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shalannaElegy
I know but will not tell
you, Aunt Irene, why there
are soapsuds in the whiskey:
Uncle Robert had to have
a drink while shaving. May
there be no bloodshed in your house
this morning of my father's death
and no unkept appearance
in the living, since he has
to wear the rouge and lipstick
of your ceremony, mother,
for the first and last time:
father, hello and goodbye
Alan Dugan 1963
* * *
This poem was introduced to me by my professor in a 1979 poetry workshop at SMU, Dr. John Skoyles. I'll always be grateful to him for introducing me and the others in the workshop to poets like James Tate, Alan Dugan, Donald Justice, Frank O'Hara, and many others--not to mention explaining all those concepts and helping us figure out that a poem is a song around a central image. (Among other things.)
* * *
If my daddy hadn't died that morning when I was only fifteen, maybe we could have talked about math. I think he would have enjoyed the study group and my nerd friends once I got into college; a lot of those guys were heavy-duty math and arithmetic nerds, whereas I am not a powerhouse but a dabbler and puzzle-doer. I think he would have loved seeing the personal computer become so dominant. I know for sure he'd have loved having one. He worked on mainframes and minicomputers, but he never really got to see any PC-like systems. Heck, back then the calculator was a big deal. The graphing calculator didn't come along until some time after I got out of college (we spent hours graphing on graph paper, which is now unheard of, I suppose.) He didn't get to walk me down the aisle at my wedding; I chose to walk the aisle alone. Not that people didn't offer to "walk me," but hey, that wasn't their place. I suppose most non-clued-in observers thought I was making some kind of feminist statement. He isn't here to take care of my mother and share the days with her. I think we really got ripped off.
But we're certainly not the only ones. Yesterday, they marked the 2,000th American casualty in the Iraq war. Young people, some of them really only kids (this according to one mournful commander who was sending bodies home). How many will it take? Blowin' in the wind, I know. I can sincerely say that I feel their pain, or that I have felt a similar pain. It's all so sad.
The icon on this post is from a photo Daddy took of me around 1971 in our back yard.
The bypass was a new, experimental treatment back in 1974. The doctor had tried to get hold of my dad all weekend to warn him that his triglycerides had soared, and that he needed to come in for a check-up. He died on a Monday morning soon after I had left for school. Mama remembers poking her head into the door of the bedroom and calling to him. "Is it that time already?" she remembers him saying.
"Yes," she said, meaning it was time to get up. But we now know that he was talking to the angel.
I sometimes think of the story/legend about the Land of the Dead, where as long as there is somebody who remembers you on Earth, you can keep watching and occasionally reaching out to help (kind of like in the last act of "Our Town") . . . and then when the last of your friends and grand-relatives join you, then you all (those who are at last "forgotten") move upward to the next level of Heaven or the afterlife (whatever you want to call it), where you have different work to do and a different focus. It's a mythic reminder for us that we are all connected as long as we have our memories, for what are we except a collection of memories, hopes, and dreams?
* * *
"'Tis the blight man was born for--
It is Margaret you mourn for."
Gerard Manley Hopkins, "Spring and Fall" (1880)
* * *
Cherish your time today. Think of the minutes as gifts to yourself, and to the ones who share your life's walk. Just for today, think of the wonders and not so much of the little irritants. And spare a thought for your "balcony people," the ones who have crossed over before you, and now watch over you and are sometimes allowed to send you help in various forms when you really need it. They're always with us.
The holiest of all holidays are those
Kept by ourselves in silence and apart;
The secret anniversaries of the heart.
--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
I know but will not tell
you, Aunt Irene, why there
are soapsuds in the whiskey:
Uncle Robert had to have
a drink while shaving. May
there be no bloodshed in your house
this morning of my father's death
and no unkept appearance
in the living, since he has
to wear the rouge and lipstick
of your ceremony, mother,
for the first and last time:
father, hello and goodbye
Alan Dugan 1963
This poem was introduced to me by my professor in a 1979 poetry workshop at SMU, Dr. John Skoyles. I'll always be grateful to him for introducing me and the others in the workshop to poets like James Tate, Alan Dugan, Donald Justice, Frank O'Hara, and many others--not to mention explaining all those concepts and helping us figure out that a poem is a song around a central image. (Among other things.)
