"But the magic comes from the power of good, that force which tells us we need not give in to the limitations and restrictions imposed on us by McFate, as Nabokov called it."

the start of school and merc in retro madness my turn tied to the wheel the days spill over into dreams and windfall.  i miss my blog, the time and space to write but life elbows out my reveries takes the armrests and eats all the popcorn.  merc in retro kicks my butt this time around im ready for the space of october.  all of a sudden you realize youve forgotten summer and autums faerie queen sweeps in with her fragrant raggedy train of rain, cider and woodsmoke.   

"Every great work of art, I would declare pompously, is a celebration, an act of insubordination against the betrayals, horrors and infidelities of life."

so many images uncaptured but there here behind my eyes brown till and dry corn, sun through a turned willow, up on the hill with the old hippies so many things i saw and wanted to show but my hands were full of books and wooden toys and the batteries were dead i just opened my eyes to it all the accordion player in the hayloft, the rain in puddles behind the boathouse, a mans hands on a lathe.  we ate good soup and bread and the world could be like this if theyd let it.

"...all victims of the arbitrary nature of a totalitarian regime that constantly intruded into the most private corners of our lives and imposed its relentless fictions on us."

i got a box in the mail today.  a me id long forgotten.  love from a friend, like a voice from the top of a well.  buoyant optimisn for who i was and may become.  i was overwhelmed it was a trove of opal, ruby, tourmaline.  sd you took the time to say youre not alone.  i see you.  and i felt the heart of me stir in her sleep, reach blind toward dreamlight.  thank you.

"...for a transitory enchanted moment man must have held his breath in the presence of this continent, compelled into an aesthetic contemplation he neither understood nor desired, face to face for the last time in history with something commensurate to his capacity for wonder."

they wanted latkes and we ate and talked for a sane quiet moment.  at work i battle abuse, neglect, intestinal parasites and a boy whose nose has run for three years.   i am the voice in the wilderness, the lame cry of a mother to children jigging toward a reckless piper.   the weather liminal by turns brilliant and dark.  pouring rain and rainbows.  gale force and stillness.  the clouds are marvelous landscape.

"We articulated all that happened to us in our own words and saw ourselves, for once, in our own image."

but i feel the difference being away from all of this, of me.

45 of 365:

1.  this book.
2.  the elegant architecture of the universe.
3.  latke dinner with my family.
4.  a bumpersticker that reads, "AIZIET!"
5.  my friend, sd.
6.  a gift beneath the pillow and over the sheet.
7.  david rovics.
8.  my boys humor.
9.  the decemberists.
10.  the folk on the hill.

space.  blank.  breathe.  sunlight.  moon.  small spirit sleeping on the stair.  the term is reconing.  reckoning.  koning or konig honig honey king.  queen bee and the honeysuckers.  people immediately think in terms of tshirts and bandnames.  beautiful light.

my inability to manage cosmetics.  im an unpracticed hand at the magazine mask.  that marge piercy poem about trotting past makeup counter ladies like a raccoon through an airport.   im dessicating and see the grasp of colored unguents as proof of oncoming age.  i didnt think myself such an easy mark. but  its just as much an act of playtime as is anything else i do.  the woman said snacks, naps and play, thats all there is.

we were supposed to go up the hill this year but the cowboys not up for it.  sat knitting between flares and later thigh to thigh with a wandering boy nipping bourbon and smoking my first cigarette in ten years.  made me feel half my age.  fireworks over the water and the man came down to the beach buoyant.  "i went to see the indians," he beamed.   

welcome fall.  

back by cowboy demand, while i wait to get the time to blog again.

"With his talismans singing in the astral wind, his three eyes aglow like forges, a drum in one hand, a bottle of moonshine in the other and the smoky froth of chewed mushroom on his gums, the spirit of Balashov's horse would carry the shaman where he wanted to go, by his will and against theirs, to the Upper World, to laugh in the face of the gods."

 

"...a way to take the certainty of death and the great wonder of life and hold them in balance, neither denying the other and each casting light on the other, death and life as both the rim and the core."

into the steps of september.  this morning in cloud valley sun over the east hill  through thick mist and its blinding like heaven perfectly blank space illuminated and on the other side.  cool condensation the good cold mornings i love when summer is over and by afternoon its almost eighty and were surprised, sweating.  everythings gone to seed, the corn orphans i dedicate to the cowboys beloved red squirrels and it all rides the arc of lifecycle down back into the ground where next spring the resurrection will be everywhere.  

