peace me, loves peace me, strangers peace me, Beloved free us from dangers
peace as a river peace as a wave peace as a verb peace saves
peace my heart peace all of ours peace all the friends peace the wars
peace a gift peace a joy peace fearless always no war toys
peace apparent
peace dove
peace triumphant
peace love
peace me, loves peace me, strangers peace me, Beloved free us from danger
I kept the paper cup in the picture, because the cup is animals and plants, but the cup also is a pair of lungs. Breathe peace. And breathe for all the people recovering from covid-19, short haul and long haul. And breathe love and shelter and support to all those grieving for our dead and let us grieve too.
For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: apparent. And for peace.
Stages of grief and Stages of peace. How do we reach and help the people who feel the urge to kill? How do we grieve the children? How do we peace the world?
A physician says to me, βYou might have had more friends and been more successful in your career if you had been put on medication a long time ago.β
I think, βYou f—ing bitch.β Nothing shows on my face. The doctor face is pleasant on the surface and the stone face that guards my feelings is deeper. I could show you the snakes and you would turn to stone but I would go to jail.
Your words donβt go away. They fester, a deep deep wound. I ask my other doctor, βIf my only symptom of pneumonia is my mood, no white count, no fever, how would I know if I had pneumonia if I were medicated?β
I think back. Age twenty five with belly pain, emergency room, CT scan and then a sigmoidoscopy. I couldnβt eat, it hurt so bad. The emergency room offers me valium. βNo,β I say, βmy father is an alcoholic. I wonβt take that.β I am sent to counseling. The counselor, smug, blonde, polished, wants to send me to her husband, a psychiatrist, for drugs. βNo,β I say, βmy father is an alcoholic. I want talk therapy not drugs.β I am very very afraid.
Things get better. I tell the counselor thank you. βYou canβt stop now,β she says, βYou must continue the counseling. Or you will have problems later on.β I go once more. She says I must keep coming. I speak to a family friend, a PhD psychologist, who encourages me to say no. I cancel. No regrets.
I am not an alcoholic. I donβt smoke. I donβt use pot nor CBD. I never tried cocaine or meth or opioids or crack. I can tell an addict by their charm: the sick people are not charming nor the people in for maintenance. The moment a person tries to charm me I wonder what they want.
The physician is wrong and cruel besides. Valium is addictive and is still overused. I could have taken the path of psychiatric medicine but I chose not to.
I will find another doctor who is less stupid and cruel. They do exist. I know, because I am one.
That’s what makes them angry that I love my liar sister even though she lied even though she hurt me even though she lied to them
That’s what makes them angry that I love my liar sister they want to love her lies they don’t want to know the truth they want to hide from lies
That’s what makes them angry
they are hella jealous
they want to be loved like that
they want to be loved whole
they want to be loved entire
they want to be loved even when they lie
That’s what makes them angry
they are so afraid to be themselves
they are so afraid to tell the truth
they are so afraid to be honest with each other
they are so tired of hiding
That’s what makes them angry one says she will be friends if we only talk about the positive about my mother, father, sister I counter: let’s not mention them at all nor your husband. Not a word. She doesn’t answer. Silence.
That’s what makes them sad
they don’t want to feel the anger
they deny the heartache
they avoid the longing
they bargain with their souls
they refuse to feel the grief
let us feel the anger let us feel the heartache let us feel the longing let us feel our grief let us feel our souls
Beloved, we long for you so
Please, Beloved, love us whole
_____________________
My sister sent me a t-shirt from Wicked. She died of cancer in 2012. The deaths from Covid-19 and every death brings her back to me. And this song sums up our relationship.
We have stages of grief. Now if we are going to make peace, we need to break it down into the stages that we need to go through. I think this incorporates and embodies the stages of grief. We need to plan peace. We need a map to get there, and it is not a simple road. We can’t just say I am peaceful. We must do the work. Here are the stages I can think of and I have certainly gotten stuck in some of these stages. What about you? No…or are you in denial? And if not you, I would bet money that you can name someone who you think or feel is stuck in one of these. Takes one to know one though, right? No, maybe that’s wrong. Stop confusing me!
