Telling the Truth

connecting the dots of my life

Tag: Life and Death

February 25, 2019

One inch short of war

Howling winds
Rattle doors and windows

Random bursts
Of unseemly fury
Hurled through air
Turn lashing trees
To toppled dreams
Caught off guard
By one lone ranger
Unleashing havoc
One inch short of war

Pointing out the faults of others, especially those of POTUS, is dangerous business. Some say we should cut him a break. After all, doesn’t our own uncontrolled behavior make us as guilty as the next party?

Perhaps it does. Nonetheless, national leaders are held to higher standards because of the number of people who depend daily on their decisions and actions. Especially, but not only in situations of national emergency. A wall on our southern border is not cause to declare a national emergency. Hurricane Maria was. A test of our readiness to do the right thing. Together.

So yes, POTUS is rightly held to higher standards. And yes, my ability to see fault-lines in POTUS likely means I’m all too familiar with this set of behaviors. In myself and in others.

It brings to mind my history with self-confident men and women who believed themselves ordained by God to keep me in line. In my place. Voiceless and without power. One inch short of being used and abused in a subterranean war fueled by abuse of power.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 25 February 2019
Photo of Hurricane Maria damage in San Juan, Puerto Rico; found at nbcnews.com

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February 20, 2019

The coming storm

Silent as snow
Trees stand motionless
At attention
Scarcely breathing
Gray chill air
Of the coming storm

These days it’s difficult to read or listen to the news without descending one step deeper into the eye of a coming storm.

Nature’s weather events regularly point to the chaos and destruction of large, uncontrollable storms. Especially those that enter lashing out in one direction, and exit lashing out in another direction.

As it happens, today we’re in the leading edge of a large weather event coming at us from the south and west. The signs are all there, just outside my kitchen window and on countless weather updates .

So what’s it all about?

I can’t help thinking about  our nation. Especially the rapid deterioration of discipline, trust and good will we witness daily, beginning at the top and flowing out and down. As a young nation among older nations, we don’t seem ready to weather future storms that grow larger and more inevitable each day.

When I looked out my kitchen window this morning, I saw the trees. They were standing at attention, calm, silent, waiting to see what this storm will bring. For some it may spell disaster. For others, it will blow over and life will go on as usual.

Right now snow plows are going up and down the road outside our house. The snow is beautiful and heavy with moisture. Sleet and freezing rain will come later.

In the end, what I saw outside my kitchen window challenged me to be what I’ve often longed to be — a poem lovely as a tree. Vulnerable, strong, graceful, able to weather storms, and willing to die. No matter what happens next for me or our nation, and no matter who happens to be in the White House.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 20 February 2019
Photo found at elizabethatkinson.com

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February 12, 2019

All I need for today

All I need for today
Is framed by my kitchen window

This is truth:
The importance of small things.
Have you counted earth’s surviving insects?

Planetary disaster goes unnoticed
The border wall calls, cries, screams
For attention
The small child in each of us
Demanding and relentless

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 12 February 2019
Photo of endangered North American Karner Blue Butterfly found at allaboutwildlife.com

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February 10, 2019

For women of a certain age

Restless mind and body
search for direction –
Ways to speak into the void
of life counting down –
One day and night at a time
Relentless

Heaviness hangs on my eyelids
I want to sleep – or do I ?
Maybe I don’t want to be
Awake

It’s easier that way –
And who would know the difference
between sweet sleep and
fear-driven avoidance?

For what was this body/soul created?

Maybe I missed something
In the directions for women
of a certain age and temperament

I’m more than a statistic.
Writing when Awake is dangerous.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 10 February 2019
Photo of sunset in the Black Forest found at pixabay.com

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February 4, 2019

A broken heart

Days pass swiftly.
Time seems to be speeding by.

Yesterday I read another chapter from Mary Oliver’s Upstream,
and felt small and late in coming to this place.
Not by informed choice, but from neglect,
and ignorance about this world.

Held back. Stunted. Fenced in.

Living at best a half-life of external demands, distractions,
and danger looming around every corner.

Unsafe. Captive to other’s ideas, attitudes and power.

Now near the end, it seems
I lived a half-life that wasn’t entirely mine.

