The Rag that LIves in the Tree

It’s been there ever since

I came to live here, seven years ago

And who knows how much longer before?

Each year it grows grayer and less defined.

I think it was once a shirt, from the bits of shape

It still holds--a child’s shirt, most likely.

Grotesquely cloudlike, it changes with the wind:

 hammerhead shark one day, a flirty

girl dancing wild at a party.  Too much to drink,

I tell her, and she smirks  at me.

Today the rag is formless, except for its  bottom edge

[(a sleeve, it must have been), that alone mimics the motions

of the lighter leaves. 

It seems like a mouth, with neither

face nor head to balance it: a mad, insensate ghost

chattering endlessly to itself

among indifferent leaves.

'tony' correspondence below

the post right after this is my effort to take a perfectly coherent facebook exchange and put it on my blog.  those of you who know me know that my relationship with computers is highly ambivalent.  first the fb conversation wouldn't copy onto the blog or even my desktop. after teeth-gritting hours i finally got several of the elements together, on 2 pages, which i then [more gritting] scanned. then i posted it.  only of course i got the pages wrong, and no editing allows me to change that, or even to add numbers, so the poor reader knows how to get to this arcana.  so please read it with that in mind.

tony is a dear onetime student of mine, from the mid 1980s.  we re-met at a reunion a few years back and became fb friends.  i have much enjoyed his posts, and especially his grand enthusiasm with parenthood.  when i read his recent post on the birth of his baby several years ago, i was deeply moved. but i was disturbed by the fact that it had been written for a 'right-to-life' publication, which by definition would embrace tony and his wife's decision, but not the decisions of pregnant women who did not wish to continue being pregnant.  so i replied to tony, who then graciously replied back.  it seems to me a useful correspondence on a number of levels, so with tony's consent, i wanted to put it on my blog.  though it's come out badly visually, i still think it's worth reading.   and if the computer allows me, i'll later add a picture or 2 from tony's family posts.  but good luck in getting thru the presentation to the content!

correspondence with tony

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safe house

Yesterday's email included 2 posts from a friend in Jerusalem, worried for me b/c i live in boston.   something both touching and ironic in this. ah where are the lies of yesteryear?

new lang zyne

monday afternoon, and leave for home wednesday. depression is bad today, but expected.  leaving the castle and my kids is always sad, and combined with depression deadly.  all my cynicism about the pharmaceuticals goes down the drain, as i pop the extra sanity-saving pill.  i was scared to come here this term, since the new pills have only partly lessened the depression and last year was such a disaster.but this year  i was well enough to connect with the kids and colleagues [though not enough of the latter since i needed so much sleep].  i taught decently, in spite of the increased fuzziness, which always of course makes me think alzheimers but is much more likely depression. the kids have been charitable and gracious  and i'll miss them.

some of the work i'd been doing with the new shrink at home i've done on my own here, and reached some interesting places.  and, though writing less than at home, i've done some good stuff--especially the growth of my character 'india footlock.'' not quite poetry,  not quite essay, a certain but odd kind of fiction.  she makes me feel a little alive again.  grown closer to some colleagues--michaela in particular, and emile and his family, and chester.

i dont like being old, and no pretty language can erase that. i am not elderly, senior, golden year'd or any of that crap. i'm old. and that means most  of  my accomplishments and failures are behind me [once i wrote, long ago, 'failure is a flimsy demon beside that trim toothed monster adequacy.' and i have been adequate.  so death, while terrifying, will also be  a relief, i think.  and much of the job of living toward it is to face the fantasies that are pure fantasy and try to let them go, and pursue the small accomplishments still possible. [one of which is an increasing aptitude at tarot reading].

i will not age gracefully or with dignity; i have never lived in either condition and neither fits me well.  if i must have an adverb--and i am too much a coward not to--let it be 'curmudgeonly.'  it's how i've lived, now let me earn it.

this was not meant to be an essay on aging--but i suppose parting once again with a beloved group of youngsters presents that temptation.  so goodbye, megans, griffin, ali's, my 2 brave trios, and all.   i'll miss you---and thanks for being people i can care enough about to miss....have  a great summer, and great lives.....

and to the beloved colleagues---tot volgende jaar!

