I always knew this day would come


and knew that I would know what I had never
known before about fighting to survive.

I recognize the reason I don't write here or anywhere.
My journal sits beneath the bedside table, unwritten
in for many months. I know I would not be able to write
nor speak of my station in life at this point. I realize
now how much I let myself be completely self-absorbed.
How much I needed someone to hear me, read me, want
to know me. I am too tired now. My life is filled with
so many conflicting emotions. I don't like where I am
with me. I actually prefer the days when I rose above
me in all of my narcissitic and egoistic leanings. Oh, oh!
To have them now could probably make all of the difference!

Not boring, my life. But I write things about what I cook
and what I wear and what I do to the house. Oh!

Dirty ashtrays. Glasses filled with liquor on the porch. Left
for days. Soured laundry. Swollen eyes. Rough and calloused
feet. Wild, untamed and unmanageable hair. The sinking. the
giving up. I don't like it. I wish I was a wild woman baying.
A wild woman truthful. I could sleep better and eat better
and let my heart know peace. In all of its troubledness, it would
know peace.

Rounding A Curve

They look like knees, these two
stones at the foot of the hill. I brake, even
though I know what they are, afraid

I may bruise or break one of them.
Molly does not know my hesitation,
with all its limitations. She is focused

on the run through the stones,
over the graves, around the crypts.
To be a dog and not care, I think,

as I park the car on the shoulder,
realize I don't even look to see
whose name is etched in stone,

whose shoulders lie beneath the clean
mown lawn, to question whether they
ever touched another's shoulders, arms,

torso, whether they knew love or not,
whether anyone remembers who they
were, their mother long since gone, a father,

perhaps, gone as well. I don't even stop
to read the names any longer--the Lula's,
the Falcon's, the Lesbia's, the Williams.

I wonder what has happened to my wonder,
if this landscape has become family to me, part
of my every day, the easy chair in the living

room, the cheap plastic chair under the carport,
the tarnished abalone shell on the porch filling
with ashes and ashes and ashes, wonder gone

to dust, life's pull the drag from the lips on a
cigarette smoked in the dark, knees crossed
on a swing whose motion relies on me.

I know

that no one can help me through this. I get through
it all or die. I see how death takes those whose hearts
are so broken, whose worlds are turned upside
down, who feel they have no purpose left.

Being melodramatic, but I am distraught and sad beyond
expectation or necessity or an acceptable level. It's, perhaps,
another way I sabotage me.

I ran over my 11 1/2 yr old cat two days ago. Just after burying
him and returning to work (as if I could work), I got a call that
my son, daughter-in-law and grandson were in a car accident
in Evansville (about an hour from here). They are going to be
fine, thank god. The car is totaled, son has a broken collar bone,
son and daughter in law both hurting and bruised, my darling little
Isaac is just fine.

But I can't not hear that thump under the wheel, see him running
herky jerky int the neighbor's yard, watch him take his last breath.
I can't get that outof my head. I can't stand to go to the door and
not find him there, waiting to come in to talk to me a bit and have
a bite to eat. I am so heartbroken.

Youngest is now off to school. The house is so quiet. Husband is
going to be gone for 11 days. Could not come at a worse time.

I need some help. I just don't know what kind of help.

We Didn't Bury A Bowl

He didn't have a toy any longer,
and he shared a bowl with the love
of his life, so I could not put that
in the ground with him. So I wrote
him a note, triple-sealed in baggies.

I thanked him for the smiles, laughs,
frustration, worry, and the share
of yuck value he gave me on any given
day, when he was young and the hunt
was the mission. I said I knew he understood
I did not see him there under the carport
in the shade. It was not a place he ever slept.

He was predictable to a fault, I thought,
but chose not to write. I told him I would
need to work hard to forget this day. The
thump beneath the wheels (I did not write
that to him--he knew the feel), the frantic
drive to the vet, my neighbor cradling him
in his arms, his mouth opening wide for air
he could not get. Oh my dear, dear Old Boy.

I have a shepherd's hook in the yard. One which
has not held a plant in some time. I went to
the store today and found a cat wind chime
and hung it from the post, which I took from
its unused and useless place and placed them
both on your grave.

I will miss you.

The scratch at the door, the fights with Molly,
your strange, and oftentimes pained yowl, your love
for me and for every human who came in this house.
And I will take care of your girl, who is missing
you this night, who searches the back door
hoping beyond hope that y0u will lift yourself

off all fours and bring claws to glass--your love call,
your letting us know every day you were still here.

Leavening

I listen to the sounds coming from my son's
room. A man's voice, acoustic guitar, words
that match the light rain falling. His door is
closed. He packs his things in anticipation.
I won't knock on the door, won't interrupt
the busyness involved in leaving, won't take
from him these minutes he needs. I need them
too. I am most keenly aware that, one night,
shortly after he's moved on, I may go into his
room and hook up a boom box, try to figure out
who he was listening to, try to reproduce this
night as if it were all that easy to do. He comes
out and tells me what a job it is to unload, let
go of all the things he's held onto for years.
We laugh. I say I understand. And I do.
The tension rises like the leavened dough
in the warm oven, covered there waiting
for my touch. And I will touch and knead
and wet the softness with my own pain
as he packs and nears his time to rise.

What I'll be planting later: coneflowers, Autmn Joy sedum, lantana, and flowering heather (it's sooo beautiful!)

Really Should Refrain


...from posting while intoxicated. Ruinous.
Disastrous (as evidenced by the post beneath this one).

*

It's strange today. The house is far too quiet. The only
sound the keys responding to my touch. A. is gone.
Her plane should have landed 1/2 hour ago. It's been
such an intense summer with her. Her mother thinks
I am relieved that she is gone. Unburdened. Her mother
can't know what I know and have seen all summer.
Her mother doesn't mean anything negative when she
says things like, "I know you're ready for her to go. I know
you must be under a great deal of pressure."

And I have been under a great deal of pressure, and A. and I
have been around one another every day (except for 3 days
in July) since 6/03. I miss her and will miss her. I have to
believe she is well enough now to move on. Her meds are
working, but now depression is rearing its ugly head. That's
generally how it goes. Get rid of the mania and psychosis,
and there's good old depression waiting to take you down.
I know she can do this. I know she can finish college, make new
friends, hold down a job, engage in intelligent conversations,
make sound decisions. I also know she is still vulnerable
and unsure.

Wes is gone today, too. Matter of fact, I was all alone last
night. It's a good thing some friends came over, and then
I went to J's house and stayed until 3 or so this morning.

I have had a child at home since 1978. This is going to be a huge
adjustment for me.

*

I am working on getting Dorianne Laux here to read in the fall.
I've contacted her and contacted the assistant professor at the
community college. I am hopeful it all works out. I would so
love to hear her read and to spend some time with her.

*

Need to get back outside and work, but it's 93 and humid, so
I think I'll wait until it cools down a little. I mowed this afternoon,
but I still need to weed the back gardens and plant some things.
Bout some heather, lantana, sedum, and coneflowers for one
of the side gardens. I must get them planted today, but I need
to lie down for a little while. Blood sugar's dropping or something.
Too much liquor last night!