April 1, Poppins

Author P.L.Travers, creator of Mary Poppins (immortalized in film by Julie Andrews) has another side -- her life as a spiritual seeker and a respected authority on myths and folklore. Jacket cover, What the Bee Knows, P.L. Travers Tonight I watched the Disney version of Mary Poppins. I fast-forwarded through most of the big cheerful numbers. I don't like the parts about tidying up the nursery, or the countryside, or the laughing on the ceiling. But there are such beautiful scenes o'er the rooftops of London. And the chimney sweeps' dance is pure risky chaotic joyful sooty excitement. The chimney sweeps all shake the master's hand, "Good luck, guv'nor," then all run out of the house and do back flips down the lane in the darkness, where the streetlights are illuminating the cherry trees in blossom. Their footsteps die away and there's a moment of silence that is incredibly satisfying. It's a movie which touches all my "issues" -- workaholism, nurture or lack of it, magic and imagination versus responsibility and money, class, childhood, adulthood, the ability to have fun. I take it very seriously. So I took down my copy of What the Bee Knows by Travers. Another connection found -- she writes about Daisy Bates! There was no 'why' in Daisy Bates. She simply 'sat down' -- an aboriginal word for camping -- and listened to what the aborigines had to tell, never imposing her own intelligence and beliefs upon them but waiting patiently for separate pieces of information to form themselves into a coherent whole. I am so drawn to these intangibles. I don't even have words for them. I just want to sit on the cold rooftops and watch the sunset in the smog. I want to make a living finding obscure connections between my heart women. I want to spend my time observing the poignancy of Cherry Tree Lane. I'm afraid the only way I can actually do this is to get a Ph.D. or a M.Div. Which I don't want to do. I don't think I could make it as a nanny either.

"Winifred, I should like to make a slight distinction between the word cheerful and just plain giddy irresponsibility!" "I would like to make one thing quite clear -- I never explain anything!"

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April 2, My faltering condition

Arjuna You define this discipline by equanimity, Krishna; but in my faltering condition, I see no ground for it. Krishna, the mind is faltering, violent, strong, and stubborn; I find it as difficult to hold as the wind. I am still amazed by the Bhagavad-Gita's relevance. Who knew. A friend in the technical recruiting business dropped by my desk today and said "Are you scared? I am -- I'm scared for you." Of course, that made me scared as all heck. Then two friends at the church potluck who live a very marginal existence (IMHO) said "Oh you'll be fine, I think you'll do great..." and then I wasn't scared and everything was okay. Discipline. I mailed the taxes today, finally. And I researched rollovers and health insurance. Some nerve-wracking information, some helpful. It is better to have more information and it takes discipline to look at the financial aspects. This is not new to me and I know I can do it. It does take discipline. And get this -- today I got a letter with submissions for the poetry journal. It was addressed to me as "editor" (ha) and contained the sentence "People like you are leading the next Renaissance that has begun to build momentum into the next century. Your vision gives permission to many of us quiet voices to be heard, to share our gifts, and our offerings to life. I am happy to support your publication. To me it is a wonderful, exciting idea and I thank you for making this opportunity available to the local community and beyond. Let's get our creative stuff out there!" She encloses a check for $15 to "help out" and six poems. I feel such a need for discipline. That's the exact word (the translation is yoga, I was surprised to note). I need it for the job change, I need it to deal with this poetry journal project. This letter swings me way off center. I forget what I'm doing. I forget to be open. I forget that my vision is honestly vague and cloudy. She tells me I have a vision, I must have a vision, eh? I can't do anything if I get too excited. I have to remember to take the next step. Action is the means for a sage who seeks to mature in discipline; tranquility is the means for one who is mature in discipline. Action first. I'll get to tranquility, somehow, someday. (This translation of the Gita is wonderful; it's by Barbara Stoler Miller, who is no longer with us. Breast cancer.)

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April 3, . . . and my altar

I get this funny feeling I should not be writing here tonight. That sensation where you look inside the head and see nothing but scraps of paper, and inadequacies, and printers that don't work, and errors in math, and ignorances, and pages that are not aligned correctly, and resentments, and silences .... and you want to slam the door to that head shut and run as fast as you can the other direction, down to Cove Beach at sunrise tomorrow, my heaven, my haven. I did work on my altar today. I threw away the birch bark from the winter trip to Idaho which looked charming when I brought it back, but now just looks messy. I vacuumed up the dust and debris and arranged three fresh scarves. Two are bright pink and the third is a deep mauvy-maroon cotton with blurry blue and green flowers. I arranged some of the magickal items on the scarves: the bone, the key-shaped charm, the brass knife, the tiny glass salt cellar, the freshly washed wineglass, my "manyfeathers" tile, my quills, the small mirror from childhood, the rosary made of wooden beads imprinted with shamrocks. It was enjoyable handling these things. I put some of the excess things in the drawer. Clutter was starting to really disturb me. I might even take more things off tomorrow. What would it be like with just the scarves for awhile? The altar feels at least prepared. At least I was able to stop in my cleaning there for one quick moment of contemplation. I haven't done much there recently. In fact, the last thing I was doing was several months ago -- using the knife to cut through the air in symbolic motions of cutting the ties with my employer. I guess that worked. Now what?

