Orange, brown and red

Fallen leaves

Surround my seat

In orange, brown and red

They do not seem at all disturbed

To find that they are dead

In fact, they seem contented

Their short life was enough

They grew amongst the branches

And they died amidst the brush

And there they lie, curling up,

wetted by the rain

Grateful to be resting

Composting again

Fallen leaves

Surround my seat

In orange, brown and red

They do not seem at all disturbed

To find that they are dead

A letter to myself

I’ve neglected you recently.

I think you might not know just how much you mean to me.

So I thought I’d tell you.

Where do I begin? Every step of the way, every moment of my existence, you were there for me. When I needed to breathe, you took a breath. When I needed to run, you moved my legs forward. When I wanted a hug, you opened your arms and gave one. You and I have danced and run and walked all over this little patch of earth we grew up in. Thank you. Thank you for holding me up and keeping me going.

When I was sick and feeling all out of sorts, you nourished me. You gave me good food, you listened to my cries and tears, and you gave me cup after cup after cup of water. You laid me down to rest. You brought me to listening ears and tender hearts. You held me close to yourself.

When I have been confused, you have counseled me. You have researched and found assistance to answer my quandaries. You have composed answers and sought out greater answers and been open to transformation. You have put all of your faculties at my disposal, for my sake.

You make so many people happy, joyful, exuberant. You make so many people feel loved.

And I am one of those people. I am one of those people that you inspire and uplift and enjoy. As I stop to think about it, I am pretty sure that I should really be encouraged by your very existence.

It’s a joy to be your friend.

Have I ever told you that? I enjoy you. I think you’re a cool cat.

You inspire me sometimes, so much,  that I just want to cry. You have fought through some very difficult things, and you kept going. You faced hurt and rejection and loss and you were brave enough to choose to face it and understand it and accept it and then move through it to greater love and greater joy than ever before.

You have chosen to embrace joy. That is inspiring. That is incredible, in this world that so often settles for darkness for fear that it will eventually overcome the light.

I am grateful to you for facing up to and casting out the lies that you have been told, because I need to know that they aren’t true.

I am so grateful to you for choosing to live. You have chosen to love, everyday. You have chosen to give because people deserve and need love, everyday.

And you know what?

So do you.

You mean the world to me. And there is only one you in the whole wide world.

Thanks for being you.

I think you might not know just how much you mean to me.

I think that all this time you have spent worrying and wondering what impression you have made on other people, you really were searching for my opinion, for my gratitude – to know that you are the most important person in my life.

Well, let me tell you, you are.

You really, really are.

I am so incredibly grateful for you. I am not at all surprised that anyone else is grateful to you, too.

You are a gift. To everyone, in this world and out of it, but first of all, most importantly of all, to me.

You are more than enough for me.

I love you and I always will.

If only

It’s comforting

To know

You’ll ne’er be alone

If only

Someone had told

Me so

It’s easy believing

It’s supposed to be easy

If only

Someone had said

It’s not

How do we breathe

When our lungs are pressed in

And we stand

With ourselves

And unanswered questions

It’s comforting

To know

You’ll ne’er be alone

If only

Someone had told

Me so

Escape

I had lived most of my life believing I was alone.

I thought,

“The world is like an old house; all stairways up and down and windows that won’t open, dark wooden halls with secret routes between floors, and lanterns dying out

and there is no one in this house but me.

Life is a game of hide and seek and I can’t find anyone. They are much too far away.

And no one seems to be seeking me. They do not even know I am here!

But I am not hiding!” I said with decision, “I am moving forward, I WILL find a way out.” So I raced from door to door, trying every lock, traversing every staircase, peering up from every balcony, looking for the way out.

“If I can keep moving, and keep myself from crying and breaking down in the middle of the floor,” I thought, “I will find the hidden way out and I will find myself – joy! – standing outside of the house, facing whatever lies beyond. And there will be others there! And maybe, just maybe, they will see me. And I will not be alone. I will belong.”

Or so I thought.

Each day I would find a new floor, a new room, and I searched and I searched for something I had missed. I searched and I searched for that one open door. Nothing. I would turn into bed exhausted, hoping that tomorrow some secret manual for escaping would land in my path. It never did.

I found many keys, behind lamps and underneath blankets. I opened many locks, opening up new rooms and new corridors. But there were more. Always more.