If my daddy hadn't died that morning when I was only fifteen, maybe we could have talked about math. I think he would have enjoyed the study group and my nerd friends once I got into college; a lot of those guys were heavy-duty math and arithmetic nerds, whereas I am not a powerhouse but a dabbler and puzzle-doer. I think he would have loved seeing the personal computer become so dominant. I know for sure he'd have loved having one. He worked on mainframes and minicomputers, but he never really got to see any PC-like systems. Heck, back then the calculator was a big deal. The graphing calculator didn't come along until some time after I got out of college (we spent hours graphing on graph paper, which is now unheard of, I suppose.) He didn't get to walk me down the aisle at my wedding; I chose to walk the aisle alone. Not that people didn't offer to "walk me," but hey, that wasn't their place. I suppose most non-clued-in observers thought I was making some kind of feminist statement. He isn't here to take care of my mother and share the days with her. I think we really got ripped off.
But we're certainly not the only ones. Yesterday, they marked the 2,000th American casualty in the Iraq war. Young people, some of them really only kids (this according to one mournful commander who was sending bodies home). How many will it take? Blowin' in the wind, I know. I can sincerely say that I feel their pain, or that I have felt a similar pain. It's all so sad.
The icon on this post is from a photo Daddy took of me around 1971 in our back yard.
The bypass was a new, experimental treatment back in 1974. The doctor had tried to get hold of my dad all weekend to warn him that his triglycerides had soared, and that he needed to come in for a check-up. He died on a Monday morning soon after I had left for school. Mama remembers poking her head into the door of the bedroom and calling to him. "Is it that time already?" she remembers him saying.
"Yes," she said, meaning it was time to get up. But we now know that he was talking to the angel.
I sometimes think of the story/legend about the Land of the Dead, where as long as there is somebody who remembers you on Earth, you can keep watching and occasionally reaching out to help (kind of like in the last act of "Our Town") . . . and then when the last of your friends and grand-relatives join you, then you all (those who are at last "forgotten") move upward to the next level of Heaven or the afterlife (whatever you want to call it), where you have different work to do and a different focus. It's a mythic reminder for us that we are all connected as long as we have our memories, for what are we except a collection of memories, hopes, and dreams?
"'Tis the blight man was born for--
It is Margaret you mourn for."
Gerard Manley Hopkins, "Spring and Fall" (1880)
Cherish your time today. Think of the minutes as gifts to yourself, and to the ones who share your life's walk. Just for today, think of the wonders and not so much of the little irritants. And spare a thought for your "balcony people," the ones who have crossed over before you, and now watch over you and are sometimes allowed to send you help in various forms when you really need it. They're always with us.
The holiest of all holidays are those
Kept by ourselves in silence and apart;
The secret anniversaries of the heart.
--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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no subject
Date: 2005-10-28 01:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-10-28 04:15 pm (UTC)"And the Wichita Lineman is still on the line. . . ."
no subject
Date: 2005-10-28 07:28 am (UTC)Sorry. Stupid thing to say. Of course he was.
no subject
Date: 2005-10-30 01:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-10-28 11:12 am (UTC)I'm not sure what I'm trying to say. Except that being in that generation seems to have been very hard on the heart.
Then again, as you were saying, that's always true.
P.
no subject
Date: 2005-10-30 01:08 pm (UTC)Our growing-up years were the best of times in some ways, but not in others. I would like a do-over (go back and do it over the right way this time!), but I don't know if I could handle the current social structure that the teens of today have to deal with. The world is too much with them (us).
My aunt had a heart valve replaced a few years ago, and she had a tough time getting out of the anaesthetic, too. But what she said she lost was her heart--the other version. Her tenderness, her caring, her connection to the world. She told me recently that it took her until recently to have any real "feelings" the way she used to understand them. "I was heartless. Like a stone. Didn't really care about anything but myself. It was like they took my heart out," she said. She was kind of scared by it until the feelings gradually grew back with the severed nerves. She said it was no wonder the Greeks thought the seat of the soul and mind was the heart. She was glad to get her "soul" back. (eek)
I think a visual infirmity is one of the most difficult to deal with. Especially if you're visually oriented, the way I am. Bless his heart, but at least you had him with you here for a while longer. I think people don't take anaesthetic quite as seriously as they should--they sign the release forms, but do they really read the possible side effects? *boggle* Most of the time it turns out fine, but the anaesthesiologist basically keeps you alive during the surgery. And then there are the stories of people waking up *but not being able to move* during the actual surgery. Eek!
Science doesn't know quite everything. . . .