Bits of De(light)

not-quite Journaling, 77

succulents--
green bits of delight
grown for joy

10/20/2024: Life is rather rough, at the moment. So, when Rosemary invited us to find inspiration in “things [we] delight in, which make [us] feel blessed and glad to be alive in spite of all the bad”, my soul and skull filled with vibrant images of tiny plants in tiny pots. I enjoy mini-gardening (especially when I’m sad or anxious or angry or hurting…). It’s green therapy! I love selecting the perfect tiny planters: a cracked finger bowl (see image above), a chipped teacup, a ½ ounce shot glass (that used to be a wee candle jar). There are more things (and people) that make me feel grateful to be alive, but today I’m choosing tiny plants and tiny pots. 

What about you? What “things you delight in, which make you feel blessed and glad to be alive in spite of all the bad”? 

 

 10/24/2024: Because some days (years?), one must get the energy to fight (and thrive) from unlikely sources (emotions?) available to one. Yes, by “one” I mean me (and you too, if you wish). 

 

a green treat
to warm my tastebuds
until spring

10/29/2024: Tonight is supposed to bring our first below freezing day of the season. So, I harvested the last of the tomatoes. A bit late for tomatoes, I know. But the unseasonably warm temperatures have been blooming and fruiting all sorts of things. Really, my sunflowers and gloriosa daisies are still blooming too. I wonder if they’ll be all frosty tomorrow… readying themselves for the Winter Solstice. 

What’s nature being up in your bit of the world?  

– for Poets and Storytellers United (Friday Writings #155: May Bite!)

Food for Flesh and Soul

not-quite Journaling, 76 

The blossoming is done
for you, they told her...
spring is gone;
summer went cold;
autumn will fall
at winter’s feet. 

But she ignored them--
wild nature is always
too wild to quit blooming 

on anyone’s command.

 

10/20/2024: I think “a terrible beauty” should be added to the definition of Climate Change. I can’t believe how many things are still blooming this late in the season. According to the forecast, it’s supposed to be 80 °F in New York City on Halloween. Makes me want to cook my traditional All Hallows’ Eve pumpkin chili outside, on a fire pit… The thought of a big cauldron bubbling over flames and coals, woodsmoke and spices and storytelling scenting the air, takes me back to the best years of my childhood *happy sigh*. 

 

If life skins off de-
light, I shall wear
midnight as a suit. 

11/10/2024: This poem bit was my response, when asked to illustrate my feelings on the election results (and what said results might mean for a chronically ill, veteran, immigrant, woman of Afro-Caribbean descent). After reading the poem, someone said they “admired and envied [my] grace and lack of pain”. At first, I thought the person was being sarcastic. When I realized they were serious, my brain and I spent some long seconds stunned by the idea of anyone being so blind… Then, I proceeded to completely lose it—loudly, descriptively, and at length: 

I shouted something (probably slightly unintelligible) about metaphors. Then I Magaly-explained that being skinned alive would involve pain, that choosing to stand up when soles and knees and palms are raw from being flayed would be pure agony, that wearing anything on freshly exposed muscles and bones would be torture, that doing any of these things would require taking sadness, rage, disappointment, will, and the almost-corpse of hope… and reshaping all that terrible energy into armor to keep my heart (and other people’s skulls) from being crushed under my pain.  

I am angry. I am sad. I am in pain. And I am not feeling particularly graceful at the moment. But “this too shall pass”. 

– for Poets and Storytellers United (Friday Writings #152: Holding Your Breath)

Not Her Heart

So many hearts keep falling
for the tainted silver in his tongue,
for the spit that dazes reasoning
before sinking teeth into flesh. 

Not her heart-- 

she recognizes the fakery
oozing out of the sick,
sick shine in his eyes; 

she sees him sign more contracts
with blood of the shackled sheep,
of the choice-robbed,
of the enthralled... 

she wonders
if any of them would ever see
the muck that sticks to his bones,
the worms living in the hollows
that should’ve housed a soul; 

will they ever
sense the incubus
under the wealth-made halo,
or has he sucked all the marrow
out of their futures and wits?

– I wrote the first version of this poem in another November, some years ago. Feeling the need to revisit the topic makes me so very nervous. Sigh.