One morning, I came back to my bedroom and I found, sitting beside my bed, a very strange thing. There was a man there. In my lonely house.

He was an ordinary looking man. Sitting on a stool. Leaning over a small something in his hands.

I figured that he also was alone, so I invited him to come with me to open the next door. Together, we could maybe, finally, escape.

He looked up from his hands and said to me, “What are you escaping from?”

“Why, this old cobwebby house, of course! There is a secret passageway somewhere that leads to the roof, or perhaps a key to that door on the first floor. Oh, if you would help me, I am sure we could get out!”

He smiled and replied, “There is no house, here.”

My vision started to blur a little, and I shook my head, “Oh no, I am sure of it. We are, both of us, in an old house. See that portrait of my great-great grandmother on the wall behind you?”

He turned to look, but said he did not see anything other than a few small trees.

“Trees? There are no trees here, we are inside!”

“We are not inside,” he said, assuredly, “we are in a field. Look, there are the wildflowers, and there are the small trees. I think they have just begun to grow.”

This would not do. I could not be helped by an imbecile. I looked back at the portrait of my great-great grandmother, and almost passed out. My vision had blurred again to such an extent that I now believed I saw trees too! They were white and brown and waving in the wind! "What wind?" I thought, "There is no wind in the house!"

“I think I need to sit down,” I said to the man. I sat on my bed, alongside of him. I peeked over to see what he was holding. All I saw was a blue smudge.

“What is that?”

“I’m not sure. I just picked it up.” He replied.

“Where did you find it?”

“Right here, in the field!” He said, with that annoying smile.

“We are not in a field,” I said, a little hesitantly. “I am afraid you are mad.”

“Oh, no. I am not mad. I was once a little confused, though. You see,” he confided, “I once thought I was in an big fancy spaceship and I was the only one there who spoke any English! Aliens were walking around the whole time and trying to speak to me but I had no idea what they were saying! All I wanted to do was escape. I sat in front of the controls and I tried and I tried to understand them, to somehow unlock the autopilot or the escape hatch or something.”

I felt the foundation of my house shifting, and I heard it groan as the ground moved under my feet.

“Yes, and then I discovered that there was this,” he held up his hand with the blue fuzzy object, “right in the middle of my spaceship! And it was chirping! So I picked it up, and began to stroke its back, and rather quickly I found myself in the middle of this field, and not on a spaceship at all.”

I saw the walls of my house cracking and plaster falling in chunks and dust from the ceiling.

The man looked at me and must have thought I seemed bewildered, because he asked, sheepishly, “I, uh, I don’t suppose you have ever been on a spaceship before?”

“Oh… no.” I admitted, “But I think I can understand what it was like. It sounds awful. Frightening. Closed-in. I know something about that.” I looked down at my shoes, now covered in plaster dust, and wondered where I had gotten them from, seeing as I had never known a time without shoes in the house.

I heard a bird chirping. I am not sure how I knew that that was what it was, because I thought I had never heard a bird before, and didn’t recognize it the first time I saw it. But when I heard this little bird in the man’s hand, I knew what it was.

So, I looked up again. I saw no walls, no ceiling, no portraits, no staircases.

There was the man, on his stool, with his bird, and myself. Around us were trees, above us was a blue sky, below us was a green and flowering field, and between us was the wind. It whipped across my cheek and tingled down my spine, it turned and whipped through the delicate plumage of the bird.

And I sank to my knees in the field. I felt the solid, damp dirt, as I hit the ground. I looked up and saw clouds, I looked out and saw dandelions and daisies, and I looked in and saw peace.

The man set the bird on the grass, where it hopped a few times before taking flight, off into the endless sky. The man knelt beside me, gently picked a white daisy, and then lifted it up and tucked it behind my ear.

My hair dances softly in the breeze. And I am not alone.

The use of a father

Sometimes, fathers leave. 

Some are then mourned while others are only cursed, but all absent fathers are missed. 
In trying to answer the burning questions left in now-abandoned hearts, good-intentioned souls list the benefits of fatherhood for a child: 
physical protection, economic provision, and a male role-model. 
The rest, it is all too often assumed, can be fulfilled by Mother.

Is this true?

Is Father essentially only the starting gun in a child’s life and, thereafter, a “help?”

I think of my father. How has he been useful to me?

This is an absurd question. Immediately I am repulsed by its utilitarian ethos.