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April 4, "into this place of rest"

Today was so strange. I just kept doing one thing after another all day. I was on fast-forward. I have to reject the feeling that I have oh-so-much-more to do. In the middle of the day, when I checked email, I found a note from my co-editor of the poetry journal. She complimented me on how HARD I work. This gave me a surge of energy for awhile, but I think it backfired. I look forward to coming here to this journal. I don't put so much pressure on myself here. Although I'm a little concerned that the entries feel less creatively innovative to me -- they are more whipped out at the end of the day willy-nilly, because so much activity is going on. What did I do today? Reset clocks which I forgot to do last night Walked dog at beach with Younger One, 7am Bathed dog who had gotten into goose poop at beach Cooked pancakes for Easter breakfast Scanned the newspaper reading up on Kosovo and the Albanian refugees Went down in the basement to wish Happy Easter to Older One and find out what he was doing today (working); worried about him on and off all day Went up to my room and removed almost all the things from my altar Cleaned out sock drawer of reject socks so I'd have room to store things removed from altar Went to church Announced at church in "milestones" that I'm leaving my job, and asked for continued "handholding" Went over to help with Sunday School Made a hat covered with blue tissue paper flowers and feathers and sequins Walked in a very lame Easter parade of four people, two adults and two children; made the best of it by showing off my blue hat Talked to several people at coffee time but felt very removed, as usual Got a gift of homemade bread from a church friend which was good because now I had food to take to mom's Went home, checked email, fought with computer (A: drive is messed up) Went to mom&dads; gave the hat to my little niece Fought with dad's computer (Win 3.1, no go) Fought with dad's other computer (Win 98, but missing fonts I needed and couldn't face downloading because that would mean a big discussion about ISPs with dad) Ate Easter dinner; tried to make nice conversation Went for a little walk in the chilly afternoon Observed a bluebird in my parents' backyard Came inside and took a very quick nap Said goodbye to brother & his family Helped clean up after brother & his family Borrowed dad's printer Came home and worked on the journal for an hour, hooked up borrowed printer, and finally got a good (?) printout Tried to go to the grocery store, but they were closed, so went to the convenience store for milk at least Came home, noticed dog had of course gotten into the Easter candy, had finished the chocolates, and was now chewing on jelly beans Cooked some nasty gardenburgers which we ate with raw vegetable sticks left over from Friday Finished doing pasteup of poetry journal with the littlepeople and the ad (fingers crossed that it will copy okay) Helped Younger One do laundry Tried to call B; left a message on her machine Started to feel totally overwhelmed Started to watch the X-Files but it was freaking me out Went up in my bedroom for a little while to relax Lit the vanilla candle Made a huge list of the things I have to attend to this coming week

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April 5, Details, details

Details have completely drained me. Details with sharp barbed points as small as hairs poked into the skin of my arms and some fluid not blood but life giving clear and insubstantial flowed out and was lost in faint spills that evaporated into crusts of vital salts all around the house. Instead of vacuuming the rugs, which are now coated with more than fine skeins of dog hair, where now bloom patchy crystal gardens of dry powdery energy, I better crawl around and roll and rub my skin on the fibers to try to reabsorb the stuff. Until I can sit up in lotus posture and look out from within my eyes and say nothing from within my mouth and move my hands without precision and wave and drape my scarves around my head without caring about their prints.

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April 6, Devotion (bhakti)

I delved into the journals of the summer of 1998 tonight. What I wrote yesterday reminded me vaguely of the rhythm of something I wrote last summer. I had to find it, I thought I might be able to make a poem out of it. I found it. I can't make a poem out of it. It's untouchable. There's a lot of general ungrammatical ranting, and then wrapping up with more ranting taking off on a TV segment about a divorced men's support league. 7/8/98 They be in trouble They be worth nothing but this line of ink they sit there in that seat until they learn to behave. No kiss no talk no sweet no phone no walk no me not this girl not this honey all this mine. I grabby I bossy I hoard. I wake overnight I know I fret I silly. I catch moonlights in my net I steal streetlights in my eyes I see fog early early I see sparklers late. My fireworks is fog they is sun disc round and flame flat through fog. After all. Amen. There is something irresistible to me about the rhythm in some of these lines and the Gollum-like twisted character of the creature that's speaking starting with "I grabby." But the beginning is -- eh -- and there's no point to the rest of it. How could I ever modify any of it without destroying the "voice"? Well, just another frustration. At least I found it and now have documented the date 7/8/98 so I won't lose it again if I do get to a place where I can work on it. Browsing my journal of last summer was extremely strengthening. I'm glad I looked at it. I was plotting everything at that time. I did have a well-thought out plan. It is not true that this all just happened suddenly and impetuously last month. I think that just to scare myself. from 7/11/98 entry I want to learn graphic design and publishing because it's a more flexible approach to making a living and I'm sick of X Corp. and I want to -- hopefully -- surround myself with less conservative people who won't give me a day long feeling of paralysis if I leave my prayer to Durga in the copier. ... I can stay until I make up a certain amount of savings -- if I need to -- Skidmore or other tuition and enough to live on ... I am not interested in fighting, discussions or arguments. They waste my energy and are better for someone else to do. I need to be the power in my way, through strange beauty and devotion. ... I am finally settling into something in my Pelvis -- my Intention -- I am Finally Getting a Grip after so much grumbling and groaning.... "The School of the Spiritual Imagination" ... Devotion. I cried a bit at the beach walking the dog this morning. Why? To greet the return of devotion, real devotion (revotion), this from a girl who used to pray the Rosary daily and read the Prayers of St. Bridget every day for A YEAR, but I was barking up partly the wrong tree -- well, maybe not -- Mary and St. Bridget, could do worse. I want to write about the birth of a new tradition, what it's like. I want to live my dream of drumming in church, my face turned toward the west.

Today I delivered the master copy of the poetry journal into the clubbed fingers of a copy store clerk who seemed a cross between a gnome and an elf, with a brain the consistency of egg salad. My precious pages, I'm worried about them. Older One sliced a large flap loose at the top of his left index finger on a broken cup this afternoon. It became clear that there was to be no economizing on trips to the emergency room. He got nine stitches and a little extra mothering (dinner at home) but now he's out again in a thunderstorm with his index finger wrapped in gauze and held aloft.

