Poem I Like

The Bird

I have grown tired of sorrow and human tears;
Life is a dream in the night, a fear among fears,
A naked runner lost in a storm of spears.

I have grown tired of rapture and love's desire;
Love is a flaming heart, and its flames aspire
Till they cloud the soul in the smoke of a windy fire.

I would wash the dust of the world in a soft green flood;
Here between sea and sea in the fairy wood,
I have found a delicate wave-green solitude.

Here, in the fairy wood, between sea and sea,
I have heard the song of a fairy bird in a tree,
And the peace that is not in the world has flown to me.

-Arthur Symons

Saturday night thoughts on Townes

I just finished watching a documentary on Townes van Zandt. It was sad...he was sad, permanently, it seemed. He died of a heart-failure. In the time he hurt his hip to the point he came home and died...did he meet with his Maker?
The thing I liked best about this beautiful, soft spoken man was his ever so subtle smile. It would creep up and out...he would take you on a slow and tantalizingly gripping journey until the smile would appear fully and you would thrill! I don't mean that drunken grin, and loud-mouthed non-sense...but the shy smile that spoke volumes of who he truly was.
He lived in a half-truth reality...no, not like mine, different. Does being in reality (can I say "greater reality" or is there such a thing?) mean being in less pain?

Joy, Fear, and Barfing

I am recovering. Yesterday during my preschool class I felt horribly sick and rushed to the little girl's bathroom, knelt in a stall (on who knows what) and vomited over and over for the duration of the class. Fortunately Miss Tracey, my aid, finished teaching the class. Later she told me that when I left an "epidemic" hit the class and all the little ones were suddenly sick as well.


So after this experience I started pontificating the act of PUKING.


As a child I had many fears. One of my fears was vomiting. I tried mentally to keep myself from what I thought the worst part of illness was, throwing up. Now however, I desire the act because I know it will bring relief.


Other things I greatly feared - getting shots and getting spankings. I felt such anxiety that I would experience more suffering simply in the before than I would in the thing I feared.

This is one of my (our) great struggles still.


The flip side of this? JOY! The joy that is found in anticipation. This is where joy for me always lay. I remember as a child some of the joy I would experience was before vacations. Looking forward to the adventure that lay ahead.

Anticipatory joy is related to my enjoyment of airports for example. And this joy can be found in our earth-life as well...the before death kind of joy.

The End

PS Here is some joyful news...Jane's son was found fine and alive and working in the Foreign Legion, ah ha!