What then, is Father? Who is Father? 
My father teases me like a brother, like a Father. My father discusses world politics with matter-of-fact blunt truth, like a lifelong friend, like a Father. My father kisses the top of my head like a lover, like a Father. My father walks with me in the dark, like a guard, like a Father. My father receives my affectionate embrace, like a child, like a Father. He is not singular in his actions, but he is not the same as the others. My father is neither lover, friend, brother, guard, or child.

What then, is Father? Who is Father? What makes this man my Father?

I must begin, obviously, with life itself. From there, his base genetic material flows to me and brings with it his illnesses and ailments of mind and body, as well as his strength. He also provides material possessions; it is true, such as clothing and shelter. But we are dealing with persons here, not possessions. 

Who is the person of Father? Who would I be without my father?
I cannot consider myself without him. Father is much more than protector, provider, or teacher. What have I learned from my father? This is a strange question to me. He has taught me many things, I suppose, but I do not see him as Teacher. He is Father.

By his life, his love, he has shown me what it is to be a man. My father has shown me that people are simple and selfish, but with love, with God, we can change. We can do amazing things. But we must be patient. My father has shown me that worry is useless, what is needed is trust. My father has shown me that I can stand on my own two feet as long as I am on a firm foundation.

But all of these lessons that lead to valuable life skills are still nothing. These thoughts and ideas are ants compared to the lion’s share of what he has truly, really given me. His presence in my life cannot be confined to what he gives or says or does to me.

My father is the man I love. 

By loving him, I come to see him ever more as he is. By loving him, I have learned to cherish quirkiness, joy, history, plurality, perseverance, honesty, manliness, womanliness; more importantly, I have learned to cherish myself. Every time he listened to my questions, thanked me for making dinner, apologized for his temper, reprimanded my carelessness, shared about his history, or held my hand as I fell asleep, this man taught my heart where it came from. He has made me to feel safe and confident, not because he gave me a house and an education, but because he gave me love. By his choosing, daily, to be a present father, I have the opportunity to be present to him. I have the opportunities that so many lack, to serve, obey, impress and be praised by, a good man. I become who I am in loving him and receiving his love.

Let me imagine… without him? Without him I have no world. Without him my mother is alone. Without him my heart burns to know, why was I not good enough to be present to? Why does my creator not wish to cherish me? How can anyone be trusted to keep their promise if the promise of a child means nothing to this man? How am I to succeed in this world that leaves women abandoned?

How can I ever thank my father enough for never leaving me? He is the anointing of my life, the sweetness in my smile, and the temper to my glass heart. I love him because he has first loved me, and when I see his graying, bespectacled face I want to cover it with a million kisses. His weariness fills me with a pulsing need to serve him. His dedication overcomes me with gratitude. I want to give, and give, and give, to this man who has made me a woman. 

How is he useful to me? This is an absurd question.

Beginning again, again

I am beginning to blog again, because I want to share my prose, as well as my poetry.

I once said that writing poetry is the barest, deepest, strongest speak I know. However, I (and other human beings) experience many things that are simply not served well by this form. I have written numerous little essays and reflections in the past and I feel myself longing to start up again. So here we go. a musing Samantha is now home to poetry and prose.

Enjoy, if you please.

Growing pains

An ache is growing

Inside of my soul

An ache like the pains of growing I’ve known

But this pain is not simple, tendon and bone

‘Tis a desperate thirst after  futures unknown

A hunger is growing

Inside of my soul

I hunger for silence and greatness and cold

I long to be humble and simple and strong

To someday be someone that you maybe want

I strive and I strive to be more than I am

And in this is folly – I think that I can

I curse this hunger, that seeks to compare

That drives to control and dissent and despair

Silence and greatness are present to me

Along with strength and simplicity

The future is full of them only
if now,
I live them

Embrace them

Lord, show me how!

The aches in my bones and my soul are alike

They ask for attention to strain and new life

I ask for Your guidance in hearing them both

In being accepting of “I am enough.”

He looks at me

I never say a word

And neither do you

Here in this darkened, sacred, small room

You simply sit here

And so do I

Head in my hands and eyes on your eyes

Which compass my soul with a glance and I try

To fall deeper and fly

Into your fiercely amorous gaze

Adoration

Of your white face

Penetration

You in your hidden grace

Contemplation

Pouring salve in the place

Of the wound

I never said anything, and neither did you

We knew

We knew

A thought

How can this be...
This man.
For me?