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April 7, Some housekeeping

There's a chance that I'm reconnecting with caring. It hurts. I think I have been in a chronic state of not caring for several years. I have neglected a lot of things. I have just wanted to do the minimum to get through. I have not paid much attention. The terrible grass is taking over the strawberry bed. I didn't care for several years. It's so hard to care. Tonight I pulled grass shoots from one square yard of strawberries. I went through Younger One's dresser. There was a pair of Little League pants in there that come up to his knees. We filled a large trash bag with clothes that are too small, stained, unwearable. He was left with almost no clothes. I found my Paul Simon CDs in Older One's collection. One had gotten wet and had paper from the liner notes stuck all over it. I cleaned it gently and tried it in the CD player. It seemed to want to continue to play. The third bedroom hasn't been used for a few years. It could be a nice cozy office space. It's filled with Older One's junk from school. The closet contains a lot of his most ragged ancient clothes. And on the shelf, trash bags filled during one of the many junior high room-shoveling-out incidents. He's going to "go through" them someday. I watered houseplants this week. They are clinging improbably to life. I'm not generous with them. In fact, I'm resentful of them. I did rescue the African violet which was drowning in a pool of excess water. I vacuumed the living room tonight. I put all the scattered Nintendo equipment in a plastic bag out of the way. I threw away an armful of trash that was just sitting around on surfaces. It's a pleasure to sit down on the couch when I don't see dirt and debris all around me. I dusted the piano. I haven't had the piano tuned in years. I haven't played the piano in even more years. At one time it seemed very important to play the piano. Older One was playing it beautifully yesterday, one of his made-up songs, with only one hand due to his lacerated finger. My material world has shrunk to the size of a piece of paper or a computer screen. Everything else is much too big and complex and difficult. Maintenance involves paying people to do things, choosing people who are competent, getting them here at certain times, overseeing the labor, or coercing my kids somehow into doing these chores, or -- worst of all -- doing it myself which sends me dependably into a state of choking rage at being overwhelmed. I've been in some state of anorexia of caring. When I work on this maintenance, I feel pain. It's easier to stick with my demanding friend, neglect.

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April 8, She flows

I feel self-conscious. At least I didn't have to say to people at work that I was going off to become a disciple of Sarasvati, even though that's one way to describe what I'm doing. I ran off to the library in a brisk warm spring breeze at lunch time to look up Sarasvati in the card catalogue. What am I, crazy? I guess I imagined a page or so of books, illustrated, juvenile, fiction, scholarly ... I got nothing. Of course. So, not completely daunted, I tried the more general topic -- Hinduism. A little browsing in the catalogue, nothing jumped out at me. So I took the general call number for Hinduism which is in the 294.5 area, and went downstairs to the shelves. The collection on Hinduism in our town library is bad beyond description. Maybe I'm missing something. I wasn't trying to be thorough, I was just looking for anything. I did find a book called The Artful Universe, An Introduction to the Vedic Religious Imagination, by William K. Mahony. I like it, although it is dry. He describes religion as "pertaining to that which re-links." Like that unifying process known in Sanskrit as yoga, religion is that multifaceted, effective process that binds together the totality of an otherwise disintegrated, dissipated, or deadened existence to form an integrated and vital whole. That sounds pretty damn good to me. I am discouraged that religion has such horrid rigid fanatical conservative fundamentalist institutionalized associations. I like thinking in terms of the religious imagination. It puts the right spin on it for me. He has two pages on Sarasvati. Some highlights: In later Hindu traditions, she becomes the muse of the imaginative arts and of creativity in general Her name means literally "she who possesses the quality of flowingness." Praised as a goddess of the divine waters in which she dwells At times identified as a lowing cow; from both cows and rivers flows nourishing liquid Dependent on no other god for her life-giving power, described as "virginal" and "autonomous" Received adoration as "she who purifies" Because of her inwardly creative and clarifying function, praised as "she who inspires excellent ideas" Divine source of and inspiration for generative and therefore sacred words, verse, prayers, hymns Identified with Vach Vach -- the universal Word who enlivens, refreshes, and inspires all things -- is regarded as residing in the flowing rivers and in the rains falling from the atmosphere, which then give life to all beings. Moving through the world as the life-giving waters, the divine Word dwells in and supports all things. There's a lot here. I'm too tired and too self-conscious to go into it much more tonight. ~~~~~~~~~~~ The booklets came back from the copy store! Except for a few completely missed staples, which I was able to fix, they looked okay. Not perfect, but okay. I'm going to go follow the advice of Z. Budapest: If you are working on a report, a book, or anything involving words, place your work on her [Sarasvati's] altar overnight and ask for her help. Plans and sketches for other creative projects can be placed under her protection as well.

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April 9, Hunh?

I'm wandering in a cold plush fog of bemusement and confusion. I'm trying to guide myself by empathy, which is a fickle unfixed star. I'm lost in a maze of backroads, Perfection Path, Judgment Way, Intellect Alley. Faces pass by me, women with dark eyeliner and large cheeks, women with blond faces full of wrinkles, women with eyes casting blue glances, men muttering about aristocracy and running their hands through their hair, men with new glasses speaking slowly and deliberately, children in red fleece jackets with overgrown mops of hair and dogtags round their necks, everhungry children with dirty bandages on their torn fingers ... Voices project toward me, phone invitations to lunch, coworkers seeking help, programmers who have written a book, poems from the hopeful. I made a book. It's 24 pages long. I worked hard on the details. Today it came out. I opened its boxes. It looked calm and bland and gray. I have a massive anti-climax, a big dumb hairy monstrous one, looking over my shoulder. We sold one book for $2.00 and gave away seven to contributors and to the "archive." How did I get here again? The manifestation of a "hunh?" ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Tonight R read the excerpts from "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomed" so beautifully I felt my blood rise like I wanted to faint. Whitman is 1800 times more appealing read aloud than Dickinson. With the tolling tolling bells' perpetual clang, Here, coffin that slowly passes, I give you my sprig of lilac. ~~~~~~~~~~~~

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April 10, Journal deprivation

I would rather mess with the archives and fix all the links in this journal than write about my day. I'm disturbed. I'm drained from being with people and NYC claustrophobia and having to be two or more places at one time. If I can't take out my journal at some point during a trip to the city, I become almost ill, catatonic, exhausted, irritable ... I don't get what I need. I lose touch with myself. And I lose my experience. What can I do, say "Pardon me while I journal?" Take an extra long bathroom break and luxuriate in my privacy in the stall? Explain that I'm in a cult that demands private meditation every hour? Cultivate an ability (like my dad's) to fall asleep when it gets to be too much? Maybe tomorrow will be better. Tonight I don't even feel like going tomorrow. Honest, I promise it will be better. They think I'm nice and quiet and serene when I'm really squirming in a very jangly agitated place.

