gray clouds
hang overhead
ready to burst
at will
my umbrella
small and fragile
the only solace
I might carry
hangs on a doorknob
in my bedroom
unknowns pile on
one after another
an alphabet soup
of indecipherable
medicalese pointing
to things I cannot see
in this dim light
How long oh Lord?
brinkswomanship
does not become me
with so much planning
and packing to do
before that last trip
home
©Elouise Renich Fraser, 25 July 2018
Photo found at AccuWeather.com
adolescent limbs
victims of hit and run gusts
hang bent and broken
***
who picks up the pieces of
this my body broken for you
and you and you –
or drinks wine of bitterness
and death for our losses?
Written following this morning’s walk through my neighborhood park. A young tree once whole was damaged during a windstorm last night. Not just a limb or branch here and there, but at least 1/3 of the tree hung down to the ground, almost totally unhinged from its trunk.
Which led me to ponder victims of other windstorms past and present. And unsung heroes and heroines who, at the cost of their own safety and health, helped and still help others survive in a world gone upside-down.
Plus the once and only Whole Human Being, Jesus of Nazareth, who endured brokenness and death for each of us, and invites us to risk ourselves for the sake of others.
©Elouise Renich Fraser, 24 July 2018
restless breeze
sends thistle seed soaring
goldfinches descend
crackling trees thud
chain saws muzzle morning calm
my friend walks her dog
Do you remember Janet Henfrey, the inimitable Weather Lady from As Time Goes By? She was fiercely dedicated to keeping things in order, including weather reports which she delivered regularly with precision, whether anyone cared to hear them or not.
Well, I can’t say things are in order today. I can, however, say that each haiku above captures my weather report from Saturday and Monday (today) morning walks through our neighborhood.
Despite the noisy chain saws that echoed everywhere this morning, catching sight of 85-year old Rita approaching in her brilliant orange raincoat and cap with her tiny dog Charlie was the best sight of all! I joined her and had a little catch-up chat.
In some ways, this neighborhood is my ‘parish.’ Or rather, our parish. A defined spot on the globe in which we go about our business. Passing the time of day with neighbors or workers outside, and visiting with friends inside. Sharing the common news and groaning or laughing together about all kinds of aches, joys and frustrations.
Then there’s that other ‘parish’ that’s just mine. That would be you, plus anyone else who reads this post from my little outpost on the planet.
Our pastor recently challenged us to name our parishes. The places where we ‘do our thing’ most of the time. So, given my lifestyle these days, you’re It! Whether you like it or not.
Please note: This isn’t a political platform. It does, however, touch the political realm from time to time. How could it not? We can hear the trees falling and the buzz-saws grinding away every day.
Nonetheless, when I get up each day, the news isn’t my guide to who I am or where I’m headed. You can count on me to remain a follower of Jesus Christ, no matter how much I falter.
I can’t say it often enough: I’m not God, and you’re not God.
You’re welcome here. It doesn’t matter what your name is, your country of origin, your political party, your wealth or lack thereof, your attitude toward current or past administrations, the state in which you live, the color of your voting district, the color of your skin, your gender, your age or your immigration status. Plus anything else I left out of that wildly incomplete list.
If you don’t agree with me, it’s OK. I’m not God and you’re not God. Which holds true whether you believe in God or not.
You are, however, wildly welcome to muddle along with me through whatever comes next.
Happy Monday!
Elouise♥
©Elouise Renich Fraser, 23 July 2018
Photo found at idlethoughts.blog
green fields wave
the valley beckons
a warm welcome
life in full heat
rises with a rush
toward summer sky
Yesterday I drove through Valley Forge National Park on my way to a doctor’s appointment. The sky was cloudless and the sun was blistering hot. No problem. Driving through VF is always a delight and a feast for the eyes. Coming home it was almost ten degrees hotter, yet just as beautiful, uncrowded and peaceful. Like a green, tree-blessed island in the middle of a hot stormy sea.
I’m tempted to feel voiceless these days. Yes, I write, and I post. I often wonder what becomes of the verbiage generated by me and by thousands of others writing about our current situation in the USA. Yet I can’t keep silent. It only makes things worse.
There’s precious life in this country waiting for release, along with buckets of pain. Fractured relationships need healing. Anger about injustice and betrayal still need a full hearing. And no one can be all things to all people.