Belle, at the airport

Belle, at the airport

Selling headphones

You adjust your hair with a sparkle plastic crown

You straighten the folds of your costume gown

Men come to hear a pleasant sound –

Your voice? Or the voice in their heads

Belle, at the airport

Selling headphones

You seem like a girl who would like to be found

Squash and sea salt

Squash and sea salt

Stove-roasted

Toasted in a pyrex pan and eaten thereafter

Whereafter

I sit surrendered to sustenance felt

Squash and sea salt

Sometimes with a spoonful of blackberry jam

Of birds and bathwater

The smallest, simplest, step of a finch

Becomes more triumphant than the soaring eagle

Each little tangle

in the woven wefted wheals I perceive

are yet spectacularly

earth-rattlingly

important

When you are with me

The lights go down, the birds to sleep

I rest, held by Your magnificent hands

Implicitly, symmetrically

I need You more than I need to breathe

It pains me and seems to suck all the dust and life out of me,

this moment that I think of You

It hurts me more not to

Release me, protect me,

from the cold haunting onslaught of my poor imagination

This life is not a competition,

save me from my rank sedition

and this arrogant self

Here is the brush

Here the lye

Here the sun beating down to dry

Do with them as You will, only please,

do not leave me

Clean me through and

Be with me still

Moonlight

Moonlight dropping glinting running

Softly pounding feet on soil

Breathing quickly

swiftly losing

all that came

before

To find it chase it

seek it rush in past

the lowing evergreens

Quiet, no one sees you running

Quickly venture

round the bend

Slowly face the end

Tend

To your wavering, sputtering heart

Here in the dark

Inertia

Each morning

About seven o’clock

I forget everything I ever learned

To arise

will be impossible, I think

And eating

is far too much trouble

Dressing? I am not sure

that I know how

Facing the world? Too much,

too much to ask

Inertia

The tendency for objects to stay in their current state

When I move, indeed

I find it difficult to cease,

and at rest I jealously grasp this peace

To move forward requires trust

In something beyond this moment

beyond myself

Why does anyone get up in the morning?

Captivating

I know the curves of your face

I know the crinkle in your eye when you blink out the sunlight and try to picture my hands reaching out for you

I know the sway in your walk that you think looks like a man’s stride

I know the pain and the sting and the doubt that you hold inside

I know the laugh in your heart and the longing for something a little more like a home

I know the hearts in your hands who choose only in you to confide

In darkness and grey skies and times when no one else sees

You see their hearts and you set their hearts free

I see the loneliness left in you after they fly

I see the tears you think no one can see you cry

I see the frustration, the condemnation, your constipation, screwing up rhythms sticking and looping and jabbing

I was there.

Do you think you can enchant me?

Ah, you know the answer.

You captivate me.

And what else?

What else, my dear?

Eternity.  Believe me. 

Creamer

The creamer swirls in a wistful way

Raindrops close out a lonely day

And we sit here staring

Wishing we were daring

We could sit here like we’re doing

Elbows sticky with the last persons drink

We could watch the rainfall still

Steam up the window and breathe

Or unbuckle the seatbelts

Step out of these doors

Might we run

Out into to the soaking parking lot and

Dance in the downpour

Might we run

Into each other's arms and

Never leave again

Room for three

There is always room for me

in your hand-me-down furnished,

toy-strewn living room.

Tea on the stove,

pipe smoke residue in the cushions,

baby sleeping in the next room

with bare feet.

No need for bright lights,

we know each others faces.

I can see your silly grin in your voice.

We rhetoricize the future

and the world outside

this dark womb.

Lying on this couch, across from you,

I’m not sure anything else exists.

I am discovering myself in your family room.