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April 11, Dimanche

Snow showers tonight, ho ho he he ha ha! This weekend is still a total blur. I can't possibly write about it. I was thinking about my characters today, Anastasia, Ancestra, Alyeska, Angelika, and Arcida (especially Arcida). I was thinking of how to write about them. I don't know. I have a little paragraph about each one and that's it. I was envisioning a sort of poetic combination of character study and minidrama. But what would save it from being mere fluff? Arcida is the mouselike one. She hides food in her desk drawers and only moves when driven from her untidy nest with a broom. Why was I thinking about the characters? Because this experience with the poetry journal project has made me really aware of how editors must crave good original writing. Oh ho yo yoy, I think I really ought to try to write something good for them. I met a very swarthy Greek man yesterday, a painter named Artemis. His paintings were very colorful. They were about Alexander the Great. Lots and lots of color. One had a lot of pink. And elephants. So I've left my job. I still haven't faced up to the question about where writing belongs in my life. I've got some links to look up, links to online poetry journals. The stuff in this journal is not very malleable. I'd much rather generate raw material than work it over. From my paper journal: New York seemed awful. Too many people, too much hair, too much metal on the head, too many black matchstick legs of anorexic girls, too many trendy glasses frames in the shape of little rectangles, too many clunky black shoes...

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April 12, So sweet and so quiet

I started to set up the entry. Then I got up and wandered around the kitchen looking for something to eat. There's nothing I want to eat out there. It's just a ploy to get away from writing this entry. The candied ginger is making me sick from sweetness. I already had a cup of tea, lemon and honey flavor. I ate a real nice mango tonight. And I had pancakes with syrup for dinner. I am on a sweetness jag. That might explain a lot. I can't get ahead of myself. I'm always behind myself. I think I can write to catch up, but I can't. I'm getting emails from real people. I'm writing to real people. I'm talking to real people. I'm spending time with real people. This always makes me fretful. A newish friend told me tonight that she thought I was "quiet." I have been called "quiet" a lot. I usually feel insulted, negatively labeled. (This stems back to high school of course, where it was the kiss of social death to be "quiet.") Now my kids get called "quiet" and I bristle about that and fear they won't get their share of attention. There's no way I can convey to the ordinary listener the Emotional Fantasia that's going on in my quietness. There's such a constant low-grade uproar I can barely hear myself think. I'd really like to turn the volume down just one evening sometime soon and get some peace and quiet.

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April 13, I'm getting better

"I'm ha-a-a-pp-py." (said in a quavering tone by the old man not quite dead yet in Monty Python & the Holy Grail) Today I worked for hours on my last official big meeting. I had to get a PC from the closet set up in a conference room. No one could find the key to the closet. I had to scrounge for a monitor cable and a network cable, finally stealing them from another idle machine. Then I had to download a bunch of irrelevant software which was forced on me by the installer program, like the Year 2000 Windows 95 upgrade. Then the one application I wanted didn't come down from the installer program, so I had to post it to the network and then pull it down. Then I had to call the guy with the projector because he hadn't shown up yet and it was almost time for the meeting. Then I had to call two people I mistakenly didn't invite and sweettalk them into coming at the last minute. Then I had to "drive," making a complex series of data changes and trying to surf the discussion about each one, catching the high points and ignoring the scummy backwaters. While I was driving a glaring bug reared its ugly head and waggled its antenna at all of us in the meeting. One participant almost left the room because she couldn't "pretend" the bug wasn't there and it was useless to continue. I was sweating in a thin wool sweater sitting next to the exhaust fan of the projector, sun butter melting into the room from behind the closed blinds. I just kept saying, soon this will be over, soon this will be over, soon this will be over. And now it is! At home I watched B's boys. Kids can really get on my nerves. One of them is a very fussy eater. I always forget he likes macaroni and cheese without the cheese. I served it with cheese tonight anyway and he didn't say anything, so I must have scared him somewhere along the line. The other one never gets enough of a turn on the Nintendo no matter what, and starts to cry about it when it's time to go home. Like it would be feasible for him to stay at my house and play Nintendo for several more hours. After they left, I ranted just a wee bit to Younger One about these boys (which was a mistake) and he punished me for it by telling me about how much I yelled at him and how once I yelled at him so bad, he remembers my eyes were all bloodshot. Lovely. Let's nip this conversation in the bud! Anyway, I AM happy. I'm on the verge of really being able to realize that I'm leaving this job behind me. I didn't HAVE to take notes in this meeting (although I did, jeez). I don't HAVE to schedule the follow-up. I don't HAVE to push through to a solution. My old team is giving me a going-away lunch Thursday. (My current manager with the nut brown eyes doesn't seem to think anything along those lines is warranted, so he's not invited.) I bought my own health insurance. I'm cleaning out my desk. I'm trying to adjust to the loss of the corporate phones and faxes and printers and copy machines and internet access. I think this is actually happening! ~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Now we see the violence inherent in the system!!! Now we see the violence inherent in the system!!!" ~~~~~~~~~~~~ "WHAT is your name?" "WHAT is your quest?" "WHAT is your favorite color?" ~~~~~~~~~~~~ (more lines from MP & the HG, a very quotable movie, IMHO)

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April 14, "What I had to build with"

