Category Archives: ocean

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Daily Evil: W is for Wild

Is wildness evil? What sort of wildness? The forest and waves and wilderness are not things we think of as evil, but some wildness in humans seems very evil. Some is silliness, some is substances, and some is truly violence and cruelty and terror and evil.

This is another of Helen Burling Ottaway’s fantasy etchings, titled The Hunt, number 6 of 30, 1986. A merman with a trident and dogfish, with a variety of tails. The etching is 6.75 by 8, the paper 11 by 15. I like the lines of movement, of waves, from the escaping shark.

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The brim of the ocean

The beach is the brim of the ocean
we dabblers play at the rim
The tide overflows up the land
What to a whale is a sin?

We walk at the edge of the ocean
we run from the waves rolling in
we swim in the sea or float in a boat
What to a whale is a sin?

Leviathan live in the ocean
breech sprays to breathe at need
the brim of their home is the land
The sea is the place that they feed

The land is a tide to a whale
Boat islands sometimes approach
Do whales wander and wonder near land?
Wonder why land must encroach?

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For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: brim.

I think I need a tune.

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Sea lions

Do you think the sea lions are talking to the Beloved? When they are on the rock with their heads tilted back, looking up?

Are they trying to feel the sun?

Do they have reflux and digest better this way?

Do you think the sea lions are talking to the Beloved?

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within normal limits

I think doctoring makes one cynical. Or at least messes up the scale of normal.

Maybe there are Marcus Welby docs out there, but I don’t know any. Doctoring messes up one’s scale. A wound is compared to black horrifying gangrene to the knee, pain is compared to screaming delirium tremens or full thickness burns or heroin withdrawal, one in four adults can be diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder at some time in their life…. so then, what is normal?

What is normal for relationships? How many deeply happy marriages do you know? If half end in divorce, what are the odds?

Where is the line in love? Where is the line between loving the other person no matter what and wait, that is domestic violence. Where is the line for abuse? Do people agree on it?

No. They do not. What I think is behavior that is frightening may be normal behavior to my partner. Is it ok to drink until one is drunk? I don’t want to be around it. I saw enough of that shit at work. I deal with addiction daily. If someone wants to get drunk, they can choose to do that. But not around me. And no, I don’t want to date them. And if they are working themselves to death, is that ok? Well, I might be a tad hypersensitive to that, since I nearly managed that myself. So I don’t want to be around that either. That might be viewed as noble self-sacrifice. But at work, I see the caregiver die before the recipient of the care, all too often. Especially in older couples, where neither one wants to let anyone in the house to help….

….but then, some people do hear me. A woman thanked me last year for saying she should quit covering for her husband. She was afraid, but backed off. He is able to do more than she expected and he also is more respectful and kind to her. She thanked me and I got all shy and tongue-tied.

My definition of love is listening. Someone who listens and hears and lets me listen and hear. When each person can say what they are thinking and feeling and wanting and worried about…. because if only one person is speaking, if only one person is determining what the relationship is, it is not a relationship.

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One must go through the water.

One must go through the water.

One might choose not
avoid
there are ways to avoid feelings

Another one might choose not

I let go
and fall
and the water closes over my head
and I let myself sink
all the way down

even
if I am over
a deep trench

once down
once deep

I open my eyes
and let my breath out
and let the deep rush in

I don’t know why
people avoid this place
it is dangerous
but so beautiful
the darkness
with beings that glow

some attack
of course

but I too am a monster
bare my fangs
and receive respect
or fear

or friendship

I am very safe here
it is so familiar
in the deep