So I’m counting on being one of the small things that matter. Like a blade of grass, a grain of wheat or even a grain of sand. Or how about a wild flower of the field?
Elouise♥
©Elouise Renich Fraser, 20 July 2018
Photo of Valley Forge National Park found at flickr.com, Paris Images
Crumbling beneath the weight
Of their own foolishness
Kicking hard-won ground
From beneath their feet
Fools crown themselves
With honor and glory
Sporting signs of faux nobility
Grown thin and ragged
They flaunt flimsy garments
Of shifting sand and ironclad
Beliefs now hanging precariously
In the balance of truth and justice
Passersby stop to gaze at the
Horror of this new world now
Showing in museums everywhere
As bluster turns to tired old mantras
Long past their overdue dates not
Likely to appear in deserted cinemas
It’s a matter of time.
©Elouise Renich Fraser, 18 July 2018
Photo found at dailymail.co.uk; the old Paramount Theater in Newark, New Jersey, USA
fortressed in iron cage
aging shutters tightly sealed
window to nowhere
supporting walls crack
crumbling to ground defeated
a matter of time
©Elouise Renich Fraser, 18 July 2018
Photo found on pixabay.com
The feeling I get
Standing before an audience
Knowing all I must do is
Read the words on the page
With grace and clarity
The feeling I got
Sitting in church yesterday
Listening to a young woman
Fill the air with a Brahms Intermezzo
Evoking unexpected grief
Friday’s open mic night was great. I read 5 short poems, saving my favorite two (of the five) for the end. So why did I feel unsorted, out of control and uncertain I was on solid ground? Because of the last two poems. Though different in tone, each was about aging.
One was Life flew south last winter; the second was Feeling pretty. I admire the way George MacDonald writes poems about being an ‘old soul.’ Sometimes I think I’ve been just that all my life.
I’m used to hearing people my age and older describe unexpected aches, pain and grief. Usually health issues, but also loss of friends and family members.
I’m not, however, accustomed to hearing older women and men describing in poetic form their feelings of living with loss and unexpected health issues. Perhaps I’m not looking in the right places.
At any rate, I find writing about this time in my life is comforting and rewarding. Especially when it’s in poetic form. Reading a few of my poems Friday evening was icing on the cake. A vulnerable, somewhat scripted way of sharing pieces of my life with a mixed audience of children, young people and adults.
Then, on Sunday morning the offertory was Brahms Intermezzo in A Major Opus 118. A young woman performed it on the piano, from her heart and memory. She’s a member of our church and studies at Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia.
I know this piece. I’ve played it many times, though not in the last few years. Her performance was magnificent, and I burst into sobs as others around me applauded. It wasn’t just the beauty of her playing. It was knowing that I’ll likely never again play the piano with that kind of freedom and confidence.
I’ve gained much in the last few years. Still, the losses sometimes undo me. Especially when they arrive unexpectedly in beautiful packages such as poems and music that evoke tears of grief and gratitude.
Happy Monday! I pray you’ll be surprised this week by gifts that undo you in a good way.
Elouise♥
©Elouise Renich Fraser, 16 July 2018
Photo found at dancearchives.net
For dying orchids, catbirds
and other occupants —
Paper-thin creamy petals
of an orchid blossom fold
and bow in death
Scattered feathers and small entrails
of a gray catbird litter the road this morning
Prisoners in and out of cells hang on
by spider-thin threads of hope
Children lost and abandoned
have no get-out-of-jail cards
Women and men found wandering
find few if any life-sustaining options
And that little mouse is now gone
except for its small helpless head
Written after my morning walk, and after discovering the first orchid blossom expired in my kitchen during the night. Likewise the little mouse a few days ago, set upon by a determined predator. You’ll find the rest in the news and in our neighborhoods any day or night of the week.
Not very likable, I admit. Yet our tears for losses great and small are invaluable connections to ourselves, to others, and to our Creator. We are, after all, living on borrowed time within a growing breakdown of human kindness and decency. We don’t have to be persons of a certain faith or even age to see, understand and grieve these daily realities.
Sabbath rest gives time to think not simply about the glories of creation, but about how much we’ve lost and how sad it all is. Our Creator honors our tears and, I believe, weeps with us. Tears of lament aren’t signs of weakness, but signs and sometimes celebrations of small connections we must renew if we want to thrive together.
