But thanks to that last spurt of Summer,
my garden’s wrecked. I plan to create, next,
the garden I want, not the one my loving friends
keep trying to give me: no watering needed
and only a minimum of weeding and pruning;
hardy natives, succulents, with colourful leaves
instead of flowers, and between the paving stones
a tiny, quick-spreading ground cover; nothing
that needs more care than I’m ready to give.
A rainy day of –
a cheerful fellow coming to fix the latch
on the screen door to the garden; a longish
phone call with a bright-voiced old friend, who began
planning when to come up here for a visit;
a local friend requesting to come over
tomorrow, so I can show her all the delights
of the iPhone her grand-daughter's given her
– warm interactions.
It’s a dismal day, overcast. Warnings of thunder.
Where to go, to elude gloomy thoughts?
Into a ritual, a Tarot card, a poem….
It’s the basics, I discover,
which become important to me
now that I’m old — the anticipation
of my simple evening meal,
its familiar tastes a matter
of supreme interest. It’s not that my mind
can’t rise to other considerations.
The flights of fancy, too, still happen.
It’s just that my personal comfort,
which takes longer now, prevails.
To be shared with Poets and Storytellers United at Friday Writings #70: Discovery.
I nurture myself
with good memories –
places / times / people –
and with the present:
the young woman next door,
an artist, who tells me my face
(‘my old face!’ I think) is beautiful
and ‘draws it so;
my little cat, who gives me
so many opportunities for loving …
I wake up far too early and cry,
then bury myself in a fantasy novel
with an anti-hero who reminds me
of the man who died a long time ago.
I come to the end of the tale over breakfast,
close the book and remember to be glad
about yesterday’s State election result …
trying to pretend to ingest slowly
that knowledge I swallowed whole, late last night
of another old friend, dear and dying.
Up the ramp and then
the steps. There’s quite a few
in the early voting queue
for the State election.
I’m pretty quick. I know who.
Everyone else agrees. She
gets home every time. She does
a good job. Here, we all know
what’s what, and who’s who.
My Tarot card for today: 10 of Cups –
fulfilment, happiness, peace
in large measure. I hope
that means the State election
turns out the way I want.
I hope the way I hope
turns out to be well-based
in the long run, I hope …
Today brings another visitor, dressed
in an orange top, the colour of joy,
and a skirt with a geometric pattern,
squares of orange and turquoise —
from the op shop, she says, and I say
of course. We all get our gear
from there. Very good gear, too.
She’s at home here, knowing she’s free
to invite herself ... sprawl on the couch
like a comfortable cat, or a sister.
Maureen drops in to see how I’m going.
No, she doesn’t need coffee. We sit and talk,
laugh, discuss books, other friends, our families,
and what a sad disappointment our latest PM
has turned out to be post-honeymoon – in bed
with the fossil fuel providers, just like all the rest.
Still, we part feeling better. Friendships are always
such joy, even in the face of large disasters.
This is one of the series of daily short poems I'm doing this year as a kind of diary or 'Book of Days'. I just realised it fits quite nicely with this week's Friday Writings prompt #69: Darkness and Light, at Poets and Storytellers United.
Today is Mabon (or Autumn Equinox)
as well as World Poetry Day,
and the dark of the moon.
Today is for going deep within
to find poems and nurture them
in enfolding dark, like the womb.
The winter world, turning, allows them
to transform, becoming new leaves, blossoms,
bright, living messengers; points of light.
My brother hits ‘Love’
on my facebook post of boats.
We’ve not lost our taste
for messing about in them
as in our teens,
with Mum along too,
and our good stepfather
making it all happen.
(Though in our teens it wasn't sailboats but a little motorised runabaout.)
Looking for something to share with Poets and Storytellers United at
Friday Writings #68: Light as a Feather, I settle on this.
The book is written.
Now I feel bereft.
The editor, careful midwife,
made everything ready,
told me, ‘Time to push!’
The child still needs to be dressed
for going out into the world beyond.
The cover artist is at work on an image.
The cover designer awaits collaboration.
I reach for the next tale / seed to nurture.
The son and daughter leave —
after moving a giant flying cockroach
back outdoors, and helping me
convert the guest bed back to a sofa.
They text from the airport lounge
and I text back. Good wishes … trivia …
we are all reluctant to bring to a finish
our happy, once-in-four years
inconsequential, vital conversation.
In the Gallery today,
‘A River of Sky’
paints our mountain
with water and light;
in another room,
creations inspired by death
are deeply peaceful;
the image of a stillborn son
accompanies his mother
everywhere.
Island-born river girl, boat-lover,
I laze aboard on this sunny day
both warm and breezy.
Son and daughter on deck
have their heads together,
breathing in the view.
The hours slip by. We forget
that anywhere there’s war,
that anywhere has earthquakes.
After good food,
astonishing art
and dear company –
too calm and replete
for making poems!
Can’t settle –
beloved son and daughter
arriving on the plane today;
final tweaks to a new final chapter
of the obsessive memoir;
breakfasting unduly late, despite
urgent need of tidying and shopping …
relieved to be told that it’s not
dementia, if I know that I forget …
where was I?
My smoochy, coochy cat,
my little sugar plum,
my precious angel girl,
my darling honey-bun.
I say these words to her,
and stroke her silken fur.
She stretches out and purrs.
She’s mine and I am hers.
My little deaf cat
sleeps through thunder
and the vacuum cleaner,
but her ears twitch to alert
whenever I tiptoe close.
Yesterday I missed writing
my daily small poem. I was
busy all day trying to create
the best words to complete
a tale I’ve been telling
of darkness and light,
old pain, old love. Then
I was exhausted. Prose
is such bloody hard work!
An artist friend at my side,
seeing an artist’s life on screen,
the little art cinema empty
but for us, so we can speak
our thrill at textures, lines –
our impatience with the stupider
parts of the commentary. We drink
caramel milkshakes, eat spring rolls
with chilli sauce. My friend’s mind
and her words flit fast and light.
My cat and I meet and greet
over breakfast and lunch;
then at night, for a longer
stretch of togetherness …
cuddles…. Between times,
deep in private thought,
we inhabit our own spaces.
It’s almost like having
another writer in the house.
(An extra one today ... for no particular reason except that two happened.)
‘Annie Hall’ appears on TV.
Another movie that I think
I could watch over and over.
The classroom scene — so
startling and brilliant back then.
(My firstborn was already 10.
But watching that movie, I still felt
young and groovy.) Falling in love
with Diane Keaton all over again,
as the whole Western world did in ‘77.
A small circle of women on a back patio,
overlooking garden and gully. Trees, a view
of mountains. A warm afternoon in early autumn.
We have known each other so long,
all the thoughts we speak are welcomed.
We reach up to Divine Mother, down
to Mother Earth, with love and gratitude.
Meditation, chanting, prayer. Then tea
and cake and talk. I look around and realise
we are all poets. It seems a natural thing.