  

"we were the history of the moon." 

books and food, the increments of my days.  one day ill get the dishes done, the other i clean the catbox.  theres the world to catch up on and this blanket to be done with.  i vent and he gives me just a little more room and it feels like the whole world.  the dogs are mad with end of summer, everything vaguely rotting, deconstructing itself, self-metabolization.  surrender.  

  

"...at the terminus of a journey from the sum of all our homes." 

the fields and roadsides in evening are glorious.  the rich slanting sun against greens and golds and seedheads, bees making fine time with tiny flowers in lilac.  the smell is new and wonderful, the good smell of leafmould smoke and oncoming cold.  i work and sleep and read and knit and laugh and my tides are making something of the teaselhead of me, abrupt and prickly.  but i recognize it and work mindfully to be gentle with myself and thereby with others.  breathe.  have some water.  smell good. 

  

 "...an experiment...the fundamental mind-set of revolutionary creators of art."

i give thanks for these opportunities.   life lessons and capital improvements.  being of use.  the love of my family.  bookshelves and bodywork.  growing into my life. 

  

"God, Cosmos, Angels and Guides, please clear me of all nonpostitives."

 i smote the datura.

  

"...the dogs as a symbol of the divine protective spirit." 

 comes fall and all the wonderful fall things.  i am a strange woman who knows herself.  my dance card is full of the facets of self, more room on the empty dancefloor for multitudes.  the nights are cool and quiet and beautiful.  my dreams elaborate and slightly terrifying.  they are full again of people i dont know.  but im not trapped and trying to get away, im playing shadowworld cocktailparty and taking the marvels for granted. 

 

   "Art is the medium those of us who see the unexplainable converse in."

44 of 365:

1.  my job.
2.  this book.
3.  my animal companions.
4.  morning dog schnorgling.
5.  a good hot shower.
6.  red wine.
7.  i can knit.
8.  this book.
9.  safe space.
10. cheese.

"All in all, it was a good summer to be an epiphyte from one of the gloomier, more downcast species."

...summarizing the literature of raymond carver:  "nothing happens and rarely do they prevail."

 

start at the beginning.  try equanimity.  see it as a blessing.  revel in gratitude.  take a breath.  make room for grace.  seeking a response vs. causing a reaction.  these are just a few things im learning right now.      

  

my first monarch in the goldenrod under damp woolen clouds the grey angel of september descending the light when it happens not punishing relentless but lyrical miraculous.  standing with two dogs on a lonesome road watching a negative space in the clouds like a star slide insideout revealing the flannel blue sky. 

 

everything itself.  undistracted by the craze of spring the plush of summer the recluse of winter.  the teasel dropped its lavender peignoir two weeks ago the brown bones beneath revealed space and air i am here.  teasel felted woolen shoes in a past life and the low valley clouds turned insideout by the infinite sky.  poking about on the verge with a long stick and again that story at the end where the dogs run a ring around her.  portent easier to discern as today is a day where the wind cant keep its secrets and only those of us out in the wind will be the ones to hear.  rustletide.   

 

 the last time i drove through pennsylvania it was a highwall pylon single lane in the dark from harrisburg to the state line.  

"...blue to denote sensitivity and an emotional nature, a dreamy, caring, loving individual.  pursues her thoughts and fantasies, intuitively attunes to the needs of others...a lover who does not wish to commit, who is attractive, but passive...does what she believes in, and is considered a charmer...you?"
 

recent conversation bw myself and the cowboy:

m:  you wanna check your chicken?

c:  you said you werent up for it.

the laughing blonde the only one that laughs like i laugh out of turn only unreasonable when you fail to consider that everythings an inside joke.  someone said i was a leader because where i sat in the room everyone else sat away from me.  she sat near me and i fetched her paper for her and she fell off a horse in dallas and jesus our blessed lord savior is the light of the world.  i mused to the cowboy that perhaps there was a pool going, who would convert the heathen first like a dogfight like who can drag the witch out of the circle like evangelical sumo.  dusk and the sound of a weedwhacker assures me that the farm is far away. 

 

 

43 of 365:

1.  reasons for waiting, jethro tull.

2.  andrew bird.

3.  my friends of faith.

4.  brian eno.

5.  i brought my own lunch.

6.  i prayed for grace.

7.  vanilla oil.

8.  first kiss, tom waits.

9.  learning to juggle.

10.  the magic eye metaphor.

11.  nina simone.