In reviewing this poem, I was surprised to see the journal entry so I read it anew. And the last paragraph of the two pages typed was the lament that I had a head with so much to say I felt I was going to die. And I wrote the words of St. Paul, ‘it is I who do it, yet not I, but Spirit within’, when I listened with tears running down my cheeks as Gladys Cooley Nicholson read my poetry on npr’s WDET, in a deep voice powerful with meaning. She honored my work.
To strike a balance with the desire to create and overwhelmed with what it takes to submit and follow a prescribed path to publish, my need to create won. So I independently studied and created at night and the need to maintain property and people took the work long days. Commitments made options unavailable. One of the non negotiables in life is sometimes there are no options.
And you are given with grace, in time, a wise granddaughter saying, you just suck it up Gram, just suck it up. She is mine.
Perhaps a bit boring, but nice to leave with no regrets and commitments intact. Amen.
Time To Go On . . .
Is it time to go on?
Just one more garden in blossom,
I think, just one more winter.
And I wonder if I could
appreciate them anymore or
berate the ones who cannot see. . .
Will I be able to look at snow
and see as a depth to remove
before I can move or will I
see a feathering dust of density
and walk through it
like the man on water?
Will I ever be able to look
at this evergreen outside
my study window and not see it
as a thought form?
Or will I take its trunk
in my hands one day and like
paper mache bend it out of existence?
It is sturdy and it grows.
It takes space and cools
this room I sit in and
is a haven for the birds that
trust its branches will hold their nests
and the spidery tines will hold them.
Will I never mow the lawn
because I will by a thought,
landscape the Earth? Am I
a dreamer in motion . . .
like speech, aahhh. . . my thoughts stutter. . . . .
July 01, 1982 journal entry
Poem Written April 01, 2016
photo by Joe Hallissey Sr.
2 responses to “The Spirit Within Speaks. . .”
The beauty of your words and that of Joe’s photography is something to behold both separately and together. Thank you. With love, Catherine
Catherine, thank you for commenting. We grow in understanding with the words and find
only the costumes are different. We must be ready for them and then we find they wear well
on us. It is a wonder it happens sometimes at all. Thanks Catherine.