©Elouise Renich Fraser, 14 July 2018
Image found at blogs.covchurch.org
I woke up this morning already excited about this evening. I get to read some of my poems again! Out loud! In front of a friendly audience of children, young people, parents and friends of all ages. In the gym at the church. A fundraiser to help support our young people’s summer project in Philadelphia.
Despite my heavy-duty awesome age, I still feel like a little kid when I share bits of my life by way of my poetry.
I’ve never been one for writing or telling stories. I know a good storyteller when I hear or read one. That means I know I’m not One of Them. Though happy accidents do happen now and then.
Prose has been my main thing for most of my life. Yet I’m more than ready to let it take a back seat to poetry. In fact, when I reread some of my prose, I hear the poet in me already sneaking a poetic spirit into my prose.
I can’t help thinking about Emily Dickinson’s lovely poem, “They shut me up in Prose.” None of that flighty poetry stuff! We want to hear a story or a well-reasoned argument. Something we can take apart, piece by piece. Or at least keep under control. To keep you under control, of course.
The ability to write prose with an ear for cadence and choice of words got me where I am today. Not just as a student, educator and administrator, but as an adult woman whose childhood and youth were ruled by a relentlessly letter-of-the law father. Flights of poetic fancy were frowned upon. As were overt emotions spontaneously expressed. With the occasional exception of Christmas and birthdays.
When I read through early posts about my childhood and youth, I’m grateful for the ability to write prose. Yet even there I hear the cadences of poetry. Though it isn’t direct, it’s a persistent sign of life already aching for attention.
So tonight I get to revel in the poet I’m becoming. One step closer to the little girl and woman I am and have always been on the inside.
Am I going to give up prose? No way. I’m not locked up in anything–not in poetry and not in prose. Still, you can expect more poetry. A delightfully underground way of getting just about anywhere.
Cheers!
Elouise♥
©Elouise Renich Fraser, 13 July 2018
Image found at resetco.org
distant voices
ride waves of morning air
cicadas drone
Today is the anniversary of my mother’s birthday. Born in 1921, she died in 1999. Today would have been her 97th birthday. Though I’ve done a lot of work on my relationship with her, I’m still finding words to describe the impact she had on my life.
My mother’s main task in life was to raise four daughters and to be unquestioningly obedient to one husband. Though not in that order. For most of her life, loyalty to him came first, not her daughters.
In her last years of life, for reasons I don’t understand, something clicked on for her. More than once she became unusually feisty with Dad, letting him know (with witnesses present) exactly where he stood and didn’t stand with her. She didn’t shut him out completely. She did, however, shut him out and down on more than one occasion. As though she’d reached her last straw.
It’s difficult to imagine Mom as a role model for me in my marriage to D. I don’t have memories of her being particularly affectionate with my father (or with me). Obedient? Absolutely. Quiet and industrious? Absolutely. On his side when he was discouraged? Absolutely. Modest and unassuming? Absolutely.
But not an equal partner given to overt affection. No matter how you describe it. When she married Dad in 1942, she abandoned huge pieces of her one-and-only life. It was part of the deal.
Today I applaud and love her for her courage, persistence, creativity, love of making music, intelligence, resourcefulness, and ability to run circles around my father intellectually without putting herself at risk. She was a survivor whose physical voice and body were impaired by polio from the time she was 28 years old. Yet she rode the waves and storms of life gracefully until she just couldn’t do it anymore.
My one huge regret is that she didn’t advocate on my behalf, or question my father’s beatings of me. I know she knew. Everyone in the house knew. Perhaps she also knew what that would mean for her, and the cost was too high to bear. The lives of women are fraught with life-endangering choices. She made hers, and to her credit, never stopped loving me, even though she didn’t know how to come to my defense.
If she were here today, I, ever the introvert, would take her for a lovely stroll in her wheelchair around our neighborhood, and let her meet and greet some of my wonderfully extroverted neighbors. Then we would go through the neighborhood park, enjoying this lovely summer day together, listening to the birds, and meeting and greeting every friendly dog along the way. Plus their owners, of course.
And I would hug her close, giving her what I can.
©Elouise Renich Fraser, 12 July 2018
Photo found at mybrownnewfies.com
Telling the Truth 