So, here I am, still in Buffalo, still enjoying life. But still not working. I'm a little bit miffed, but I'm pretty sure that it's at least partially my fault, so I must not rail against the universe, but quietly accept my fate. I'm frustrated because after a YEAR of what was essentially unemployment, tho a busy unemployment, I am SO ready to start contributing to the world again. To have full days, even fuller than they currently are.
But, in the interim, I have been making this place with my lovelies into my home too, which is harder than it sounds. Carving out little corners for myself is very necessary for me, because I find that if I'm not being careful, it is easy to think of this as their place in which I am simply a guest with no right to shelf space or closet space or anything else. This is not actually the case, so as I shove my way into nooks and crannies, I am asserting the fact that I pay rent too and I belong here! Not to give the impression in any sense that I feel unwanted. They want me to do this too, it's just a process of changing my thinking.
In addition to this, I have been spending lots of time discovering new passions (like opera and gardening), or rediscovering those things which I have always been passionate about, but had let go of while at home, like dancing and most notably poetry. Suddenly, it seems to be everywhere, whether it's in the greater amount of time I have to spend with Mary Oliver and Glenn Freeman and this beautiful post by one of my most favoritest bloggers. So, as a consequence, I've been writing more poetry than I have since graduation. I think this is a good thing.
Thankfully, it's been more about remembering the rhythms and disciplines that I was taught in college than starting over from scratch. The recollection of daily discipline, the blank page which has never terrified me, cups of coffee and words, unruly words that dare me to master them. Pushing myself beyond the first thing that I could say, the obvious, beyond that to the second thing, and the third until I am startled by the sense that I am making with fresh words. The production of massive amounts of shitty first drafts and cobbled together verses which will never see the light if I can help it. But feeling capable, for the first time in a long time. Feeling worthy of the craft in a way that I never felt at home. Remembering that even when the work is profoundly unworthy, there is something beyond it, something that needs to be written towards instead of just arrived at in one fell swoop. And remembering the teeth-grinding, painstaking, eye-jabbing, endless process of editing. Yes, whether or not that one comma goes in really will make all the difference.
It is good. It is profoundly good to be pushing myself to rediscover my voice, to allow myself to admit to an aptitude. I AM a writer, dammit!!! Maybe an inconstant and poor one, but that is a real part of who I am!!! In that spirit, I end by repeating this gorgeous snippet of verse from Hafiz, and then offer one of my own recent pieces. I almost hate to put them beside each other because there is absolutely no comparison, but then, I guess that's part of the daring that I am trying to own.
"A poet is someone
who can pour light
into a cup
then raise it to nourish
your beautiful, parched, holy mouth."
-Hafiz
* * *
Visitation
When the Holy Spirit comes in a South Texas summer,
She takes the form of a tall, white egret
standing, watching, waiting in the Baptizing River
her yellow eyes at once warning you away and
daring you to come wash.
The water here could be fire again,
if the bird wills it to be.
The slimy rocks, the muddy ripples,
she sings a croaking song over them
to let you know—-these are for you.
No sparkling fountains, no golden dust.
Just a sun-cracked mud bank,
the skimming, benediction hands of
the willow tree
and the harsh, holy eye of the egret,
piercing your hands and side,
turning the water red as you go under
and rise a saint.