Lichen

Rain shudders down in dewy drops as sparrows light on branches

Trees low over and bright verdant vines continue to climb

Gray fog casts a blue darkness over my forest

As lichen gently clutches the cedar stumps

And I am grateful

With each step a patch of moss bears my footprint

With each glance my eyes rest on a fertile rotting limb

With each breath I catch the scent of evergreen and must

With each word the sound dissipates into the wind

And I am grateful

A woman, placed in the kitchen

Oily black, the saucepan waits

Expectant and warm

At the sound of hot fat the window is opened

I let in the cool air of creation

Creating a gift I am eager to start

Chopping and peeling parsnips and large cups

Of spinach and carrots and sweet ground beef

The door opens, heart swells, he enters, I smell

We are ready to eat

And yet

Quiet echo

Growing greater

Sometimes shaking the depths of me

I, rejoicing

And yet still

My joy is not complete

I, laughing

And yet

There’s a sad sob hiding underneath

And yet

Someone out there refuses to let me go

My trust in You lives on until I cannot see the darkness

Everest

Everest

Dreams were made for living

Someday

I will rest

As the wheels in my head slow their turning

We’re here and in the stillness now

Waiting here together now

As the quiet echoes out

In my contented heart

I can’t imagine leaving here

Hearts are eased and beating here

Softer than they were

But if

you don’t want to be

In this quiet

here with me

Please go higher

If there was a way to never leave you nor to lose

If you were a prize that I could simply see and choose

If there were a way to guarantee my heart’s fair use

I would say no 

I would say no

For there is value in a person far above another’s joy

And the taking of your heart would be to utterly destroy

All the love, all the gift, that can unite a girl and boy

If I die

I won’t take you with me

You are not my own

So if you don’t want me

Please go higher

Please go higher

Respirate

I’m living this day over

Like recycled air

I’m turning this page over

Because I am bare

-ly breathing and I

don’t want to bleed anymore

Woman of a thousand faces

A moment, women.

A moment, while I speak

Each moment is a sacrament

of grace that peaks

And valleys

And troughs

And waves overhead

Woman

of a thousand faces

Pretend, if you will, that your true face is dead

Woman

in a million spaces

listen to me now, and lay down your head

Woman, you’ve a thousand faces

But you know that one is true

It’s the one that is lovely

Has a soul, brain, and body

It’s the one that is only and uniquely you

There’s a purpose that purposed the stars to align

It’s the purpose that made out your person’s design

And the trees to give fruit

Like the fruit in your womb

Be not afraid

rest your eyes

I am the way and the truth and the life

Follow my lead and let me drive

Sway to the rhythm of eventide

I lead you onwards by hand and by foot

and my power is made perfect

in ashes and soot

Woman, oh, woman

Lay on this breast

Let your face lose its worries

and wrinkles and mists

Hear my heart beat

Follow its rhythm

Follow my feet

3 am

Where do our hearts go

As the days drift deeper to dark

What is wisdom

When we feel too stuck to embark

On a journey which may lead us to glory

But could yet leave us lying depressed in the cold

Is this one “yet” the true source of our fears

Or is our distaste the result of our nearness

To fear

For what have we to fear, but fear itself

Tremor we do

Night terrors confront us, say

pain and sorrow are

the only results

of the only choices

we can choose

Life, truth, beauty

Mean nothing at 3 am

When we are frozen

To our ideals of what our lives must be

To what our God cannot do

To what has been promised

And what we are entitled to

What will melt us and allow us to step

Allow us to move and to live in light

Perhaps we must sleep through the night

All of your daughters

All of your daughters

Weep at your feet

Oh! See my hands!

They are gnarled and bleed

My legs,

they are molding and sloughing away

All of us kneel and we beg and we pray

These, my sisters, with faces drenched

Tears run through their soiled hands

Our raiment is threadbare, moth-eaten, burned

Remainders of whom we so earnestly spurned

You are radiant, crown-ed

Woman of light

Smoke and shade

To your left and your right

Our ranks are still swelling

Oh, much we have cost!

We are your daughters

We are the lost

Mother, mother!!

Lamentation decries

Oh please now, we beg of thee

Glance down your eyes

Look thou upon us, with merciful gaze

We come to you broken, we come in disgrace

Mother, oh mother! Our hearts are near dead!

With our last breath we cry out to your head

It is crowned with twelve stars

The moon’s under your feet

I place my head there, please, be my defeat

Stand on my murdering, nametaking heart

We need a new ending. We need a new start.

Gestation

Germinating

Incubating, separating, replicating cell

Zygote larger on the inside

Than it seems

Perfect, pure, immaculate

Carried in a tabernacle

Spotless as the snow

Imperceptibly, yet so rapidly

Seed containing fullness

Ripening o’er nine months

Waiting, while you’re germinating

We are longing for your coming

Child Emmanuel

With us in the darkness

Of Mary’s verdant womb

Unseen, unheard, but present

Heaven in this room