pet projects

Check out our virtual wasp's nest.

Cool. It is behind the screen?

Yep. Reminds me of an ant terrarium I had when I was a kid. Those things are pointless; I mean, after a month it becomes so encrusted with dirt that you can't see the tunnels anymore. It was my own private mud pie between two sheets of glass.

Whatcha do with it?

I decided to set the fuckers free. They set up shop by the front door and I saw more action from them in that two weeks than the entire time their colony was imprisoned.

Two weeks?

Yeah...my mom poured bleach on the mound. Nice, huh? In retrospect, I should have let them be altogether.

That's what we are, ya know?

What?

God's ant farm. We made such a mess of things that he set us loose on the earth.

Hmpf. So who's gonna pour bleach on us?

His mother. He's been away at college and it's time to redecorate.

Blow + Austin City Limits photos

a glimpse

light auburn ringlets
K's eyes, mouth and chin
my nose, feet and hands

a knot in his cord
such an active little one, who swam in circles
he grew and it shrank
ticking time, tic-toc

I have a picture of Caleb the week before he died. Due to my size, Dr. G sent me to the Perinatal Group again to check for growth abnormalities. None were found. K and I breathed a huge sigh of relief, unknowing. I recall the tech tracing the vague outline of the cord, remarking that they do not generally show well on sonograms.

But his open eyes did.

I looked at those eyes this morning. A serene countenance staring into the fluid of his world, where our muted sounds and light broke through. I look and I try not to imagine him suffering. See, I will never know this.

What do I know? That my hands touched him constantly - comforting him through hiccups, grabbing an errant foot as he stretched, supporting his tiny back at night as he slept. That his father read to him, I sang to him, we reached in to him and he reached back. Those moments will last as the wanting for why fades.

Now when I cry it is for different reasons: bittersweet chocolate in Añejo, a brilliant math equation, the trees at twilight under a full moon. I mourn the loss of touch, sight, sound, taste and smell. I pine for a lover who will not meet his/her man. For conjured memories frozen in an idyllic land.

And nestled with K in our great green bed, my face conducting the warmth of his back, I felt it - a love that goes beyond oneself. Caleb's expression held that, as we held him.

Within eternal potentialities. That is all it ever is.

Wake me up when September ends

Since rising this morning and fondling K out the door, I’ve cleaned every inch of our 1600 sq. ft. abode, danced sans clothing, hit The Drag to shoot some film, bathed the cat and the dog (neither were pleased, however, Stubbs did shake his soggy ass all over the house in a fantastic post-lavatum frenzy), finished reading my book, walked three miles and eaten my weight in nuts (which isn’t much these days).

I'm supposed to be 'taking it easy'.


It’s odd to be home from work. I am a link in a long chain of toiling spirits that cannot sit still to save their fucking life. My mother’s mother was an Army MP and detective for the Delaware police department. Hard nose and silver tongue. Trace a delicate finger along that family tree and you not find a woman without calloused hands and feet. Nothing short of a brain hemorrhage keeps them from their duties. Forget whining, bullshit, or horseplay...roll up your sleeves, find a strategy and get it done - What’s your problem? Yeah? Well, let’s think it through.


On the side of that great oak flourishes an equitable mistress in her own gracious right. Slight branches that arc into gossamer plumes to counterbalance steadfastness: a weeping willow. All crying aside, artistic determination holds sway. My father’s mother is a reed, long and strong, reflecting a constant bend…you know, just in case, right n’ ready for the unavoidable storm. A pensive intellect with ever-flowing compassion, these women build shelters to fill with canned goods - Are you okay? Oh? Sweetheart, let’s feel it through.

Both find the most inopportune time to either make nothing out of something or something out of nothing. Both have their craft and vulnerability.

Above all, I’ve noticed this: both hold a solitary note, AKA - I can do this on my own.


And I, the veritable amalgam, think and feel ‘round the point of insanity, only to find in the 25th hour that I’m right back where I started from.

Crazy? Hmmm...I was crazy once. They locked me up and fed me nuts.

release

I wrote this in my private journal over two months ago - Qi was my pet name for Caleb. Now, as I want to lose myself in grief, I read this and see how even then he was teaching me the art of letting go.

Qi, I sit in apology to you. Baby, love, the one I have wanted for so long, look at me now - I seethe and waste away in sorrow instead of joy for the gift of you.

I could blame a million stars, but it would be untrue. The fault lies with me. All I need do is look back on countless actions and reactions to see how sorrow driven I am at the core of my being. Would I be happy if I had my every whim? Perhaps I have made poor choices in that constant quest, settling for the unacceptable to make it somehow okay. It is not okay.