And maybe we don’t all go through all of these stages. Or go through them in the same order. When I watch families grieve after a death, they often fight. They fight about how to grieve. The family members may be in very different stages, or the family may have stages or roles assigned to certain people, who may or may not accept the assigned role. My maternal family has anger assigned to me. I don’t really care any more. Since I am not angry, presumably they can’t handle anger and need to outsource it. I got tired of saying “I am not angry” and being told that yes, you are angry until I would get angry… you see the problem, right? It got ridiculous. My sense of the absurd kicked in and then I would try to really enjoy being angry. You are supposed to give things your best effort, right? Snort.
Message me if you think of some stages that I’ve missed! Then we can all get to work, on working through these. MAKE PEACE, PEACE OUT, PEACE ME, PEACE YOU, PEACE THE WORLD! Might take a while. Get on it, get to work.
Twisting words
Confusion
Denial
Bargaining
Anger
Bitterness
Revenge
Acting Out
Oppositional Defiance
Acceptance
Forgiveness
Healing
Hope
Reconciliation
Peace
_____________
What does the helmet have to do with this? Nothing… I just like the helmet. I keep thinking that it could be a breastplate instead of a helmet. And it is a clue to my May blogging… where am I? Where is this helmet?
we are talking about silence
yours deliberate
you don’t want people to know
how you make your money
you are angry, I notice
at how people treat you
you are a self made man
with a lot of money
I don’t much care
about your money
happy for you
& etc
I am more interested in silence
I go silent in Kindergarten
because I am too weird
have no tv
and want to sing
I do not bother to lie
because people don’t listen anyhow
and they don’t believe me
I listen, you say
I read everything you send me
That is not enough, I think
I don’t say it
I think about saying it
I don’t say it
I stopped sending you my poems
months ago
when you got angry
I asked if you would respond
something
a positive
a negative
even just “Read it.”
I don’t understand
why you got angry
and I am not scared
so much as surprised
I guess you brook no criticism
ever
I wonder why you must be perfect
seems tiring to me
at any rate
I am not sending you any poems
any more
since then
you could read my blog
I post some there
selected ones
unexceptional
less personal
though I suppose you could still
be angry
you say you know I am angry
when I go silent
I go silent, thinking about that
you are right that there is anger there
in the room with us
you sense it
it is yours, not mine
the bear chained in the dungeon
roaring
poor bear
I send it love
and it is crying
bitter tears
wet and cold
in a pool of tears
I can’t free it
only you can
for a moment you are aware
that I am silent about my poems
then you slam the dungeon door again
and talk about guns and science
and what you will do next
and what you will do next
with your bear
and without me
I am blogging A to Z about artists, particularly women artists and mostly about my mother, Helen Burling Ottaway. Today’s post is about my mother and my sister: another woman artist. Christine Robbins Ottaway.
I do not have much of her fine art. She was a landscape architect and historic preservation expert and worked for Caltrans. She also wrote, on her blog Butterfly Soup, and in other places.
The painting is an oil, by my mother Helen Ottaway, done when my sister was 14. This painting seems especially creepy to me, the oranges and blues. I love the painting but it is frightening as well. My sister could write terrifying stories. Here is my poem about one of her stories. The title of her story is “We don’t make good wives”.
Paper over
They are papering over your memory They want the clean version The inhuman perfect version I remember the violent sea serpent Related to Aunt Nessie: me, I think
He stole your skin, you say
But you lure him to, posing
On the shore naked
And let him take you home
And impregnate you
And then you have six daughters
What did he expect? you say
Cold blooded and beautiful
White skin and greenish hair
Who all can swim like fish
and all seven search
Until you find the skin
and then away
You say, he took my skin
Now I have taken his
Let them paper over your memory Let them pretend you were sweet I hold your words in my mind And I love you wholly
Discover and re-discover Mexicoβs cuisine, culture and history through the recipes, backyard stories and other interesting findings of an expatriate in Canada
Engaging in some lyrical athletics whilst painting pictures with words and pounding the pavement. I run; blog; write poetry; chase after my kids & drink coffee.
Refugees welcome - FlΓΌchtlinge willkommen I am teaching German to refugees. Ich unterrichte geflΓΌchtete Menschen in der deutschen Sprache. I am writing this blog in English and German because my friends speak English and German. Ich schreibe auf Deutsch und Englisch, weil meine Freunde Deutsch und Englisch sprechen.
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