One Word Journal: Oct 22

reverberate

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October 22, 2010 One Sentence Journal

I’m not quite sure what it is that makes me delight this much in styling my hair in an 80’s larger than life ‘do I wear in “Taming” (perhaps its about the title!)

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Grateful on October 23, 2010

I am grateful new writers continue joining us in our writing sessions for “And Now You Write” – YAY!

I am grateful for the conversation with Jessica last night.

I am grateful for the new discoveries I made about my femininity last night.

I am grateful for the cinnamon rolls Samuel and I baked this morning.

I am grateful for the comments on my “Chameleon” poem, especially from a man saying “I now know more than I ever thought I would know” and he said he could feel the empty sadness which tells me the poem did its work.

I am grateful I embrace doing things differently (even when I would rather do things “samely” LOL

I am grateful for my windchimes.

I am grateful for stolen shared glances and smiles with friends.

I am grateful.

See more progress on: Daily: Reflect on at least 5 things for which I'm grateful (Happiness Manifesto #2)

One Word Journal: October 21, 2010

modpodge

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One Sentence Journal: October 21, 2010

I am surprised, no – shocked, at how much fun I am having destroying a book I detest and making art from it. :-)

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Today, October 21 I am so grateful

that today’s “And Now You Write” lesson is inspiring the heck out of me…facilitator bonus prize!

Elli

for Marvin’s ability to teach dance

for the way the early morning sun slants, as if it is waving to my front porch

Samuel’s increasing ability to express his emotions constructively

the promise this weekend holds: two performances, a party, a roadtrip with beloveds to a place I have never been, a support group and lots of hugs from my babies! (they don’t like me to call them that!)

See more progress on: Daily: Reflect on at least 5 things for which I'm grateful (Happiness Manifesto #2)

Today, October 21, I am grateful for...

speechlessness

the Art and Spirituality Center

painting in purple

Mary Oliver

Blog comments

giggles with Emma

silent early mornings

painting with water

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Spirit Day, 2010

I can not claim to know your pain
I know pain
I can not claim to know your despair
I know despair
And I do know
reaching out, palm of
hand to palm to hand
clear eyes to tearing eyes
hearing the soul song for
together we are able
to nestle in each other’s
necls to come to know your
smell there:
the smell of your hidden sadness
the lurks after a heaving crying session
we can know that of each other
and pray it is enough

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

Before I Do It

Today I realized I was too familiar

with humdrum mediocrity in the air

Stacked Special K, Trix, Cinnamon Toast Crunch

Vacant eyes scanning for Penne or Linguini

Surprised, each time, by the seductive

smell of the Coffee aisle

Eyes away from other eyes, pushing metal

I count my steps each night when I walk

around the block. I listen for the slap

of each footstep on the pavement and

wonder what it will be like when I no

longer lift my feet up and down

My neighbors all keep their blinds closed

And then last night, I walked through my door

and Ed, my dog, greeted me, a question

hanging from his wagging tail, his

eyes, looking into mine with a dare

I had to reach down, to touch him

Pure intention with skin

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

The Beginning of the Poetry chairs

Paint flies through the air
and hopefully lands, there
on the to-be poetry chair

It doesn’t seem like
a large act, historically
immense or dense yet

The effect of the wetness,
the slight shimmer, it spells
“Hope” somehow – -

Mary Oliver told me, “You
don’t have to be good,”
I feel my shoulders
release

Just point the paint
push and move and release
and repeat. “You have to become
like a machine,” he said.

This purple I add
starts to turn this
simple one-time-sitting
in-Ikea-warehouse predictable
chair into sculpture

Intention and color morphs it
from “just like all the other
chairs” into a place to sit to
write to read to listen
to enjoy to become
poetry

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

One Sentence Journal: October 20, 2010

The feeling of my head against the pillow was strange and yet strangely sweet.

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Beloved Teresa

Beloved Teresa, you gave the sisters

guidance. I need it, I need you, now

I need to see love taking form

I need to feel your gentle

hand, marble essence, between

my shoulder blades

How may we make this just fine to

make that just fine?

