One more memory

I've been writing a song... unbelievable I know but this one I'm especially excited about.  

A couple days ago I had this memory pop into my mind.  It was one of my first memories and one of the happiest I've known since.  

My dad used to have this old, green mg complete with torn vinyl seats and rusty floors.  It was incredible.  As broken down as it was I still wish we had that car.  

Being the only girl of four, I didn't get much time with my dad so when he suggested going for a ride in his rust bucket of a vehicle I jumped at the opportunity.  He was taking me for a ride in the mg and I was going to sit in the front seat with my hands gripping the door handle and window all the way down just to let the breeze run wildly through my hair.  I wasn't even tall enough to see out the window.  The only thing in view from my sticky throne was the sky and some branches and I thought to myself, "This is heaven - my dad by my side and nothing to see but sky".  It felt like I was flying. 

I've never told my dad how much that day meant to me and it was easy to forget when other car rides piled on top of it - car rides to ballet, to lacrosse, to choir, to band, car rides to college and back, car rides with difficult questions to answer.

That ride was the beginning of many but it embodies the unique relationship this man and I share.  

It's protection.  It's challenging.  It's inspiring.  It's what I needed when I didn't want it.  It's realizing there is someone else just like me who doesn't care whether I failed a test or whether I sing the right words to Paul Simon songs.  It's the feeling of knowing there is someone riding right beside you who looks at the world the same way you do and treasures the view from an old car.

Long ago we got rid of the car and on that day my dad and I both cried.

Here it is:

It's the first time I'm going with you

It's the first time I'd even dare

The whole world passes by without a care

Gonna breathe it all in I swear

I'm too small they say

for the will that drives me on

I'm too wild they say

to contend as just a pawn

so I'll go, go, go until I'm gone

My happiest day would be 

not seeing what's ahead

The two of us not knowing where it's gonna end

and our futures charging the wind

I don't know the way

to live life on my own

I'm afraid to

race on all alone

but I still go, go, go until I'm gone

It's time that I hate

It's what's done me in

Oh the line we must walk all of us balancing

but if I look at you I forget where I've been

and we go, go, go until we're gone

Years ago, when I was a little girl, I remember my mother reading me this poem. Its simplicity struck me.  Its meaning was attainable to me even at a young age and it was poignant to me then though I still do not know why.  

Thinking back, I believe that was the beginning of my love of poetry - the rhythm, the meter, the mystery, the misinterpretation.  The whole experience was magical to me.  So, in light of this memory I thought that I might post it to help us all remember the joy of words and the beauty they bring to our lives.

Bed In Summer

In winter I get up at night

and dress by yellow candle light.

In summer quite the other way

I have to go to bed by day

I have to go to bed and see

the birds still hopping in the trees

and hear the grown up people's feet

still going past me in the street.

And does it not seem hard to you

when all the sky is clear and blue

and I should like so much to play

to have to go to bed by day?

-Robert Louis Stevenson

The Dirty Shirt Hearthbreak

 

You know that piece of clothing you wore when you were a kid that was just the berries?  Whether it was a dress or a pair of boots or a hat or a shirt, you would wear it every day and in between times too.  It didn’t matter how ridiculous it looked on you, you would wear it and it was the only thing that made you feel comfortable and made you feel like you.  When I was a little girl I had this dress that I loved but I was so clumsy and such a dirt magnet that it would get filthy quite often.  It never felt the same when it wasn’t on me.  This is poem is dedicated to all those pieces of clothing.

 

Dirty Shirt Heartbreak

 

My favorite shirt is dirty

It’s sitting within view

A top my pile of laundry

Still covered in dusty dew

 

How I wish it were clean

So that I could wear it

I wish I had not seen

The stain from that carrot

 

It doesn’t really look good on me

But it’s my favorite, my absolute favorite

It doesn’t really fit either

But it’s so soft, so absolutely soft

 

I don’t think I’ll go out today

I just don’t want to

There is just no way

I need my shirt, I just do

The Dregs

An ode to coffee - one of my favorite things to do and drink.

The Dregs

I have come to the end of my cup.

I see the leavings and little bits of things

Lying against the sides and

In the pit of this porcelain pool.

 

I did not think that such things,

Like coffee grounds and fuzz,

Dwelled at the bottom of such

A divine and able vessel.

 

They cling desperately to every surface

As if begging not to be consumed.

But I am not tempted by the traces of

This once glorious beverage.

 

I don’t want them.

Nor do I need the dried trails

Of coffee.

 

I want something even greater than it’s predecessor

 

I want the sweet lazy sugar,

Slow to dissolve,

That still lingers in the basin

Simply waiting to be devoured.

 

I take out my spoon

As if to say,

“I am done and shall not have any more,”

Then I lunge.

 

And savor

The sweetest part of the cup,

The best and the last,

The Dregs.

