The First Time

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 As your fingers glide

graciously along 

my arms, 

to settle on my shoulders,

I am transported 

to the first time.

The First time

you had the right to 

this action. 

Which,

of course, 

created a reaction in me. 

A Touch of the Brain Cancer...

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That is what he said to me, as we stood at the end of each of our driveways. Timing our conversation in between the cars that were passing us as we caught up with each other. That is the way with near neighbors. One doesn't speak for days, weeks, maybe even months, if the weather is cold, or icy, or snowy. 

He wan't even Irish. He was Italian. The Irish are always know for the understated catastrophe, while I thought, the Italians were a much more exuberant people, or is that a stereotype? Not being Italian, I not an expert in these matters. 

How does one have a touch of the brain cancer? This was a quandary I have puzzled over for the last two years, as he struggled with surgeries, radiation, chemotherapy. It seemed to me as I watched, from across the street, it was so much more than a touch, it looked more like dynamite hitting hard where it hurt the most. 

As his journey followed the path of illness, I watched ambulances make intermittent visits to his home, ferrying him away, for his wife to return him days later. 

She always sent me a wave and a smile as she slowly took up all of the outside tasks I was use to seeing him do for the last twenty years. She once mentioned, he just wan't sure if she was taking the lawn mowing seriously enough. Really, I responded, as I was unaware that lawn mowing was a serious matter. Yes, she said. He wanted the rows to be straighter, the edges cleaner, the clippings to disappear. Her thoughts? He was missing being able to control...anything. When she shed it in that light, I could see it too.  Smiling, she would go back to sweeping her drive, and I would walk back up mine, admiring her more each day. 

These last two years have given me the opportunity to watch two people who were truly dedicated to making the time add up to something. Something of substance. Something to admire. Something that is rare. 

It is easy to love when we are young. It is easy to love when we are healthy. It is easy to love when the journey is uneventful. But we grow old, we get sick, and mountains form over years making life challenging.  The real reward, is when we are old, when we are sick, and when life's journey is very eventful, in every sense of the word, we still love. 

His "touch of the brain cancer" was an detour I am sure they would have rather not experienced, yet they did it with grace, kindness, and love, each and every day these last two years. He will be missed, this old neighbor of mine, but his memory will be strong in my heart for the rest of my life. 

Lingering Thoughts

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If you should die...

       before me,

I will still slide my 

Hand - or- leg over to your side,  

Seeking warmth, 

   and comfort, 

and

   safety in dreams,         

When I was not alone. 

...

Recordar

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Some of the artist recent work...

Spaniards have a word,
just one word,
that captures
the memories of
our years together.

Recordar (in Spanish)
literally means:
remembering back
through my heart.

All from my recent Mother's Day card

Sliding forward
without
stop
without
pause
without
awareness


we have been
trapped
here.
Together.

It has been:
for better
and for worse.

Remembering back,
as viewed through my heart,
I see it has been:
more of the better,
and much less of the worse.

Nellie: who had a slower life, while moving faster

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Nell at 18

Last week, my husband's grandmother's egg timer was inadvertently broken. Do you remember the kind? Wooden with a glass hourglass filled with sand. Just enough sand for a three minute egg. Which to be honest,  I have never made.  Still, I have harbored this non-electronic device, for over thirty years. My four children played with it often.

It bit the dust in the hands of my grandchildren. Sigh.

It wasn't till it was broken, I began to think about how every morning Grandma Nellie would make eggs with the timer. First for her husband, then her son Walter Jr., and a few years later her daughter Rosemary was added to the mix (who was my spouses mother).

If Nellie's mornings were anything like mine, it must have been rushed. Then again, she was a force to be reckoned with, so maybe, they came to the table dressed, co-operative and  ready to eat.  Never to be late for the nuns who waited for them at school.

 I'll never know for sure.

Still, I can see her hand, as she dropped the egg in the boiling water, flipping the timer over,  glancing over at the children, while capturing the toast as it catapulted into the air from the toaster, with the butter ready to be spread, glancing over as the last sands slipping through the glass,  grabbing the metal "egg spoon" (as she called it) lifting the eggs, slipping the oval protein into egg cups (which I also possess). With a quick slice of the knife, giving the egg the equivalent of a haircut, ready to be serve.