What can I do, with grace and love

who must I be with my children

with my projects just fine with my vision

just fine with my business just fine with

the people who show up just fine, desiring

tending, desiring questions, desiring

that gentle tug and nudge and

oh so gentle leaning just fine

Beloved Teresa, you gave the sisters

guidance. I need it, I need you, now

I need to see love taking form

I need to feel your gentle

hand, marble essence, between

my shoulder blades

I feel your answer in moving beyond

the just fine.

I feel your answer moving my fingers

massaging my forehead,

“You, me, she, we so far

beyond when you, me, she, we

climb into the heart of the one

who created us… and surrender,

allow, open, lean back….

Beloved Teresa, you gave the sisters

guidance. I need it, I need you, now

I need to see love taking form

I need to feel your gentle

hand, marble essence, between

my shoulder blades

Sister, let me lean into you

and yours, love

Feel that descent that sweet

acceptance that weightlessness

that ecstacy that light…

Beloved Teresa…..

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

Mom and her Pfaff

Mom didn’t wear much
perfume or make up it was
her sewing machine that
adorned her like her
ubiquitous peach lipstick

Mom confessed it was
the cutting out she hated
the destruction before
the creation before the
machine’s whirrrrrrrrr

I sought fancy details
(the very ones she abhorred)
ruffles, tucks, tweaks and slippery
fabric were famous for delaying
the revered final stitch

Later she stiched flowers onto
my wedding gown which I wasn’t
so wild about, I didn’t see her
bowing to my fancy, they were
her love and honor sewed in – -

The time the gong chased
me from my kitchen cabinet Mom
followed Sue’s frightened prsence
sans sewing machint, that time
Only withered windex, comet, Tide…

Post spectrum discovery she
sewed Sam’s shirts in a Motel 6 room
Her voice the foot pedal, “He needs
to learn. He needs to know.
You need to be…...”

On Hawthorne Avenue, only late at night
when her dailiness was past
machine went to table top

her quiet, dutiful, necessary
love: useful, wearable art
sewn stich by stitch

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

One Word Journal: October 17, 2010

Cat!!!

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One Sentence Journal: October 17, 2010

I have gotten to be rather exceptional with being detached and welcoming delight, randomly.

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Monday Morning Gratitude, October 18

is so grateful for my new phone which makes my work SOOOO much easier

word stew

coffee

the Poetry Gong

revision

inspiring friends

twangles

intimacy with true desire, true rage, true hunger, true pleasure….

I am so grateful!

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One Sentence Journal: October 15, 2010

I can make it through four more Shrew performances.

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Gratitude on October 16

Samuel is helping me today.

I am grateful for Samuel’s four quarters from the tooth fairy, which he is carrying around like a secret treasure… ^smiles

I am grateful to only have FOUR shows left! YAY!

I am grateful to have a Saturday morning filled with poetry, reading and writing.

I am grateful to have a-ha’s, even when they hurt.

I am grateful for my trusty cup of coffee

I am grateful for the Kern Literary events this week so I may begin my SWAN networking.

I am grateful for the Poetry Gong at Big Tent Poetry.

I am grateful.

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The Groan

Not exceptionally cheery and FYI, not autobiographical… yet another of my “fiction-poetry” experiments.

The groan rose from her chest, alien-thought-form
breaking through from the darkness into the

earthquake chasm created by the light, coming, there, from
the open window, open door, open-anything made her
soul skin shout, dried up rose petal word showers

“Don’t even think of making me rise up and out of this bed…”
She’ll more than gladly stay here, safe, dusty and
unexfoliated, under this slightly grey sheet

Her toes unpedicured, my heart unspent, her mind
made up.
“Don’t even think of making me
rise up and out of this bed…”

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

Here

HERE

Living, we cover vast territories;
imagine your life drawn on a map—
I never imagined it would stop.
Here. My children born.
Here.

My life force, my spark doesn’t fit in
Here. (But it comes close enough so
I stay)
Here.

I returned
Here.
While she stayed
to be educated. There.
I plug myself in.
Here.

Unknowns the unanswered hows. There.
glue my map shut. Here. paste smeared
on the creases between this highway
and that landmark I find myself
Still here.

My life drawn on a map.
Still.
Here.