I'm getting myself all upset about "personal" writing. The question is in the foreground today because I ran into references to this journal in two places outside the journal itself. The exposure switched on that bright inquisitor lightbulb, glaring harsh questions into my face about doing this kind of writing. * I think about this all the time. I wish I could actually write an essay about it, or somehow marshall my thoughts to come up with an opinion I could live with. But I can't in the course of a nightly entry. * (I need a copy of Joanna Russ, How to Suppress Women's Writing.) * Over the weekend, at the Heavyweight Poetry Bout, my friend called the woman poet's work "confessional." The man poet's work apparently was not confessional. I felt like getting into a fight, but I kept my mouth shut. I guess I was a coward. * I've been browsing in Borges, Dreamtigers. I am slowly getting more familiar with Borges. In his epilogue, Borges writes: "A man sets himself the task of portraying the world. Through the years he peoples a space with images of provinces, kingdoms, mountains, bays, ships, islands, fishes, rooms, instruments, stars, horses, and people. Shortly before his death, he discovers that that patient labyrinth of lines traces the image of his face." He describes this book as his most "personal." * So he is to be congratulated on finally getting to personal, while I criticize myself for already being there? Did I take too much of a shortcut? * (pissed off) * There is that sense of artifice, device, deviousness to be considered. I've written about that before. The Wall. The piece "Borges and I" is not "personal" because it has a device, a concept, a conceit -- that he is two: "I allow myself to live, so that Borges may contrive his literature and that literature justifies my existence." "I do not know which of us two is writing this page." * Sometimes I write with the Wall and sometimes I don't. With the wall -- harder, more rewarding maybe, but more frustrating also. I have to think harder and revise more. Without the wall -- easier to be funny, cranky, tired, maybe more real, more friendly? * Edna St. Vincent Millay has a tower rather than a wall, "the lofty tower I laboured at." These lines feel like an antidote to that frustration with the imperfect efforts of creation. It's all there.                                ...  it was wrought From what I had to build with: honest bone Is there, and anguish; pride; and burning thought; And lust is there, and nights not spent alone. I love these lines and repeat them to myself often. * They printed my letter about online journaling, so I'm passing along their message in return. BookWomen, A reader's community for those who love women's words Published six times a year by the Center for Feminist Reading, Minnesota Women's Press, Inc., 771 Raymond Avenue, St. Paul, MN 55114. Email books@womenspress.com Subscriptions: $24 a year, submissions welcome Dedicated to: Building a community of readers Celebrating the joys of living with books Exploring the place of reading and books in women's lives Spreading the word about women writers and their work

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April 15, Everybody leaves

Are you sad? Yes. Can I have your phone number? Yes. Can I have your email address? Yes. Keep in touch. Okay. I'd like to try to keep in touch. Okay. We're going to have to have lunch sometime. Okay. Would it be okay to have lunch again sometime? Okay. Everybody leaves. I know. Thank you, organizing lady. Thank you, money lady. Thank you for "just because you work in Human Resources doesn't mean you're human." Thank you for the laughs and the fajitas. Thank you for bringing those quiet girl babies with the powerful eyes. Thank you for the bouquet of pink tulips. Thank you for the magical elephant from India. Now it's here, helping my son with his homework. And then there's you -- Silvercurls -- what do I do with you and the turquoise chemistry between us?

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April 16, Poem for Leaving the Job

I love this poem. I've saved it for years in my files at work. I'm not like the poet/speaker, but he gives me something to strive for. I'm too exhausted from goodbyes to write anything tonight. ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Ah, the Freshness in the Face of Leaving a Task Undone Ah, the freshness in the face of leaving a task undone! To be remiss is to be positively out in the country! What a refuge it is to be completely unreliable! I can breathe easier now that the appointments are behind me. I missed them all, through deliberate negligence, Having waited for the urge to go, which I knew couldn't come. I'm free and against organized, clothed society. I'm naked and plunge into the water of my imagination. It's too late to be at either of the two meetings where I should have been at the same time, Deliberately at the same time ... No matter, I'll stay here dreaming verses and smiling in italics. This spectator aspect of life is so amusing! I can't even light the next cigarette ... If it's an action, It can wait for me, along with the others, in the nonmeeting called life. 17 June 1929 Fernando Pessoa Translated by Richard Zenith From "Fernando Pessoa & Co." (Grove)

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April 17, A glittering stone that's made of sand

In high school I wrote a poem that had the lines "Today is placed in the palm of my hand/ A glittering stone that's made of sand." Today was like that. I skipped graphic design class because they were going on an all-day field trip to New York and I couldn't handle it. So I had a whole free day. And, ho hum, I did stuff like try to nap, vacuum dust off the computer desk, reattach the repaired printer, pull invading grass out of the herb garden, browse the Paint Shop Pro manual my dad brought over, try to nap again (can't), pay some bills, balance the checkbook, go to the grocery store, read Julia Alvarez, mess with poems for May's issue (a monthly poetry journal? am I crazy?), hassle the kids. Very uninspiring; it all flaked away into a little pile of sand. I wrote a long dull entry in my paper journal about all the people I said goodbye to. I will never remember them unless I write them down. There was only one section of interest: The most touching moment -- surprise -- was when C invited me to sit down in her office. I heard that like some kind of -- unearned white light from on high -- sit down? I'd been squirming on my feet all day, shuffling, edgy, unsure how long to converse, uncomfortably conversing, explaining my plans over and over. It felt so good to hear -- "sit down" -- like you can Rest. For a minute, here in this tiny office. She still scares me, like all the managers do (except B). I get a dry mouth and talk funny. C gave me a hug! I was awed. (Is this something really simple? Why do I experience it as fathomless?)

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April 18, Nothing doing

My uncertainty. I like to be so careful. I'm frozen in the headlights, trying to think. It's not working. When in doubt, procrastinate. I'll deal with it later. I refuse to write about my dilemmas, the unsolicited advice I'm getting, the pressure to communicate. Boring material, and far too tense for where I need to go tonight. At least B fed me spaghetti and meatballs. In spite of my shocking stubborn stuttering. I stuttered all day, my movements jerking in a strobe light. I insist on the right to do nothing. Procrastination unlocks the window of intuition. So-and-so blows in with the wind. I send her right out, hanging her to dry like wet sheets. Ah! I've worked my way around to laundry. What I really wanted to write about after all. Two loads today. The clothes are clean and warm and full of static from the dryer, ready for next week.