On quiet days I long for another opportunity to live
and taste life on my terms, from the inside out,
not as a timid onlooker into the lives of others.

Am I ungrateful?
Or just sad….even brokenhearted.

Perhaps a broken heart is a beginning, not the end.
That, and playing the piano as though
for the very first time.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 4 February 2019
Photo of path in Ireland found on pinterest.com

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February 2, 2019

My mother’s spirit

My mother’s spirit
Came calling last night
I saw her footprints
In this morning’s snow
Precise and measured
She passed quietly
Beneath my window
Step by small-hooved step
Down the driveway
Before crossing over
Into the woods beyond
Our house asleep
And dreaming

I think they were the prints of a red fox–which reminded me of my mother’s bright red coat. She would have loved the brilliant rainbow umbrella, and the fashionable leggings and boots.

The tracks down our driveway this morning told me I’m not alone. Neither are my three sisters, each of us with our own mother-daughter relationship to ponder. Mother Eileen died in mid-February 1999, twenty years ago, seven years before our sister Diane died of ALS in mid-February 2006.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 2 February 2019
Photo found at fiftiness.com

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January 9, 2019

the sound of nothing

Blush-pink morning clouds
Paint the sky peachy sherbet
Fresh from last night’s raucous rain
Now gathered in mud puddles

Outside my bedroom window
Venus shines in the east
Birds soar through chilled air
Graceful trees sway to and fro
Freed by the sound of nothing

This morning’s quiet was welcome, especially given the bluster and chest-thumping offered up daily by our news feeds. Huge plates overflow with hand-wringing, fact-checking, posturing and dissecting served up fresh, minute by minute. Starvation diet. That’s what it feels like. Even the best scenarios aren’t enough to sustain us.

Nature isn’t God. Nor is Nature a meek little lamb. Nonetheless, when seen through eyes of faith, Nature becomes a vast, open, accessible tutor about life.

My daily challenge is to stop, look and listen. Though the music isn’t always beautiful, it always points to truth. A welcome respite from today’s clamorous voices, and a reminder that we are all finite. This current state of affairs will not last forever.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 9 January 2019
Photo of Venus at dawn found at flickr.com, taken by Joseph Brimacombe

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January 7, 2019

On giving ourselves away

What is a good death, Teacher?
And where might I look to find one?

Bad deaths abound
Alongside seemingly valiant deaths
And deaths of great sacrifice

But are they good deaths?

My new calendar hangs above me
Three young renaissance women
Observe life within and without
Through eyes that betray nothing
Wisps of pure virgin hair peek
From demur and ornate headpieces

Will they die good deaths, Teacher?
If so, why? When? And how?
And will they have led good lives?

Or will they muddle through
Whatever life requires of them?
Clean slates upon which dreams
Begin and end without a whimper
Good girls and good women
Who cared not for themselves
But for the needs of others
Now gone without a trace

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 7 January 2019
Hans Holbein sketch found at pinterest.com

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January 5, 2019

color me fragile

color me fragile
transparent windows open
to waves of music
floating through winter’s cold nights
from stars and planets waiting
to welcome me home

I think often of death these days. Not as something to fear, but as a reminder that today’s music won’t wait for tomorrow. It’s here. Now. Waiting to be experienced, honored, held close. A reminder of the good that has come my way and the good people who still sing to me when I feel lonely, scared or overwhelmed. Many now wait to welcome me home.

Morose? No. It’s food for my soul. A warm fuzzy blanket to wrap around me when I begin to falter. It’s the reason I greet each day with expectancy and hope mixed with sadness. Life sometimes feels heavy to bear. Then those reminders come floating in. A gift, if not proof, that I’ve had and have a life beyond the life I see and remember.

Praying your day is filled with graceful music from unexpected sources.

Elouise♥

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 5 January 2019
Image found at wallpaperup.com

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January 2, 2019

Sand of life’s fine wine

One day follows another
Slips between my fingers —
Sand of life’s fine wine
Served in tiny portions

I want it all right now
To have and to hold —
Shaping every room into
The castle of my choosing

Weariness descends
Seagulls circle beckoning
My eyes close dreaming —
Waves lapping at my toes

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 2 January 2019
Photo found at pbs.org

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