layers and dances and being an ass

there are some words
that are letters, and not much more

there are other words
that have layers of worlds beneath each sound
each layer harboring a hero, a villain, magic, and mystics

Widow
is such a word

Once upon a time
a lost and broken girl
took steps
staggering and wobbly
like a wet, weak foal
towards the woman she could be...
and the winds blew in
the right
direction...lifting her
and she didn't just walk
she found a way
to fly

and in the happy ending
lived dirty laundry
a lack of money
and words that lacked the luster
of fairy tale beauty
and
there was touch
laughter
and most of all, a willingness to learn

There was a budding
burgeoning moment
where the seedling saw sunsets
and smelled the lilacs
and knew
KNEW
that there was a path paved, rocky, sometimes shadowed
pointed
in the right direction

and the dragons came
the demons
the villains and warlocks and curses and the
blackness

happy endings contain
the possibility of
ending

and so it did

too soon.

too realistically.

and still steps must be placed
down whatever that path still holds

one foot in front of another

black finger nails, polish chipped
sprained ankles in awkward boots with spiderman stickers
is that a job on the horizon?  or is it just
unemployment...
the irrelevance is almost maddening

because your feet are on the ground
and there are little ones surrounding you
there is no option
beyond learning
no focus beyond foundation

there is dance
because that fills you
there is music
because that lifts you
there is laughter
because that defines you

you move
through liquid loss and love and life
where everything
EVERYTHING
congeals
comes together in the strangest ways
spins apart in a pinwheel of color
and your desires and wishes
melt
until the crusting castles
left behind
are the crystallized bits of love and connection and loss and fear
that sparkle with hope

because hope
is what ties it all together

ribbons of multicolored hope
butterfly wings
landing on your elbow
tickling the sensitive skin
but beyond
easy sight

sticky sap residue
from pine cone castles

muddy faces and dirt blackened toes
tangled hair made gorgeous
by THAT smile

It's a dance
All of it
and in every dance,
the beauty comes
from making what might be a stumble
into the most magical
of dips and spins
and pirouettes.

So play that silent song
and dance like an ass

Because THAT
is what will get
you through.

understanding dancing

to understand your heart
fully
is a process in dissection of a living organ
cut it
watch how it bleeds
where the blood runs to...
how it pools

and cut again
a simple, smooth, sensual slice

patch it.  feel it throb, silently spinning in cirlces
of a lonely disco dance
wet, sticky, hot, dying
searching for life
striving to build strength

pumping

to understand yourself
there is a watlz inside a shattered
snow globe
swirling
while water leaks
and small white chunks,
cube-like crumbles of some sort of
plastic
cling to the things
it should be fluttering around

where does it stick?
how to you step around it?
what shall you use to patch the holes both
tiny and titanic

to understand someone else
is to peel your skin
gently remove the muscle and bone
step out, slowly, from your skeleton
let everything else
leak
bleed
swirl down the drain
of everything your heart
thought
it might be able to carry
crashing around a bloody mosh pit, flailing
and refilling
the empty places
of that other place

and still

inside each journey
is a chain...
heavy metal links
binding you
to what you already know
with arms on waist
a sultry salsa dance
with a fine, faceless partner

which in the grand ballroom
you must admit
really isn't much
after all , dancing alone.

bowing...but to what end? Perhaps a view from the guillotine?

perhaps rage
is not always a dragon
flapping wings with a force
to bowl over those attacking
screeching roars and feathering flames
in torrents from dripping fangs

perhaps rage
is also a rope and gag
dropping our hands
limp and useless at our sides
burning, yes
but burning silent cinders
inside where things should be
soft

I sit
my fingers buzz
my feet come close to a tingle
somewhere inside me
a tremendous voice
with no sound
screams loud enough to bleed
so incredibly silently

tendrils of what was
become smoke
from a dream and
pirouette in picture perfect
spirals
meant only to bind me
into
my self-made madman dreams
of
deepest dark

Don't let it in!
But...it is in...it built this house
the bricks of blood and bone
make a special, certain kind of quiet

I have marked myself
with blood
colors holding hope
messages from beyond where
I can reach

the rage still runs quiet
not one swing from my arms
no muscles clenched

and yet

the fight
rages raucous, breaking and rending
while I sit inside and watch
praying

praying that the destruction
is dalliance I do with myself
while others watch
a way to break open in full view

for if the shadows consume
if they overcome, overwhelm, overtake
I worry
perhaps my silence will rule
and the open
will finally close
a curtain call
for the actors I am
telling me it's time
to bow

What is it I need, already??

Ok, fine.  Fine!  First of all, it annoys me that in this blog, I never share my silly.  Perhaps I'm saving it for the living me, not the black lines on a white background place of pouring it all out to figure it out, to exorcise it.  Whatever.

So I really am trying to learn.   It seems that in my blankest moments, the universe keeps placing in front of me, for lack of a better term, carrots.  But it's like they are partly rotten.

First, looking for nothing, just connecting, the shadow of a bear stepped in...stayed in touch...professed to possess a version of caring...gave me a sense of self beauty...reminded me of passion, hope, desire.  It was a lie.  A floating figure unable to flesh itself out, unwilling.

Second, just doing what I do, another moment sharing my desperation, another shadow reached out.  A shadow puzzle, barely held together and blasted apart soon after we connected.  Timid.  Confused.  Mistrustful of self.  Perhaps a puzzle missing some key pieces, as well.  But the shadow puzzle stayed in touch, too...kept connecting.  And this one was flesh.  And smelled good.  Felt good.