A Fairy Tale from the Castle

The Woman stares up at the tower.   Once she had lived there. She was rapunzel then,  her hair streamed down over the moat and onto the bridge, and all the lovers tried to climb up to her…

You  were not repunzel, says the invisible child sternly.  You were a middle-aged lady with short hair.  Sometimes a man looked up and waved.  That’s not rapunzel.  That’s not even the wicked witch.

The woman ignores her.  I was rapunzel, she repeats.  And when I washed my hair, I hung it out the window to dry.

And it landed in the moat and the last few inches got filthy with moat water and grime and carp crap, and you had to wash it again.

It blew over the moat and floated onto the bridge….

Which was full of dirt and peacock shit and you still had to wash it again.

And the young men all wanted to climb up the hair into my window because I was so beautiful.

And their boots were full of mud and bits of leaves and you still….

But the wicked witch wouldn’t let them, and they all fell into the moat and drowned, she says, very loudly now.

And then what? A sigh.  Better to stop arguing and get the damn story over.

The wicked witch made everybody go to sleep for a hundred years, and so they did.  Except I had insomnia, and stayed awake for many of those years.  It was very boring.

Yes,’ agrees the invisible child with another sigh.  And then what happened?

Well, eventually we all woke up and went about our lives.  But by then the wicked witch had cut my hair all off….

Must have startled the hell out of the carp.

And by then it was all gray anyhow, and no one would have wanted to climb it.

And that’s why you never got married.

Well, it was one of the reasons…

The Return of the Bad Traveler--2013i

It sounds so elegant and sophisticated, doesn't it?  'Where did you go?',  'Oh, Paris and London.'  even i feel inpressed with myself when i see that phrase. but once again, perversity wins ut--or at least nibbles at my heels.  i really hadn't wanted to go anywhere.  but since they changed the policy and nw the caslte is closed for the kids' break, i can't stay here.  so i thught it would be nice to see both places, which i have loved, and haven't been to for years.  it would be easy because i know them pretty well--especially london.  but i doundt dig up any excitement for the trip.

at the asme time, i can't dig  up any disappointment.  i was tired all the time, as i am here, or in brookline, or wherever.  so i slept a lot, which felt great.  it's only the usual old demons that bothered me.  one of the reasons i stopped going to london is that i had stopped enjoying it as a tourist. i felt i'd be happy there for 3 or 6 months, on some sort of work project, and live as i do at home--going out when there's something i really want to go out for, and staying home otherwise.  but you can't do that easily when you're paying hotel bills.  or actually, i can't. no, actually i couldn't. now, it turns out, i can.  the little id voice popped in a lot, saying, 'liten, you're in london; go to a museum or a play.'  but there was no theatre in town that appealed to me much--certainly nothing i'd go to if it were playing at home. only 2 museums i felt compelled to see, and those i actually got to.  these were the national gallery and, of course, the portrait gallery. in the national not only did see christine of denmark [who rejected henry 8's courtship, supposedly with the line, 'if i had 2 heads,' i'd gladly give his majesty one.]. and upstairs, the duttch section, with some wonderful vermeers and de hochs.   and later i got to see two very old friends again, which was lovely.

paris too was fun to see, and i got to the louvre with the group.  i have always disliked the louvre as a museum--too many people, too much sensory input from a million paintings. i got a big panic attack, but had te sense to tell the guide i was leaving, and found my way to the only paintings i cared about--holbein's portrait of anne of cleves.  i kept getting lost and panicky, and took a couple of tranquilizers, which worked but knocked me out later. no matter. a peaceful and almost solitary visit with anne, which made it all worth while. she's still hanging out with erasmus, and for the firt time i had noticed at the portrait gallery in london that christine of denmark is also right by erasmus.  i did enjoy this a lot--2 unlikely companions for the great philosopher.  when i left Anne in paris, i got to see also Marguerite of austria, and her english aunt.  between all that and the two city bu tours, i saw all i needed--and slept a lot.  no drama, but a worthy time.