02004 Solstice Letter III

June

a week of grief      
and broken things      

but then the moon      
filled out round      

& this bright      
birdsong morning   

From Cindy, 'a nice quote for you from Emerson's journals':

"Society disgusts and the poet resolves to go into retirement & indulge this great heart & feed his thoughts henceforwards with botany & astronomy.  Behold, on the instant, his appetites are exasperated:  he wants dinners & concerts, scholars & fine women, theatre & club.  And life consists in managing adroitly these antagonisms to intensate each other.  Life must have continence & abandonment."

 

    the rose unfolds      
    day after day      
    it opens itself      
    pale petals gold      
    heart to the sun      
    to the bee –

in the park
four crows eating
at the picnic table

July

My mom and her twin are eighty years old today -- both going strong and in excellent health. Nearly eighty people celebrated with them at a gathering last week.

Both are 'Sis'; both are 'Mom'; both are 'Grandma'. 

Think what they have seen in their lives -- electricity, automobiles, indoor plumbing, air travel, telephones, washing machines, refrigerators, vacuum cleaners, dishwashers, astronauts on the moon, computers, television, email -- all this for women who went to a country school in a horse-pulled buggy.

fatigue
has me
deep deep deep

Carpet roses climb the slope along the steps up to the river path. These are not the full, blowsy, cabbage roses that make one think of England, nor tight, symmetrical buds like those at a flower shop. These are flat-open roses, deep-pink with pale centers; relaxed, abundant in blossoms rather than petals.

The neighbor who planted them has moved, but these sturdy, hardy plants bloom on without care. Though these crawl rather than climb, they are reminiscent of the wild roses that engulf old shacks on abandoned farms.

These roses are my neighbors now. They greet me every morning as I go up to walk along the ever-changing river. Sometimes busy with bees, sometimes drifted in snow, they are perpetual residents in a neighborhood of people passing through.

                                                                                  this sky
                                                                                  these roses
                                                                                  another summer

heat
even the
gnats fly slowly

Such pain. I realize, again, that I am an odd person – my expectations of people so naive, my understanding so limited. How I am wounded again and again, yet seem to grow no calluses. Surely this is an error. Like N–, that blazing day, stepping into a parking lot from an air-conditioned building and thinking, "There must be some mistake!"

                                                                       pulling burrs
                                                                       from the dog's coat
                                                                                  sickle moon

hugging goodby --
       your bony
       spine

I've had company, and now must recover from the subsequent (unregretted) fatigue. This visitor is a friend "from before" -- before I was ill, the "I used to . . . " times: I used to be active, busy, career-focussed, high-energy; I used to swim a mile a day; I used to etc. . .

I am learning to leave this behind; I am learning to be in today. And this visit helped -- one of those friendships that, after years of separation, picks up as if we had lunch last week. One of those friendships that reminds me there is continuity, even through great change.

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