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April 19, Flaunting my flaws

Ok, what do I write when all that comes to mind is a sort of yelling cleansing outbreath or some kind of grunting wordless snorting? ~~~~~~~~~~ There are so many little incidents of today. Most of them revolve around my ego and I pshaw them and pooh-pooh them. But hey, let's try to go there and see what happens. Dreaming about wild animals, moose, and then pandas. How completely really-cool of me. I am a lot better at computer basics than most of the people in the class. I probably already know 30 percent or more of what we'll be learning in this class. I'm just buying myself some vegetative time and a credential. Is there another way to do this? I'm seeing myself as a courtesan of April, a free woman, receiving guests on her own terms. I want to have a little private dance party in my house at lunchtime. My main objective over the next 11 weeks is to find new ways to dress really-cute. I'm starting to spend much too much time thinking about taking Older One's life into my own hands. Through a deep streak of stubborn reverse snobism, I don't want to ask Marge Piercy to reprint a poem of hers in our poetry journal. Even though I'm in contact through someone with someone who seems to be a close friend of hers and the request is at my fingertips. I've got my back up about it. It's just not me. What kind of explanation is that? These are all very unpleasant aspects of my character. They are all lined up, raising their skirts and flaunting their flaws. I'm afraid all I can do is let them kick it up for awhile until the next really-humbling incident comes along.

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April 20, Muchacha flaca y perversa

I'm dismayed by this. I was late getting back to class from lunch today. I was in the middle of a very spirited journal battle with Octavio Paz and I lost track of time. I was reading "The Poet's Works" in Eagle or Sun? I was imagining a female writing partner for Paz, an equal counterpart, what she would bring to his work. It was getting very down and dirty in the journal. I was also imitating his writing style, and I was poking fun at him, and calling him Poor Paz. I went back to his text to look for hints of women. Besides Doña Campamocho (tr. Lady Rotrock) and Virgin/Wrathful Star, there was this one: I hear the footsteps of the dawn creeping through the crevices, thin and perverse girl who hurls a letter full of snares and slander. I am Caught! This gave me the weirdest feeling. Then I came across a section where he uses images I used in an entry here: Paz: I write on the glimmering table, my pen resting heavily on its chest that is almost living, that moans and remembers the forest of its birth. Great wings of black ink open. The lamp explodes and a cape of broken glass covers my words. A sharp sliver of light cuts off my right hand. I keep writing with this stump that sprouts shadows. Me (2/16/99): I'm looking around on the desk for inspiration. I see a bunch of lazy pens lying down flat on their backs with their mouths clamped shut. They lie there, all lazy and flabby. If I picked them up they would flop over limp like Dali's clocks. They are so stupid. You can't even shake them into contributing. The lamp is not helping. It pretends to look over my shoulder and shed some light on a subject. It pretends to be an expert on illumination. But it has a selfish shade wrapped around its head like a mummy bandage, and I can tell it's only interested in its own brilliant insights. It's listening to itself talk and it has no light to spare. I'm getting read to flip its switch. Now this is very interesting. I am already feeling weird from having met myself in his dawn, then I find my pens and my lamp. Clearly we were both looking around, desperately seeking inspiration. But look what Paz does -- first ennobles the table by recall of a forest. Then violence, explosion, damage -- excitement. And Heroism -- he's still writing with the stump. And me? I am farting around with the limp pens and the selfish lampshade. He keeps on writing through the whole scene. Me, I make myself not writing in the scene even as I'm writing it. This is making me angry, as much for his cheap heroics as for my own backing away from engagement, and making it "their fault." There is more, including some very far-fetched comparisons between that Millay sonnet about the tower and Paz's building and destruction of a city. By now, I have gotten myself all worked up and I look at my watch and it's one o'clock. I go back to class, but I don't calm down, in fact I don't calm down all afternoon and I'm still not calmed down. But I feel better having at least made the time to write this here. The dismay comes from realizing that I could actually spend my lunch hours writing. I obviously don't want to admit that my job change has any implications for my writing life. If I do more writing, I will be living in another reality a lot of the time. I can't live with my right hand cut off. It's not that easy to function.

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April 21, April means tragic

Low energy. Death in April on my mind. I'm still wearing a down jacket trying to stay warm. Hopeless is not the word. Is the word accepting? Always be death in April. I have large clumps of columbine growing tall in my borders. Once I told someone the flowers were gray. I remembered them as gray. I looked at them more closely later, and they are a pale ghostly white with traces of lavender and light pink, as cold as death. The perennial book says "Plants self-sow freely, but only the true species produce attractive seedlings. Hybrid seedlings are often pale or grotesquely misshapen; uproot and discard them." I tried to uproot them, to move them up the hill to make a hedge of ghosts in front of the cinder block wall along the upper terrace. But they wouldn't go away. Now I have more of them than ever. Stan Littleton Oklahoma City Sean, Dave, Scott, Jason, Dave

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April 22, Patience effort silence sleep

Dedicated to Vach, the goddess of speech. The fourth quarter of Holy Utterance, Vach, "They call it Indra, Mitra, Varuna, Fire (Agni); or it is the heavenly Sun-bird." Week of patience. I have had to have so much patience. I am reeling with patience. And yet more patience is going to be required of me. Tonight there was another great monstrous silence at my parents' house. I couldn't fight it. I tried with a very weak heart. I prayed. It beat me. I finally gave up struggling and watched Frazier with everyone else. It was an episode about Valentine's Day. The effort takes a lot out of me in any case. I have to remember that. Tomorrow may not be a very good day, even though I have high hopes for it. My first legitimate day off, since class only meets four days a week. I have a list of things to do that I think is reasonable. Banking. Finish my graphic design homework for Saturday. Write the article on the Heavyweight Poetry Bout. Go to the library. Look up information on Greenwood and Hysteria (presses). Make some phone calls. Probably at least some housekeeping items. And a lot of other tasks. It's not unreasonable. Believe me! Tonight I am fretfully looking around for something that will give me an infusion of power. Enough power (equals hope) to get through tonight and on to the next day. It has not been an easy week. Low estrogen. Massacres and memories of massacres. First week of class. First week with no income. My sister in town, three whole evenings "visiting" over at my parents' house. Worrying about Older One. Worrying about this summer. Reexperiencing some writing time. And pressure pressure pressure from all these silly backlogged subprojects waiting in the wings. Whew, when I write it out like that I feel even worse. (I'm being tongue-in-cheek there, can you tell?) To tell the honest truth, I have plenty of power / hope, even some in reserve. My anger is keeping me warm. Someone's casting spells for me. And I love sitting around in class being ahead of most everyone in understanding. I love spending my lunch hours writing in my journal -- I'll get reacquainted with my insides! No vast silences there! And -- I'm sleeping through the night! All I had to do was leave the office, and I started sleeping through the night again. Oh, my knees and elbows, oh my head on the pillow!

