ann sent it off to the calendar people. They agreed. She was born early in 91 and so in spring she was perfectly posed, a young part Siamese kitten who looked like a raccoon kit, laying draped along our weathered wood fence, surrounded by the greenery and flowers.
First Ann sent it to the Page a Day folk for inclusion in their main page a day calendar. They rejected her I think because she was a mix breed Siamese. That calendar tends to feature purebreds a little more. Then Ann saw the kittens wall calendar and we resent. In 1997 she became January 31 and a cover girl, along with several other kittens, thus appearing twice in the calendar. She could not have cared less. I was so proud, I eventually had the whole thing framed. She was not only a calendar girl, but a cover girl. But now she has gone into the mystery.
Reminder
I will not hold you
trapped in dreams I have, not those
dreams of perfection
that I like to dream.
Instead I will take the moon's
rays and weave of them
a bracelet, remind
you of your freedom, of hope,
of your destiny.
February 3, 2009 8:46 PM
Contraction
1 week ago
I like that...
ReplyDeleteSometimes I think I need a reminder tattooed across my forehead though :(
xxx
What do you mean? Your cat is gone.
ReplyDeleteWhere? What?
You know how I feel for you with your kitty's passing. I still see mine from the corners of my eyes, but he darts back into his other world when I turn to stare. So sorry.
ReplyDeleteI love how apparently accepting you are of the phases of your life. Some people rail against them and end up running themselves crazy because of it. Others try to deny the changes and just look ridiculous.
Yeah, a Calendar Girl. Those are good memories. You sound sorta kinda maybe a teensy weensy depressed, you had mucho emotional stuff lately. Take care.
ReplyDeleteTechno, not depressed, not as a primary. Sad. Grieving. Of course I am sad. Of course I grieve. This grief is not to be fixed but to be honored. It is the sacred remains of love.
ReplyDeleteIn the cycle of grief is a temporary darkness of acceptance that is identical in most ways to clinical depression, but to block it is to do damage to the grieving process.
I do love your coyote poems. Both of these are lovely though, truly. And I can also relate to the cycle of poetry, which ebbs and flows, like everything else around us.
ReplyDeleteMichelle, I had a drill sergeant who always threatened to hit us with his two by heavy. That kind of reminder...
ReplyDeleteJozien, my 18 year old went off to die somewhere else.
Karen, I guess I am fortunate that I found a way to accept the changes. But I have really always kind of been that way, flexible like that. My mom said it was hard to punish me because I would simply accept whatever the punishment was and find other ways to start amusing myself. I rarely stayed miserable for long as a child. That also means that wives find me difficult. I won't change, I'll just adjust.
Rachel. Thanks.
ReplyDeletexxoo
Okay.....I'll meet you at the corner, lets go :)
ReplyDeletexxxx
First off, even after the 200 there is something to be said for prose.
ReplyDeleteCoyote, even in your bewildered hungry state you are beautiful.
Why is it that you posting on your cat has me pausing above all other posts? Projecting, perhaps. Lost my cat, who was really my friend, was it last year, the year before? Some things never leave us even when they do.
Erin, it is really important for me to remember that the griefs I experience on the planet are not singular, not only mine. It is here at this point of meeting that we find each other most simply. A touch between us at this intersection lasts and changes the shape of reality. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteThat's a beautiful elegy for the old cat, so sorry you've lost her, but what a long rich life!
ReplyDeleteI can't imagine your writing creativity will desert you altogether; your output over that time has been astonishing, in quality and quantity, I'm not sure how many people could keep that up. But I'm sure you keep us in the loop about what happens next, eh?