This was her way. Neat, tidy, efficient. I aspire to her standards, while never quite reaching the flag.

Upon marring my husband, I began visiting her once a month. In between visits we wrote letters to one another. Her's always signed off with the phrase, love and prayers.

As my children arrive, I brought them with to visit. Over the years it became more frequent. For the last three years of her life I spent every Monday with her, toddlers in toe.

Nell was an original. Her stories fascinated me.  She would tell me the tales of her seven sisters, her two brothers,(she would rather not speak of them, she could forgive, but she couldn't forget. Why, I'll never know).

She would tell of how she bleached the bottom of her shoes after returning from her daily forays into Chicago, until she no longer felt up to her trips on the  "L"*. Visiting Marshall Fields, Holy Name Cathedral, and Lutz's on her way back home.   Then her shoes stayed home, along with herself.

My favorite will always be her response when asked if she would be coming for a visit. Nell would say "with the help of God and six policemen, I'll be there."

I have always thought this was most likely her escort as she ascended into heaven.


*The Chicago "L" (short for "elevated" as the train is elevated above the streets) is the rapid transit system serving the city of Chicago

Un-moored

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I never take
Clipper ships,
   (of my dreams),
out my back door.

Across the grass
to the apple orchard,
firmly secured by
threads of life,
I dragged my boat.





A picnic table
 providing a deck,
so to speak,
to lay upon and read.

Gliding through
waves,
actually leaves rustling,
hearing the sea
slide past,
as pages turn.

Pulling me into the
current of far away.

** Painting by MONTAGUE DAWSON:The Billowing Ocean - The Clipper Ship “Titania”

Small

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Recent watercolor, which once again has little or nothing to do with anything,
least of all this poem. 

Moments build
small mountains
between people.

My mountains
grow without
aid of volcanic lava.

Maybe eruptions.
while sometimes unexpected,
purge pain,
retarding the growth
of heartache.

Though while my heart aches,
my mountains
feel ragged
with sharp cuts,
from cutting words.

Now,
I'm without words,
without tears,
longing for both.

Hoping for:
healing from
salt water,
even while it burns.

Open Window

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Proof positive, things have changed

The curtains are open today.  A sight I have never observed in the thirty years I have lived here. Mrs. B is now in a cubicle home, in a town ten miles away. As it is morning, the sun must now be shining on a floor not use to seeing natural light.  I wonder, does the carpet plead for shade? For of course, the wood floors are carefully covered in wall to wall wool carpet, or does it revel in it, like a sleek cat finally finding warmth?

On her moving day, I walked over through the wet, rainy day to visit her one last time as my next door neighbor. Her carefully cared for living room was covered in boxes, papers, and used gift bags all looking like a tornado had arrived, and stayed without welcome.

She was perfectly coiffed. She was assuring herself, as well as me, this was all for the best, though it was difficult to leave, she wanted the place in town, but it was too expensive, so this really was best.

I reminded her of when we first moved here, her mother, her little dog, Pepe.  She remembered how her first home was above her father-in-law's grocery store in the next town, and they only spoke Italian. The building of her home, how happy she was to have a house to raise her children. A boy, then a girl.  Her hearing aids in today, allowed for the conversations that in the past had eluded us.

All the while her son and daughter-in-law packed boxes reassuring me they would find really nice renters for the house. This intertwined with how much better this will be as they are't able to be there all of the time, and ...

Mrs. B's erect body slowly folding into a chair, slightly shaking, causing me to fight the tears, as I said, I will come visit you, bring my grandson, all the while wishing somehow I had more to offer. Her face lighting up, while tears leaked out, saying how much she would like that.

As I took my leave, after carefully writing down the address, phone number of her new home, along with the son's number, I walked  home, slowly in the rain, which seemed only fitting as my tears were falling in the same steady stream.

Fencing in Words

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Not glamorous, but the view I have had for thirty years...