– for Poets and Storytellers United (Friday Writings #151: “a box full of darkness”)

Reclaiming

not-quite Journaling, 75

 reclaiming
the ways that made me
makes me more

10/20/2024: My Piano Man and I are back at New York Comic Con after five long years. The first two years of absence happened because of surgeries, chemotherapy, radiation… The next three years, I missed it because I got ill (eye infection, Crohn’s and neuropathy flare-ups) the day before the convention. This year, I nearly missed it again because of a new breast cancer scare. At the moment, we’re mostly sure that there is no cancer--more testing needed… In the meantime, I will enjoy loving and living; I will reclaim what I can; I will delight in all the moments the universe gives me. Tomorrow will bring what it will, but today is mine. 

 

10/24/2024: Every once in a while, we learn we’ve trusted someone who didn’t deserve it. Some might think of such discovery as a loss, but I see it as the best of wins. Getting rid of something rotten opens space for better things. Definitely a win. 

– for Poets and Storytellers United (Friday Writings #150: How high the moon?)

October Is Bittersweet

not-quite Journaling, 74

 

10/1/2024: I love October--the colors, the clothes, the food, the spooky decorations, the lore, the tales, the remembrance of the lives of my Dead. I know some people find celebrating the dead with merriment weird (even ghoulish), but I’ve always thought it extra lovely to have a special time of the year when we share stories (sad and happy and funny) about the lives of those we’ve lost to death. It’s one of the best ways to keep them alive (in our hearts). 

 

Love waits--not always
patiently, perhaps; still,
love that has been touched,
love that has been fed,
love that remembers
love... waits.

10/6/2024: During a breast cancer awareness meeting, two individuals were discussing (okay, they were arguing at the top of their lungs about) cancer and true love. One shouted that if the love is true, the partner of a cancer patient would never leave them. The other yelled that if the cancer patient truly loves their partner, then they would understand the partner’s decision to walk away. When they asked a few of us our thoughts on the issue, I said that love is personal and complicated. The disgusted looks on their faces told me they didn’t think much of my opinion. So, I shut my mouth and started this poem bit. I still think that different loves are differently complicated. Selfishly (and unrepentantly), I’m just glad that my own love has been made stronger by my own ordeal. Also, I’m rather relieved that I don’t feel the need to scream at people, when I disagree with their much too loud views--ignoring them (and doing something that soothes me) is way more satisfying.  

 

10/10/2024: There are songs I only listen to in October. There are foods I only eat in October. Songs and foods that were the favorites of loved ones I’ve lost to death. I think of them always, but I only let the memories linger in October… 

– for Poets and Storytellers United (Friday Writings #148: October Is Bittersweet)

Screaming Doesn’t Help (much)

not-quite Journaling, 73

Screaming doesn’t seem to help much,
so I shall harvest myself a soothing.

9/22/2024: I’m not dead. I figured I should put that out there right away. I haven’t been feeling awesome--physically or emotionally--but I’m getting better. I lost several friends, to a preventable accident, in the last few weeks. The grief hasn’t been easy on my flesh or bones or spirit. I needed a break… I’ve spent a lot of time crying (all right, screaming rage-filled tears), reading old favorites, watching my plants grow, letting my Piano Man comfort me, smiling at messages from many of you (thank you!), and straight out roaring with laughter at increasingly outrageous memes from Rommy (humor--particularly dark humor--is one of my favorite medicines, and mi querida amiga knows that).

Today, I chose to celebrate the Autumnal Equinox by doing some harvesting and delighting in the gifts my wee garden has produced this season. I pulled the sweet potatoes out of the soil with my bare hands--the dirt felt warm and alive, and I bet the potatoes will taste just as life-giving. The tomatoes have been sweet, juicy, and plentiful. The passion fruit needs more time (we can relate, can’t we?).

I’ll spend the next few days catching up. I hope life is being good to you. I hope the world isn’t causing you much pain. I hope society’s current turmoil isn’t clobbering your nerves. I hope you are as well as is humanly possible. I hope… for us all.

 

on days marred with loss,
I’ll let autumn rain cleanse pain
of flesh and spirit

 – for Poets and Storytellers United (Friday Writings #146: Substitutions)

Unsaid Words Will Die Screaming

Quiet not
the raging mouths that scream
differently tuned

songs, which burst
with conviction, with outrage,
with words you’ve never held
between skull and teeth.

Living words (and people) will
not be muzzled
without cruelty (or war)--

unsaid words
fight to become.
Let them
(we must)
be something,
do something,
say something...

or lose
everything.

 
The Scream, by Edvard Munch

 – for Poets and Storytellers United (Friday Writings #143: What Makes You Scream?)