Marking Occasions
It appears that I’m a creature of habit, or that my thought patterns are cyclical. About this time last year, I wrote a post also about marking occasions, about loss, on consolation. I suppose it’s because last week we, Rob and I, celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary, and I celebrated my 57th birthday, that I was thinking about how important it is to mark these occasions in whatever way. Though the pandemic was (and is) weird, there was something nice, looking back, about our first pandemic birthdays. I remember so many good people coming over and dropping off flowers and wine and chocolate, socially distanced at the front door. There was something so real and heartfelt about the visits. There was little we could really do for each other, most of us, but we could do that. It felt big, it felt like a connection, very human and meaningful.
Another thing to mark is that The WHO has declared the emergency phase of the pandemic over. We have done some heavy grieving that is just not going to stop with over 7 million deaths and counting. With the “bereavement multiplier” effect, it’s no wonder that the post I originally wrote before the pandemic, sharing poems for grief and loss, remains as popular as it does.
Lately I’ve run into a few more poems and quotations that were helpful for me, and I thought I’d pass them along here.
I love this next poem by Alden Nowlan, a Canadian poet, because it’s exactly how I hope I’ll sign off, too.
This is What I Wanted to Sign Off With
by Alden Nowlan
You know what I’m
like when I`m sick: I’d sooner
curse than cry. And people don’t often
know what they’re saying in the end.
Or I could die in my sleep.
So I’ll say it now. Here it is.
Don’t pay any attention
if I don’t get it right
when it is for real. Blame that
on terror and pain
or the stuff they’re shooting
into my veins. This is what I wanted to
sign off with. Bend
closer, listen, I love you.
Looking for this poem by Nowlan, I was drawn back to Anthony Wilson’s indispensable blog. Very worth going back and reading his notes on this poem.
And then I looked through his list to see if he had another poem I wanted to re-read, and of course it was there. This one:
by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!
I miss him in the weeping of the rain;
I want him at the shrinking of the tide;
The old snows melt from every mountain-side,
And last year’s leaves are smoke in every lane;
But last year’s bitter loving must remain
Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide.
There are a hundred places where I fear
To go,—so with his memory they brim.
And entering with relief some quiet place
Where never fell his foot or shone his face
I say, “There is no memory of him here!”
And so stand stricken, so remembering him.
There are those things folks say to comfort, and a lot of them are just, not. “Time heals.” Well, yes, but also no. As Millay says, it’s a lie. And knowing you’re not alone in feeling that as a lie, well, maybe that’s a comfort.
I’ve not read the whole that this is from, but the words by C.K. Williams about how “each death demands / its own procedures / of mourning but I can’t / find those I need” really helps. Each death is universal; each death is utterly its own. And then, when the losses build up, I wonder what happens to our ability to find the right ways to mourn? The trauma gets embedded into our bodies in ways that are not easy, though loss is never easy. The layers of loss and trauma though, that must be different now.
from “Wept” by C.K. Williams
Never so much absence,
though, and not just absence,
never such a sense
of violated presence,
so much desolation,
so many desperate
last hopes refuted,
Never more pure despair.
Surely I know by now
that each death demands
its own procedures
of mourning but I can’t
find those I need even
to begin mourning you:
so much affectionate
accord there was with you,
that to imagine
being without you
is impossibly
diminishing….
But now I do need words that comfort. And I want to leave behind words that might comfort others. (Not that I have plans to depart this earth, mind you, any time soon…) (Though who ever knows?).
One feels somewhat helpless, still, at times, to do much good, to be of use. So much is beyond us. But can we think about these things:
“Keep awake, alive, new. Perform the paradox of being hard and yet soft. Survive without calcification of the tender membranes. Be a poet. Be alive.”
— Tennessee Williams
“Give light, and the darkness will disappear of itself.”
— Erasmus
“Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world all at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach. Any small, calm thing that one soul can do to help another soul, to assist some portion of this poor suffering world, will help immensely.”
— Clarissa Pinkola Estes
And so, can we, too, listen for the smallest insects to sing, as Barbara Crocker does in her poem? Can we breathe in the grass and release it for “the leaves’ green need.”
Listen
by Barbara Crooker
I want to tell you something. This morning is bright
after all the steady rain, and every iris,
peony, rose, opens its mouth, rejoicing. I want to say,
wake up, open your eyes, there’s a snow-covered road
ahead, a field of blankness, a sheet of paper, an empty screen.
Even the smallest insects are singing, vibrating their entire bodies,
tiny violins of longing and desire. We were made for song.
I can’t tell you what prayer is, but I can take the breath
of the meadow into my mouth, and I can release it for the leaves’
green need. I want to tell you your life is a blue coal, a slice
of orange in the mouth, cut hay in the nostrils. The cardinals’
red song dances in your blood. Look, every month the moon
blossoms into a peony, then shrinks to a sliver of garlic.
And then it blooms again.
“Without doing anything, things can sometimes go more smoothly just because of our peaceful presence. In a small boat when a storm comes, if one person remains solid and calm, others will not panic and the boat is more likely to stay afloat.”
— Thich Nhat Hanh
I think a lot about my boat of calm, and how I’ve had my moments where I was not calm. But I’ve also had a couple of deeply profound signs / interactions of late that tell me this might be one of the most important things I can do. And maybe a lot of appearing calm is acting? But because it’s a practice for me, a long one, I feel like my calm-acting has been worth something, too.
And so I’m dearly and tenderly and fervently wishing you a week ahead of calm.
The quick reminder too, that my Beauty School Patreon yet goes on. If you’d like a Monday morning prompt in your inbox consider subscribing for $3 a month. I’ve just reached the one year mark! And you would have access to past posts, and then those going forward. The goal currently is that once I’ve hit 100 posts, I’ll have enough for a book. And perhaps you’d think it cool to be part of that? :)
Warmly,