The Bloom

Here is today's poem.  This is dedicated to my mother, who taught me this great truth, and to Andrew, who continues to help me live it.

The Bloom 

It is said that a flower’s importance

Lies in the fact that she is completely useless.

 

She cannot serve to clean the pot

Or take out the mark of a coffee stained spot.

She only sits and basks

With her head to the sky and her feet in a flask.

 

She cannot bring you good advice

Or scare away your kitchen mice.

She can only embrace her beauty

And be…

 

Yes her only purpose is to exist

In lovely layers no bigger than a fist.

But it is this that makes her necessary

For she teaches us what is truly arbitrary.

 

Sometimes it is most important to be

Not to achieve, gain, speak, or even see.

We must always drink up living

And remember our lives are beauty giving. 

A new page

Dear blog readers,

As you know and have seen by the state of my empty blog, I have been a tad bit preoccupied.  The process of getting married and recording a new album, though wonderful, have taken their toll on writing any more than songs and thank you notes.  And though my blog's readers are few they are faithful and for this I am sorry.  Truly I apologize. You did not deserve the neglect that you received and as I ruefully look back at my behavior I have made a determined decision to change.

The blog will now take a more interesting format.  Instead of being a wordy and emotional train of thought, the blog will become a sort of challenge for me. 

Let me explain.

When I write songs I tend use my deepest emotion. I lean therefore toward a more contemplative and sensitive view of the world and often find myself drowning in imagery and history and poignant feelings. 

The challenge is to keep the energy flowing and continue writing despite the constant attraction of being caught up on an emotional roller-coaster and being unable to put anything down on the page.  The new blog is meant to keep the waters flowing - to keep it fresh.

Each day, or hopefully close to, I will write a new poem and post it for you to read.  Being from a family of poets this is an intimidating task so I will therefore make no promises of excellence.  Keep in mind that not all blog entries will be meant seriously.  Feel free to laugh or cry laughing or click the x box on your window. 

Enjoy the new blog.

Here is the poem of the day:

There is an open window

Propped there with  an old milk bottle

For it cannot stand up on its own.

Together they fight against the powers that do not show.

Gravity and wind around their efforts tangle

Breaking hope - faith now blown.

And why is it that they must stand so,

Poised and balanced at this strange angle

And Fate's purposes to them unknown?

 

But I, their silent master, now must go

Or I shall risk a breath fatal

For in this room rank smell has made a home

So stand strong oh courageous duo

And never falter in your battle.

You've saved me from this scent that through your port has flown.

No greater love could you have shown

Than to lay down your life so the smell will leave me alone.

The Radio Tower Must Come Down

I was a strange child, even more strange than I have become as an adult.  Indeed my current quirks and habits, my infatuations and my pet peeves are simply aged versions of the oddities that were constantly exploding from my childhood frame. 

 

The strangest thing about me, beyond the constant cravings for mayonnaise and my innate need to sing show tunes at the top of my lungs, was my love of the a-typical landscapes.  I loved water towers, rusty train tracks, and awkward buildings.  Their imperfections and bizarre qualities were beautiful to me or at least honest.  I felt at home among the broken things in our world – the shattered windows, the potholes, the fallen tree branches.  I felt a connection with the out-of-place pieces around me – Telephone wires, gutters, and cars unused in so many years that they had grow into the place they were left.

 

I felt a similarity to these things – an inexplicable kinship.   And there was one thing, one monument protruding out of the horizon of my childhood that echoed the awkwardness I felt inside every time I looked at it.

 

Out my window and stuck into the pristine and relatively untouched ground of Annapolis was a radio tower with its flashing red cap and skeletal form speaking to me a language I understood – a language to belong. 

 

“Oh that thing is so hideous. I can’t stand it.  Why can’t they put it somewhere else?” I would hear the complaints still every night I would whisper the unspoken poundings of my heart to this creature as if it were a star with its seat in the heavens.  It was a comfort to me though I had no idea why at the time. It accompanied my childhood and was a constant presence as I grew up.

 

Its feet awkwardly touched the same thick grass of the nearby field where I ran day after day with blades whipping against my bare and brown knees.  It sat there high above my town and saw everything.  It saw me grow up and it saw Annapolis change around it. 

 

Slowly and surely I forgot it even existed as we forget things that were once precious to us like a blanket, or a place, or a friend.

 

And now years have gone by without even a shudder.  They must pass and we must change. Childhood has gone.  The radio tower that was so familiar to me in my youth has not even a mark on the ground as a memorial of its existence. 

 

How does it happen?  Where do those things go?  Does God have some strange and divine storehouse where these things are kept?  Do they go to a place hung with pirate hooks, and fairy dust, and bright eyes? 

 

Though my life has changed and it’s landscape as well, I still search for things that echo the sentiments of my heart yet now, instead of looking at the broken things of the world, I look to the sky and I search for a small blinking red light and hope that it might give me some reassurance that I still belong.