April is coming to an end, May is around the weekend, and I am herding words onto a blank page. Baby is asleep, dishes wait, with no remorse, in the sink, with crumbs of  breakfast clinging, while I contemplate the silence of my sanctuary.

I have lived in this home for thirty years, while my neighbor, Mrs. B has lived in her home for fifty years. Today, she is moving into a new home, at least new to her.  Did she see this day coming or was the advance one of  stealth?

As I type this, I am able to see her solid brink house built by her husband with Italian hands.  Mr. B has been gone, though she has often said, she still expects him to walk in for a few words to bicker over, probably ten years. He was erect, walked with tiny steps on tiny feet, used a ham radio, groomed his yard with a manicurist care.

I think they prescribed to my husband's Irish gran's school of neighbors, "High fences make good neighbors.", though there wasn't any fence, just honeysuckle bushes, routinely trimmed one a year , with much care and a string to maintain the equal height as he cut along the row. He had an engineer's precision, and a temperament that did not interfere with his goal.

Sometimes, he would offer sage advice to our children, "wear shoes, missed a stripe with the mower, or clip the peonies after they bloom." Which, of course, surprised them as normally he was the silent one. Mrs. B on the other had, was the talker. She had worked in the bank where the children had savings accounts.When we would make our sojourns into that staid, silent establishment, to deposit money, but really to receive a tootsie pop, they were always surprised to see Mrs. B and always caught off guard when she knew who they were, for they, in their hearts, believed they were invisible to her when at home playing in the back yard. Funny how that is.


Anyway, she is moving, which for some reason, I find also moving. She was probably the age I am now, when we moved into this house with only two children, one on the way, no knowledge of the fourth that was to come after the third. Mrs B's  mother lived with her then, a white haired woman, and because she spoke only Italian, I never was able to communicate with.

As long as I have lived here, I have never seen the shades on the east side of her house open, even today they are drawn, closing out the morning light. I have only ever been inside her house a handful of times, though she has been in my home many times. I do know she has two kitchens, which I had never heard of before meeting her. I was in awe of this piece of information as cleaning one seemed like enough work for me. Since then, I have come to know many people with more then one kitchen.

(in fact, there is a house for sale not far from me that we call 'three kitchen" and can barely constrain myself from going to the open house to see exactly how this is laid out as it is small three bedroom ranch, not a mansion, which would seem a more likely candidate to house three kitchens, don't you think?)

These last few years with out her husband have been very trying for her. I know this for a fact as she has set off her burglar alarm with abandon at all times of the day. The difficult part is, she is very, very hard of hearing, doesn't wear her hearing aids in the house, and cannot hear the alarm when is it gong off.  Alerting her to the fact it is going off, after one ascertains it is an error is even trickier.

Then, of course, her house was broken into while she was at the Italian Women's luncheon, and fear has now won the day.  Nor can I blame her.

We are connected by time, proximity, and sentences, and I will miss knowing she was there.  

Levitating

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The Patient Man, I Love

I lie awake, levitating*,
while  you slumber beside me.


My annual respiratory distress,
thankfully,
is not distressing your sleep.

This unfortunate malady,
allows me the luxury,
of meditating on you.

Once again,
realizing how your life,
has made mine possible.




*Gotta love nebulizer treatments

Coming Home

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Suspended, kind of like these plants I recently saw. 

Today,
My husband of thirty-eight years
is arriving on a jet plane.

I will, in a little while,
traverse four lanes of
wilderness,
to retrieve him.

The days without him
have left me feeling
s u s p e n d e d
between
being alive
and waiting to
live.

Attempting to go Forth

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A recent quilt top I have made, which has nothing
 what so ever to do with anything.

Today:
I am going forth.

Not to slay dragons,
(except maybe the ones with in)
but to retrieve the dry cleaning.

Not to change the course of the nation,
(perhaps the course of my heart)
but to uncover the dining room table of borrowed objects.

Not to rescue fair maidens or princes,
(barely myself, these days)
but Clementine (our dog) from the hole in the fence.

These days of going forth are built of little tasks,
Alone,
Just a drop.
A drop of the ocean*.
The ocean of the everyday.







(to borrow from Emily Dickinson)