But I feel like I need to find a way to be happy without anyone else.  Or one half of me does.  The other half just sits back and laughs gently, shaking her head.  Because I also truly believe that connection, companionship, touch, nearness...all those synonyms are what matter.  They are the meat and the mayo of life...without them, even good bread is dry.

So I get on dating sites.  Which annoy the hell out of me.  And I think about having parties here.  I learned to knit.  I learned to draw.  I learned to braid my hair.  I'm trying to read more again.  Really, all I want to do is just shake the shit out of these illusory demons that taunt me.  Why do you reach out, when all you can give me are tiny bits of only almost lies that aren't really quite lies??

It's so frustrating...so infuriating,  Why can't I just embrace my widows grief?!  A friend told me, with a snarky laugh (because that's what he does) that grieving IS sex for a widow.  I grieve.  I do!  I crumble to to floor on spaghetti knees and ugly cry.  Tears that make my nostrils close and push out the snot.  Like nothing I've ever experienced before, and trust me, I'm a practiced crier.  This is like a new salt language.

It's time.  I know.  But are these shadow touches lessons?  Or are they chances?  Temptations?  Coincidences?  All of the above?  Or just a load of crap and nothing.

I know I am getting better, a teeny tiny bit, at patience.  I want to reach out...always reach out.  Do it now.  Try now.  See if there is something to hold...NOW.  But I'm fighting to hold back because maybe that is what I need to learn.  To chill.  To be chased.

I don't want to be a secret connection.  I want to be someone's girlfriend.  I want to have someone to be excited about.  I want to let my heart jump when the text blings and I want to be able to tell people about it.  I am so annoyed with myself.  I know I shouldn't be.  I just want to be stronger in this regard.  But aren't we all weak?  Don't we all want connection, love, compassion?  It's okay.  It really is okay to long for that.  To hope for that.

Maybe there is a way to long and learn to be strong alone at the same time.  Ugh.  Doesn't THAT sound like a fun two step?

Maybe that's what I need to do...go dancing. 

ramblings

the world closes in, while it attempts to open.  I remember I wrote about juggling.  Dropping balls and being willing to continue trying, searching the corners of the room as they bounce and scatter after another failed attempt.  I see all of that.  I see that being with my kids has become easier...caring for them alone more common, manageable, comforting in fact.  I think, if only I hadn't also lost my job.  That would be pretty helpful.  But it's gone.  I feel so much stronger, but no less lost.  How is that a possible conversion?  So strange.

I have read that it takes about five years for a widow/widower to feel the strength to move on.  I know someone...this person had all the Virgina Woolfe bits...a room of her own.  And she is with someone.  I hate how much jealousy I feel.  Like I should have been able to heal and find a way through the way that she did...at the rate she did.  But I didn't just lose my husband.  And I'm not done with loss.  I lost him, my stability, my future...and I haven't found a way through yet.

I'm working on it...but it is not all within my control.  I keep coming back to sayings I hate:  god doesn't give you more than you can handle; everything happens for a reason.

I don't believe in that kind of god.  And I believe reason is something we give to things as we fight our way through and find things to pull us over the last lip. That is our reason.  We make it, we define it, we anoint it.

I had a muse once.  A man I shouldn't have had.  A secret.  Who wanted less from me than I wanted from him.  I gave it.  It may have been wrong.  And I know it hurt.  But it kept me doing more than just breathing.  As foolish, partial, and selfish as it was...and I so wanted him to be a version of my white knight.  I wanted him to come across states and save me from the emptiness that threatens to engulf me.

Perhaps I need to just engulf myself.  I know how to do so many versions of things that help me survive.  None of them include this amazing love I have for my kids.  It's like a draw to find the closest way of "right" that I can reach. And whatever will save me, however I save myself, I will not use my babies as the tools to get me through. They help. But they deserve more than that...it is not their responsibility to "save" me. I must find a way to survive myself, in their honor, and for myself above them...I must continue to learn to be my own best friend.

I can do this.  I know I can.  I have to...I have John inside me and he could do anything.  I just cannot seem to find the path to the small pieces I need.  I am fighting to find a way to be happy, while everything crumbles around me...

A friend told me that, when John went into his wheel chair, a part of me died.  He saw it.  He couldn't reach me.  Perhaps I need to embrace that.  Perhaps what I need to face is that I am dealing with a pregnancy, a birth, a new life.  Not one of those is easy...simple...fast...

There is months and months of joyful, strange, uncomfortable pain...culminating in labor.  work.  For me it began with almost three days of my body stalling...something inside trying to push...nothing inside working together...leaning on another...trying...stalling...pain...near death...to start again two years later.  And pain beyond the stars.  Like something ripping every limb from every grounding point.  No medication helped, so we used medication.  And still had to cut me apart.  Again.  And pushing.  So much pushing...the ramifications impressed the doctors and left me screaming for weeks..crying..whimpering.

When do I get to whimpering?  To accepting that another knife will cut me open.  Again.  I know I can do this.  I have done versions of it before.  And more.  So much more.

Can I not ask to be reborn, already?  To walk with new, healthy feet, upon the earth and search for a hand to hold that is strong enough?

I wonder, quietly, if the reality is that I had my hand.  From here, I walk alone.  Rebirth sometimes goes wrong.  Do I do this myself?  Do I await my own Doctor?  It doesn't seem to matter.  There is no one to ask.  There is only moving forward, attempting to find strength, wholeness, belief, integrity.  In a world where the guys seem to only want to get in your pants.  And the friends are too far away or too busy with their own lives.

None of this is an answer.  There are no answers.  There is just what is.  There is effort.  Attempts.  Hope.  Fear.  Wonder.  Mistakes.  Joy.  and sorrow.