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April 23, Library

bell hooks, Remembered Rapture Octavio Paz, a biography of Sor Juana The Defiant Muse, Hispanic Feminist Poems from the Middle Ages to the Present, ed. Angel Flores and Kate Flores Poetry like Bread, Poets of the Political Imagination From Curbstone Press, ed. Martin Espada Czeslaw Milosz, Bells in Winter Neruda and Vallejo, Selected Poems, edited by Robert Bly Lorca and Jimenez, Selected Poems, chosen and translated by Robert Bly Dan Poynter, The Self-Publishing Manual Gary Olsen, Getting Started in Multimedia Design, A designer's guide otthe nuts and bolts of developing multimedia concepts Jan V. White, Editing by Design, Word-and-picture communication for editors and designers

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April 24, Two different plaids

I have nothing to say tonight. Mowing the lawn and giving Older One a driving lesson have sent every thought right out of my head. Let's not ignore the impact of having my mailing list talking about online journals and awards. It's a no-win situation. It's making me terribly self-conscious. I'm so quick to forget that I don't care. Why am I doing this again? Oh yeah, writing practice, using the imagined pressure of an audience's expectations to force me to compose. So I can hear what I have to say. To be able to wander, and in my wanderings, to see what I like to look at. So I'll know. ~~~~~~~~~~~ I'm wanting to be writing in my paper journal. Free-writing surprises are what really keep me addicted to writing. They happen more in the paper journal. And happen more the more I write. Today at lunchtime I sat down and wrote a very quick page in the paper journal. It started out very fussy and then turned on a phrase, once I decided to write about what was really bothering me: What is bothering me is the tuning. I'm frantically twisting the dial of my hearts-ears trying to tune in the frequency that will guide me. I haven't ever really listened. I want to hear so badly it's like the craving between my legs. It's a grotesque craving. A black and white craving. A craving that won't be denied. The host out there -- the host of forms, animal, vegetable and mineral, all curved and phantasmagorically colorful, shifting, merging, whispering words of charm and treasure into each others' ears -- I want their attention, I want to call to them "Speak to me, speak to me! I'm wearing two different plaids and I haven't cut my hair in six months! Can't you see, can't you see, can't you see me, I am worthy of your attention!"

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April 25, Weeding and people

I'm really too exhausted to be doing this. I fought with myself for a long time -- write, go to bed, write, go to bed, write, go to bed.... Why? I weeded the rhubarb. I weeded more of the strawberries. (I'm looking forward to that annual pie I get from the backyard.) I raked the thick thatch of grass clippings off the lawn. (I refuse to use the bagger attachment.) This was probably more exercise than I've had in months. Then there's people. Nothing big, just continuous effort all day. Church people. I wanted intensely to retreat with the Spanish-language poets. I was deep in their world, but dragged myself toward the surface to go to church. I wanted to hear L's sermon on finding the goddess. I love seeing her in the pulpit. It's so incongruous. Next Sunday -- Beltane celebration. This should be interesting! The normal minister is on sabbatical. (Well, there is no normal minister.) Greeting and meeting and chatting was just too much for me. I'm afraid I come across as catatonic or ill or grumpy. I just can't cope with these people sometimes. I finally found that wonderful woman, a friend of L's, that I see every year or so. She always remembers me. We catch up. We always actually talk about our lives. I don't know what it is about her. She's actually a complete stranger. She made me feel comfortable and affirmed in these changes. That was a gift. Now can I go to bed?

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April 26, Notes of a mujer desnuda

About to flip out over the frame into choking frustration. I don't think the furnace is working. I really really really hate it when the furnace stops working. It happens at least once a year. This would be the second time this year. I think I'm going to ignore it and pretend it's warm enough to be summer when we don't need the furnace anyway. My kids are both being funky. The older one is procrastinating on his housing application for college next fall. Is this a subtle sign that he doesn't want to go? That he'll be living with me forever? That he's just stupid and lazy? That he wants me to do it? My whole philosophy with him has been to not do it, this is a simple thing, but it is so hard. The younger one was trying to practice his trumpet tonight. I was dozing on the couch (I'm still partly in a stupor; I think from getting too much sun on Sunday). I told him to go practice in the kitchen. He went into the kitchen and was honking and grumbling and frustrated and came out and said he couldn't play the trumpet in the kitchen. I got mad and said "This is a stupid problem and I can't help you with it." Then made him turn off the TV and go find something else to do. I don't know what he did. I talked to an old man tonight. We're publishing his poem. He was so, so grateful that I called him. I felt a little alarmed. I'm trying to move the May issue along bit by bit. I'm not too worried about it. I can't find a thing for Journal Shares this month. César Vallejo Robert Bly always manages to say at least one thing that annoys me. Here's what Bly writes about Vallejo: In Poemas Humanos especially, Vallejo suggests so well the incredible weight of daily life, how it pulls men down; carrying a day is like carrying a mountain. And what the weight of daily life wants to pull us down to is mediocrity. He hates it. I notice that women respond immediately to this horror of mediocrity in Vallejo, a horror women share, being often pushed by circumstances into monotonous, "one-stringed" living, without a trace of wildness. Well, okay, I know what he's saying, but why "women"? To be fair this was written a long time ago, 1971? (I want my writing to be livid with wildness. In fact, I am fairly wild about the furnace not working.) Here's the household poem from Vallejo: Babble Meek house with no style, framed with a single knock and a single piece of rainbow wax. And in the house she destroys and she cleans; says at times: "The asylum is nice. Where? Here!" Other times she breaks down and cries. Juan Ramón Jiménez Unfortunately, Juan Ramón Jiménez's poems are full of naked women. A naked woman over and over again. "... a naked woman running mad through the pure night!" "Your sonnet, just like/ some pure and naked woman, ..." "A naked woman / in the dark corridors." "She started going back toward nakedness ... Then she took off the cloth and was entirely naked..." He made me wonder if I could write poems about naked men. What would these poems look like? I want to laugh hysterically. Somehow naked men are just not as romantic, I guess. Now I will go on to Neruda.