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

Friday gratitude:

grateful for rest,

the smell of morning,

open windows,

my new phone,

writing breakthroughs for the writers of “And Now You Write”,

the discovery of new poets,

orange

See more progress on: Daily: Reflect on at least 5 things for which I'm grateful (Happiness Manifesto #2)

October 14 - Just Drive

I would never look into her eyes
and see myself reflected
Never be able to ask her if she
suffered and how it felt to come
face-to-face with death -

I wonder, now, if she has any awareness
of what has come to pass
If she could somehow let me know
what death has taught her
If she was there when my soul
flew forth and was pushed back,
so mightily. Was she one of the
ones who held my head up,
who kept her siblings calm and quiet?

“Just drive” toward light
our only drive alone
a family beginning its ending
Toward a waiting wheelchair
toward a tiny white casket under a
blanket of beautiful flowers
toward a grave I still visit on occasion,
tenderly offering this year’s flowers
since I never was able to have offered
gentle good night rituals
no breakfasts in bed or late night
secret excursions to addresses unknown,
giggling at our sillyness
no conversations about what to do, what
not to do, no big sisterly
advice for Kat or Emma or Sam

I was forty eight when I wrote this poem
still refusing to just drive…...

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

She loves

She loves the way it sounds: absolve

Step back, get a better view:
set free, let go, abandon: add wings
to heaven (or something or someplace
like that)

What would it be like to have
the hisses and ridicule heard
as the twelve-year-old-she evaporate?

The auditory mist would be taken up,
on flying chariots, hazy clouds of glitter
trailing them as love prevails,
finally, in memory, in future – -

She loves the way it sounds: absolve

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

June 1985, Mesa Arizona

It whispers in my ear when speech evades me.

“I don’t know where it blows from. And in its sources is my power.”

My eyes find the ability to open. I see my feet, standing in canvas shoes.

I see the sidewalk pavement, the phone booth,

The broken down car.

Miles from home, from love, and settling out there, alone.

My voice sounds braver than my slightly shaking hand feels.

My sweaty brow is cooler when

It snakes past me.

Do I kid myself when I insist on

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

October 11, 2010 - Bootcamp Check In

I didn’t make it to Zumba today but I did make it to the gym for a general work out. This is awesome for me because it isn’t all or nothing, it is about being with what is…the world doesn’t stop spinning if I don’t make it to Zumba class AND my body feels better if I work out somehow, every day.

This felt great!!

I also love that after my workouts, whatever form they take, I make time for quiet meditation a la savasana in yoga. Last night I had some marvelous awarenesses. Sometimes they come, sometimes it is pure silence… and whatever it is is just right…

See more progress on: October Bootcamp: Commit & Achieve, Daily

October 11, 2010 One Word Journal

flow

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October 11, 2010

I adore writing along the river.

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10/11/2010 gratitudes....

is grateful for the sunshiney morning

the writers of “And Now You Write”

poetry

Samuel’s helpfulness during Sunday School yesterday

a several day break from performances

quirky hats

See more progress on: Daily: Reflect on at least 5 things for which I'm grateful (Happiness Manifesto #2)

October 10, 2010

deflated

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October 10, 2010 One Sentence Journal

I was in bed before 10 and my body rebelled by feeling like an ancient piece of rusty pipe when I woke up.

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October 9, 2010 One Sentence Journal

I got just the right amount of “Hey, look, I am at a party!” in before I climbed under the comforter, content.

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10/10/2010 gratitude

is grateful for

deep stretching & the experimentation/conversation with Natalie

my notebooks

haiku as an art form

laughter with friends

hugs

goofy costumes

tonight rest will be available in a nice, long swath.

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October 8 , 2010

I cried almost uncontrollably during yoga.