Should you, the innocent, be made victim to my circumstance? Never, my love, never. Yet I have not thought of you before crying for my own loss, my own anger, my own need. I held back the love that would normally spill from me like a tidal wave. The absence of angst would free me to give you my attention. I'd sing you lullabies and learn to knit. I'd read every nonsense book on how to care for you just so I could forget it all the first moment I looked in your eyes. I'd lovingly map out your room, wash and fold your new clothes and daydream about how beautiful you are. You are beautiful, Qi.

Baby, I will break down this wall, constructed over decades of fear and rejection, to free my heart for you. I owe you this and more. I owe you love, not the love I didn't get or the love I may not get, but honest love. I owe you to keep in mind that you are your own entity, not some creation of mine. I owe you to look into your soul and respect you for the unique creature you are. I owe you the right to know your father in the best way possible, in your life everyday, giving you his attention, knowledge and love, despite any feelings I have toward him or how he may or may not get it right according to me. I owe you a peaceful world, a secure foundation, a warm place to come home to, a safe haven from the atrocities of life, an ear to your adventures, a space all your own, an independence from the ties that bind. I owe you wings and a guide, a map and a compass, a light in the darkness.

I have been consumed by the emotions around me. I want to cry all the time. I could chalk this up to hormones, to a difficult pregnancy, but I know different. I cried before I conceived you. I cried for what I wanted and didn't have. You were one of those things and now I have you, so why the tears? Why the anger?

Baby, this consciousness is mysterious and at times unkind. It gives and takes without remorse. I would be foolish to allow my wanting of a perfect love and family to obstruct the joy of having you at all - a weak mother borne in constant craving - because no matter what happens, you are a gift.

Tonight I will sleep and feel you inside me. I will listen to the rhythm of our bodies and stop fighting the urge to accept it. I will let go of the guilt that keeps my thoughts and care from you.

An amazing miracle. I cherish you.

his mermaid

whatever it takes you to relieve it
that's all right with me
take this morning in my kitchen
or whatever that helps you to believe
you will find me down by the river
getting high on my mortality
i'll be holding hands with nameless beauty
or whoever wants to stand next to me

all eyes on me

you can take it easy
'cause i've got a mind to
put your parachute on slow
we're moving into calmer waters
where all your loveliness will show
for all of your wanting me to react to
"look no hands on this carousel"
for me to be true to whatever you cling to
whenever your heart is going to tell

all eyes on me
i'm going to the moon
time heals what you can't see
heads back
i'm leaving soon leaving soon

by Sinead Lohan

adrift

This sorrow has lifted a song from my lips. I sing for the simplest things. The joy of K's body next to mine. A soft caress, a strong hug.

It connects me, even as this broken heart circumvents accord. My early morning walk was a soujourn in silent acceptance, down into the whirlpool where those who have no alternative turn.

Like a boat upon the ocean I am bound to float away
on the current that has caught me and invited me to stay
with the slowly moving water that is headed for the shore
where the land no longer holds me quite the way it did before

K and I picked up Caleb's ashes today. The cold urn in my hand did not resemble any living thing. It did not even represent a memory, and yet I held it with a firm grip, like a protective mother.

My own vessel will not sink. I have no weight as I wait for the fire of sunset's low tide.

an abyss

I wasn't sure I could write.

Mostly I am at a loss of what I want to convey. A different emotion washes over me from one second to the next.

At the hospital I was so calm - sad, but calm. I had a job to do. Returning to everyday life broke that spell. I am no longer sheltered by the kindness of strangers. Here is my dog, my cat, my lover. There is the lamp, the bed, the dishwasher. Familiarity at its worst. And for the first time anger paid a visit.

Yet even my anger is calm. There is no guttural wail. No screaming and throwing of precious collectables. A tear quietly outlines the hollow of my ancient tree of life. This empty womb that I unconsciously rub has flattened overnight.

I cradle an unfathomable ache. I asked the Lord to take care of my boy. His answer was to take him away.

Caleb

How can I write this? The act itself is like sharing the untellable. My mother by my side. Her hand in mine. What did I say?

There are no words.

His face. His beautiful face. His open mouth as his body was lifted up to me. A grace that I've never seen. And still there are no words.

Did he give me the strength I needed to do what I had to do? To push, to rest, to hold his limp, but tender body at my breast, to count each toe and finger, to brush his lips, to kiss his face?

My boy, my sweet, sweet, boy. I love you, always.

In this heart, he breathed into me a woman. A gift I can never fully thank.

I carry you with me,
a ghost inside
and in these shattered arms
you're still alive.
I carry you with me,
a holy shrine
where dogs and angels follow
right behind.

Could I be walking higher?

I will feel for you in the music.
I will send that river home.
I will cry for you
when the night is down.
I raise my head up to the mountains,
talk to the birds and I fly
'cause the spirit lives on,
when the body dies

And could I be walking higher,
could I be right beside him?