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April 27, Extravagant surprises

I like Neruda's work. I will have to read more and more of it. He was influenced by Whitman. "Whitman has clearly had much more influence on the Spanish poets than on the North American poets," says Bly. Eliot was too intellectual for the Spanish, Whitman was too primitive for the Americans. Emily Dickinson said of Whitman "I never read his Book -- but was told that he was disgraceful." My mother said she never liked Whitman. She thought he was "crude." I wrote my college entrance essay on Whitman, probably a topic on the American I would most like to meet. I can't remember a thing I said. I would be very interested to read it again. When he lived in Madrid, Neruda published surrealist poems in a magazine called Caballo Verde por la Poesía (Green Horse for Poetry). Bly says of surrealist poetry: The conventionally wise assure us that to a surrealist the outer world has no reality -- only his inner flow of images is real. Neruda's work demolishes this banality. Neruda's poetry is deeply surrealist, and yet entities of the outer world like the United Fruit Company have greater force in his poems than in those of any strictly "outward" poet alive. Neruda had few literary theories. Neruda said in an interview with Bly: "I would say to young poets of my country and of Latin America -- perhaps this is our tradition--to discover things, to be in the sea, to be in the mountains, and approach every living thing. And how can you not love such an approach to life, that has such extravagant surprises?" That's surrealism to me, to write of the extravagant surprises.

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April 28 The elusive flame of oxygen

I wish I could define more clearly what I am looking for. I don't want to publish angry work. I don't want to publish women's work. I don't want to publish pretty good work. I don't want to publish self-destructive work. I don't want to publish darkside work (well, maybe). I don't want to publish raving work. I don't want to publish giggling work. I don't want to publish adolescent work. I don't want to publish work that placates, or panders, or pleases. I want to publish work that makes me breathe faster. I want to publish the work of an unknown power. I want to publish work of constrained delirium. I want to publish ecstatic work with no lords and no kings. I want to publish surrealist work emanating from the body. I want to publish work that causes theories and forms to implode. I want to publish the work of naked women wrapped in furious quilts*. I want to publish work in the tradition of Woolf. I want to publish work that wrestles with and sprains the alphabet. I want to publish work that demolishes like no other weapon known to man. I want to publish work with no letdown and no letup. There isn't much of it out there. Devi by Suzanne Ironbiter is the first work that comes to mind. Woolf. Mary Daly. Susan Griffin? Carol Emshwiller's story "Glory." Djuna Barnes? Clarice Lispector. Carole Maso? (Question marks by those I haven't read adequately enough to really know.) I can't articulate the common denominator. Books that get you through the choking, books that open your throat and allow you to breathe for the first time. Papier-Mache Press has a nice business. Sandra Martz is quoted in Poets & Writers (May/June '99), saying "Our core mission is to provide for women's voices and women's stories to be heard." That's not enough to describe what I'm looking for. SARK has a very nice business. She has something I envy, books with pictures. And she has a Camp. And a Cottage. But .... her work is not it, not even close. That guy from Black Sparrow that published Bukowski. John Martin. How happy is he about that? I like the approach, but not the Bukowski. Jan Freeman, Paris Press. I wouldn't mind publishing something like Open Me Carefully. That would seem worthwhile. She's not too far away from me (geographically, I mean). These pagan publications, SageWoman, Of a Like Mind -- what's wrong with them? I don't know. Backwater. Dead end. Stupidly, I wonder both why they are not angrier, and why they are not more mainstream. Maybe I just haven't given them a chance. My doubts say whatever I am thinking about won't have any readers. And it will burn out like a falling star in our atmosphere. I can't figure out if I'm supposed to be looking for this Flaming Work or writing it. I guess it doesn't matter. I just better know it when I see it. *PS One comment about quilts -- that quilting hand makes thousands and thousands of small stabs with the needle.

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April 29 "There is no forgetfulness"

Discouraged today. I'm spending a lot of energy fighting off obsessions and difficulties. I'm reading my journal from 1997, trying to befriend myself, but instead reliving every moment of hysteria from that year, and there were many. I tried to write something in here, but I kept erasing every sentence after I wrote it. So I give up. I'll put in a Neruda poem. I opened to this one randomly and it does seem to match my mood. There is No Forgetfulness (Sonata) If you ask where I have been I have to say, "It so happens ..." I have to talk about the earth turned dark with stones, and the river which ruins itself by keeping alive; I only know about objects that birds lose, the sea far behind us, or my sister crying. Why so many different places, why does one day merge with another day? Why does a black night gather in the mouth? Why all these people dead? If you ask where I come from I have to start talking with broken objects, with kitchenware that has too much bitterness, with animals quite often rotten, and with my heavy soul. What have met and crossed are not memories, nor the yellow pigeon that sleeps in forgetfulness; but they are faces with tears, fingers at the throat, anything that drops out of the leaves : The shadowiness of a day already passed by, of a day fed with our own mournful blood. Look and see violets, swallows, all those things we love so much and can see on the tender greeting-cards with long tails where time and sweetness are sauntering. But let's not go deeper than those teeth, nor bite into the rinds growing over the silence, because I don't know what to say : There are so many people dead and so many sea-walls that the red sun used to split, and so many heads that the boats hit, and so many hands that have closed around kisses, and so many things I would like to forget. tr. Robert Bly

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April 30 I'm in space

I want to float in a field of stars, airless and pure but for the sparkling motes of space dust reflecting starlight. It's nice and black here. I don't have anything to do. I can't move. I float. Oh -- I am alone. I am alone. I am alone in the velvety originality of space. I can be miserable, or I can be fascinated. I can hide my eyes, or I can tinker with the stars. My fingers still work in these fingerless gloves. My thinking still works in my orthogonal brain. My heart still pumps in my mechanized chest. My toes wiggle and break off, but I don't need them anymore. My smile expands to fill the space available. My tears will vaporize when I cry. My dark side will freeze, and my bright side will burn. I'm still naked under all these yards of wool shawl, but no one can see me. I am distracted by beauty, but sometimes I can still give a blessing.

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