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October 8: Soul's Window Ledge

Sitting on my soul’s window ledge
Tears’ urge, up through my gut
anger bubbling over unheard
moans and shouts, berated by
ephithets undermining stretching,
intellectual physical higher tiered
muscles tight, face, down, not able
tears push, shove, pander
through my gut
down my face, leaving
mineral traces and an ache
sitting on my soul’s window ledge
I see a boy, strumming a guitar
walking down the busy street
that faces my front door, my kitchen
window my writing spaces I can’t
help but smile and wish it was
me (or perhaps my daughter) he
was playing for, an old fashioned
balladeer or 80’s teen angsty movie
maybe lifts me from the tale of
tears, the wondering how weird am I
thinking “I can’t get my heels on the
floor so everything is in my shoulders
my arms my wrists anyone who enjoys
this torture as a means of relaxation doesn’t
speak my body language” instead an awkward
insulting flood of imminent nausea epitaph
“I am the oddest duck in the marsh
the ugliest country, confused state duck
who keeps returning because the
quacking, the swimming, the fluttering
of my tail feels so darned good!” even
when I grimace and almost grunt
and lie on my back, writhing in
unmoaned tears…..
I sit on my soul’s window ledge
and sigh

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

October 7, 2010: Leaves Song (A Rondeau)

Yes, another form – -today, some metrical verse…

Leaves sing God’s song, tune cycles of budding, birth, giving, release,
Autumn golds, ambers, flaming red have forgotten April’s sweet peace
Wind rumbles through this drying season, bounding water over rocks
Shorts and sunscreen abandoned in drawers, left for warm wooly socks
She stirs her pumpkin soup dinner and watches the darkness increase – -

The question: When did she last hear the relentless honking of geese?
See the V flying South turn from the grey clouds, pregnant with rain – obese
No need for paper when nature’s calendar clicks and turns the clocks
Leaves sing God’s song

Ali throws open the cellar door, her smile shouts “Cheers for caprice!”
Kitchen air and floor fills with Maple’s and Elm’s orange and cerise
Fight between Bob the Cat and Jack the Jay, bird wins with squawks
She gathers the broom, the trash can, the bags when she hears the knocks
There – stomping morning’s dew from his brawny boots she sees love’s police
Leaves sing God’s song

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

October 6: Gogyohka #1/#2

Gogyohka #1

Pink corduroy back pack
overflowing with stuff
I can’t see through the
panty house and hoop
instructions leak out

Gogyohka #2

To function as it was meant
it needs to be plugged in
and left alone for a while:
I need to learn pure rest
even from my cell phone

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

One Sentence Journal: October 6, 2010

Note to self: when thinking of why I am involved in theater, do not remember this week.

See more progress on: reflect daily in a 'one sentence' journal

Grateful on October 7

I am grateful for:

Emma’s giggles

long sleeves

windshield wipers

intuitive painting

Sister Sherry

yoga classes

tenacious teachers

interesting textures.

See more progress on: Daily: Reflect on at least 5 things for which I'm grateful (Happiness Manifesto #2)

It is October 6 and I am so grateful for...

the chill in the air… delectable!

having heartful activities to look forward to (today it is Yoga and hanging out at the Art and Spirituality Center)

Photos from the reunion I could not attend but am able to see on Facebook

my castmates

Everyone participating in “And Now You Write”

Only two more days of rehearsal for “TOS”!

Samuel’s excitement for learning this year. Blossoming…

See more progress on: Daily: Reflect on at least 5 things for which I'm grateful (Happiness Manifesto #2)

October 5: Look Under the Leaves

While this still feels rough drafty, I offer it to you anyway. The opening and closing lines come from a writing prompt at Carry On Tuesday and is a line from one of Shakespeare’s sonnets.

Where art thou, Muse?

Hidden in a haiku line or
woven into a pantoum’s sweater
There, your shadow is showing
underneath the essay’s hook

I read of you in that three
year old letter I thought
I had mailed or lost

I think I heard your call
in the song of the journeying
bird or perhaps on that worn,
leather patch on the bikers back pack

Yesterday I felt your presence
in the graffitti scrawling, slopping
on the women’s room stall

My pencil hesitates to move
to stay this bumpy, nearly
invisiible course

It is easier to claim
it is too dark to see

I wonder was it you
who left? That’s the
song I sing but

a new verse wants to
be written that is saying
it was I who turned
my back on thee.

Where art thou, Muse?

