Turning The Page

I have just returned from a quiet journey to the coast of my country, Canada.  The atmosphere was serene, the air was crisp albeit on chilly side.  But my family was warm and giving.  I wondered how empty I was or am, because words didn't come spilling over sheets of paper.  Now that I'm back, I'm not sure what nonsense I'll be spinning.  

I pinned this quotation to the fridge by William Staff

                                                  What can anyone give you greater
                                                  than now, starting here, right in
                                                  this room, when you turn around?




Thinking

There is nothing
to say today.
No words come
bubbling to my 
brain.  More of
this and less of
that.

I need a thinking
hat where
words can spin.
Be true and cast
out tales of all
that has been.

And a passageway
to let memories in. 

Humility

There is no respect for others without humility in one's self.
                                                                                                      Henri-Frédéric Amiel




When I was young,
I thought all these places were at
                             my fingertips.


Greece, Italy, Mesapotamia, France,
                  he pyramids, the ocean
                                  and the gods.  

Flowing white sheer curtains open to 
the air, not a smoky smelly screen
with squished flies.  I got as far as

Grand Forks, didn't find the suitcase 
and did Target.  As for Egypt, I thought
it was a make-believe history class story.

Why did I wind down sitting still as a rock
on a piece of flat cold land where the only
water and wave you get is when the snow
melts and it's nice but hardly majestic.

Nothing glittery here.

Was it the children?  No imagination?
No determination?  No real guts.  What
stopped me in my tracks...I did nothing.

It was done to me.

At least when I smile about it, people
think I'm great to be satisfied as a stone 
staying back to hold down the fort.  STOP.
Saying it so I don't believe in my thoughts 
anymore.  They won't change my world,
my mind, my stomach ache or my pain.

Now we can live with twenty to thirty

years of shame instead of just one or two.                     

SunRise

The sun has risen again today.  Be the best you can be.

 News has come to me recently about an organization:  womenforwomen.org
This group works in helping women survivors of war change their world.  They work by donations, sponsorships and a host of ways to provide support and to let women suffering the after effects of war that they are not alone.  Check out the site and see how you can help.

                                          Bells

                               If the bells toll for me
                               I've hardly been saintly.

                               But if they should;  think of times
                               when I did all I could to hold our
                               heads up


                               when being an ostrich would have
                               been more profound and true.


                               Remember my head in the ground?
                               I still do.


                               Think of times when there was no
                               one but you.  My heart held many
                               things;   memories and desires; but
                               it's with my hands that I created you
                               and me;  it's with my hands that I
                               brushed that beautiful soft brown 
                               hair.  With these hands I rubbed your
                               back, and with these hands I tied your
                               shoelaces back.


                               These hands made lunches, signed
                               permission slips, put your supper in
                               a dish.  With these hands I held your
                               new body amidst new bodies.  These
                               hands forever hold your new soul.


                               Remember this when the bells toll.
                                  

Heaven's Gate

Search the darkness...surge like an ocean
don't scatter yourself like a storm.   by Ghazels
                                                                                  There I was, thinking to shut 
                                                       the gate to Heaven's door.  Instead
another opened in front of me...a new page...a new fury?

Quest for the beloved...retrieving the lost...looking for what I left 
behind; it's a foolish thing to do, you will never find life the way it used to be.  Not to worry, I'll live what I must live now...with gratitude and vengeance.


The flavor of time living in a sea of questions.
I've drowned in a sea of sorrow.
Now I am fuming in flames of fury.

How do I say what needs to be said?
How much living is there left to do?
Each day rings beauty, heavenly is
my day to day breath.

With sunshine in my eyes;
I go to bed and sleep with
the angels who have flown
over me in feathery graces.

I made my living, I loved my God.
Played with my anger, nearly lost 
my mind

and now with what we thought
was true has come to a head
the crossroads to a future that
wouldn't happen for me they
said;  obliges me to conjure up
a life with no energy left to spend.
Maxing out time and again.

But I still like it here God.
No debate, just hanging at
the gate.  It's hard to be 
useful when people forget
one day - this will be their lot
too.

Don't feel bad for anyone.
The circle turns and you get
what's on your plate.  Truly
no more complicated than that
whether you open or close the
gate.

Dedicated to all the 50+HIVers who are living this new era of AIDS.