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

October 4, 2010

Yesterday I worked on a bunch of drafts, was in such a blood sludgy frame of mind, yet I wrote a haiku and didn’t even notice it until I was kicking myself for not writing yesterday when I discovered… oh yes, you did, Julie! oh yes, you did!

Looks like autumn sky
Or is it a Kern decoy?
Wind chime lullaby

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

Grateful on October 5, 2010

I am so grateful for…

the need of a comforter while I sleep

my children

tomatoes

this laptop I am using to write

living the questions

my notebooks

patience

birdsong

cool air.

See more progress on: Daily: Reflect on at least 5 things for which I'm grateful (Happiness Manifesto #2)

One Sentence Journal - October 4, 2010

I had almost forgotten what this sludgy feeling in my blood stream felt like.

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October 3, 2010 One Word Journal

Squeezed

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October 3, 2010 One Sentence Journal

My giving was wayyyyyy out of balance with my receiving today.

See more progress on: reflect daily in a 'one sentence' journal

It is Monday Morning and I am grateful....

I am grateful a very hectic yesterday is over

for my camera

for my ability to focus in laser-beams of moments

for my costumes for Taming of the Shrew

that the next five days are finite (reminding myself it is not ‘always’ like this!)

conversations which center on the creative process

Hank

Mondays.

See more progress on: Daily: Reflect on at least 5 things for which I'm grateful (Happiness Manifesto #2)

One Sentence Journal. October 2, 2010

I made it, even if I “lost” the challenge all ready.

See more progress on: reflect daily in a 'one sentence' journal

October 3: An Inverted Etheree (Breathe Now)

Shoulders lift so high they look like earrings
“Release their tension, Kimosabe”
So I do and they lie, resting
atop the rest of me, still
breath meets breath unfolding
silence slices through
release let go
Yes, you know
More than
was
thought
before
your mind sought
“the” secret, sole
“the” one only
Rightness in plenty
Receive what is given
Open arms, when pulse meets breath
Smile wellspring celebration is
happening now, is happening now
Shoulders release, silence slices: breathe… now.

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

Grateful on October 2, 2010

I am grateful:

to be getting back into the swing of dailiness

for Samuel’s partnership in keeping me “on task” lol

the people and words flowing in And Now You Write

my new hoooooop YAY!

dancing in general

the discovery of new poetry forms

air conditioning.

See more progress on: Daily: Reflect on at least 5 things for which I'm grateful (Happiness Manifesto #2)

October 2: Saturday Morning, 6:32 AM

An Etheree… Julie on her never ending quest to find and write new forms

Pffffffft
helpless
to assist
solutions
float out of reach
There must be some way…
Pause, as if in prayer
From silence erupts nothing
Here the speed of sound moves slowly
Ten minutes later: gritty ghost work
Still brings empty hands, speechless images

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

Off to the Gym, too late for Zumba

(My schedule is getting thrown off by other people’s stuff and I am staying centered, anyway.)

Will Zumba on Monday, start hooping tomorrow.

See more progress on: October Bootcamp: Commit & Achieve, Daily

One Sentence Journal - September 30, 2010

Today I nurtured another’s hangover and while hanging over at my waist later at rehearsal remembered how much I love love love to dance.

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September 30 One Word Journal

Nurturing

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Frightened - October 1 Poem

I’m frightened

The nine-year-old-me
inside-me watches
blaze untethered

in my mother’s hands
falling to the forest’s
feet, there, fire free

broken through its glass bowl
made to restrict it
I’m frightened

destructive beast
unseparated from
the spaces between

my racing heart beats

My mother is frightened
The surreal becomes
the familiar

Mom throws dirt
the fire succumbs
to my mother
I breathe
sort of
again

See more progress on: write a (sloppy, half-formed if need be) poem every day (or so) during October 2010

Untitled

I am grateful it is October!

for 43things – just waiting here for me to use it again

for 750words (also waiting)

for photos from the past old friends dig up and post

for forgiveness

for incredible sunrises recently

for the ability to read and write poetry

for perseverence

that I was cast in Maggie (hey, even second or fourteenth choice is fine if I got the role) for so many reasons but the dancing is feeling especially great.

See more progress on: Daily: Reflect on at least 5 things for which I'm grateful (Happiness Manifesto #2)