From an Upper Floor

The Deep Within. . . is the connection. . .

I scribed October 10, 1983. . .

We wait for this day. You hear the arguments in the head and you think all the while the hands do the mind’s bidding. In this we find a great interest and comfort knowing that it is possible to function in a secular life and continue to grow. Your questions show the current interest thinking which man should be doing. You ply the heaven for answers and forgive us for saying there are no answers to the questions.

There is nothing yet written which would answer your why, how and wherefores to satisfy. Not possible. There is a keeping on, keeping on and a growth possible not yet tapped. Questions persist and not always have answers that leave one in comfort and wellbeing.

You have already tapped this reservoir. Which proves that man, as a whole, can do this for himself. You reach this point where your answers will be forthcoming, as you provide them for yourself. You cannot find in the heavens, even , the final conquest. There are worlds upon worlds, but the Rabbi told you that, didn’t he?

You know this in that part of you which has searched the skies for that part of heaven which would give ultimate rest. You know that, have always know it and now is part of your fabric.

Not comforting, is it? There is no place, not a one, where everything is brought to completion. How can there be, when there is no completion? How can there be when all is in a state of becoming? It is all becoming; we are all becoming. Becoming what? We can only surmise. No one knows.

This is where the grandfather God is the comfort. This is where man finds if he gives thought and thinks it through, he gets bogged down. In despair, throws up his hands with ‘God Knows’!

He is right if he means ‘unknowing, unfathomable, omniscient, omnipresent, spirit of the Universes, he is in good territory. If he means a being like himself, in physical form, he spends the night walking around his house looking for a place to lay down his head.

You have the ability to grasp this concept, and with the devices and comforts of living add to its intensity to keep on keeping on, you find within the reason to make perfect. What you see in your commitments and priorities reasons to help. Without your help, we all would be floundering. We look for growth and enhancement of mankind in all areas.

Commitments will set our priorities and unveiled will be to our surprise, substance of who we are and from where we come.

THE LEGACY

We dried the tears with straw flowers
and they scratched your face.

The etchings on the parchment
which was your skin will forever be stayed
and will be read only by
the keenest eye and the discerning heart.

The indelible ink which wrote
was with pen dipped in love.
Repeated washings rinsed with tears
did not bleach it out.

So take your heart and this one and this
and ask for memories to build
in worlds uncertain, in unions
without ballast,
a treasure chest, a memory bank.

The loves will loose
the memories in future times
and in the moment
release for their own, a strength.

And never know in a history buried
deep beneath their skins,
there was a she-man
of indeterminate strength
who plied her trade
and in the course of time,

endowed her progeny. . . .

(Poem from Dec 01, 1983
Journal Entry)

July 16, 2022

Veronica Hallissey has been writing since the 1960s, with her poetry published in a variety of small press magazines. Born into a farm family in Lockport, NY, and educated at the University of Buffalo and other midwest institutions, she brings and unusual point-of-view to her poetry, combining strong natural images with a deep spiritual language. She lives in Ramona, CA.
With These Hands. . . love. . . gratitude. . .

To Use These Hands. . . . from another time. . .

As dawn breaks, my fingers of both hands curl about each other and I marvel at their slimness, their ability to elicit the feel of themselves, each digit wrapped around the other.

And I think that nothing, no other world will ever make me feel such blessedness as my hands’ ability to do so many things over the course of this life. To kneading bread, to winding the yarn, to smoothing the brow of my very sick child and have him tell me later that it helped him sleep. Everything I touch holds a lesson for me.

The square inch of soil I spooned with young hands yielded secrets kept from generations. The eyes of a child as my hands embrace young shoulders tells me what went into their ancient heritage. And I grasp their hands in mine and convey my love by touch.

I would use these hands to mold and make and set trends never before thought. I see the beauty of the great god in the blending of these human genes and see the perfect Adam and perfect Eve emerging and see the virtue in the making and the doing of the homely tasks that will start the holy process once again.

And I will open my arms and spread my hands to grasp the youngest by my hip and be grateful for hands that show how very much I love on this planet called Earth

My input to date. . .July 13, 2022. . . .I was unprepared for what these last years would bring. There was no hint of not being able to do with my hands what I loved doing. But the accumulation of physical work which was a palliative for the emotional turmoil brought on by many variables, has given me too much time with regretful, ‘I should not have allowed’ whatever dotage has brought me.

Even the simple task of grasping a spoon or scissors, grits the teeth, coupled with a half dozen other auto immune deficiencies science has uncovered. It is not easy to allow Nature its qualities to cease and heal. She shouts in my house, enough already! Time to let go and be.

My head has not gotten the message. It still is in gear. We will continue to argue but we both know she has the heavier clout.

But who was the teacher who said, ‘do and you will be shown how’? I did and do and now I am reminded not to forget my bread recipe when I arrive.

July 13, 2022

Veronica Hallissey has been writing since the 1960s, with her poetry published in a variety of small press magazines. Born into a farm family in Lockport, NY, and educated at the University of Buffalo and other midwest institutions, she brings and unusual point-of-view to her poetry, combining strong natural images with a deep spiritual language. She lives in Ramona, CA.
The Dance. . . We as participants. . . .

The Dance. . . .

There is a dance that our feet learn to do when first we stand up. That dance is learned well, for even when our legs no longer dance, our phantom feet remember the dance. They itch to dance. And under penalty of death we think, we stay with it.

If we decide to learn new steps, the old ones often need to be altered. And if they are, we either think we are not needed for our dance, or we feel our steps are not noticed anymore and are taken for granted. Either way, we feel sorry for ourselves or worse, give up.

Very few give in and learn new steps, perhaps slower ones. The new dance though is alien to our self image and we are certain the new steps will be laughed at. Fortunately others do not remember our old steps as we who danced them. In the fashion of Fred Astaire, our memory tells us we swept others along with us.

And that is the kicker.

When one is aware that a new step is needed, one is aware also that the dance is soon ending. How to do it gracefully, with a sweeping dip that barely touches the floor, takes a nimble body and mind.

Most of us do it with the tentative steps we learned when first we learned to dance. For the vision might still be sweeping, but the body falters. We soon find the audience’s attention is riveted on younger feet still learning new and beguiling steps.

We shuffle off the floor. Our dance is over. And we are never the wiser that the young feet doing the new dance could not dance at all without our learning the old dance first.

artwork by
Claudia Hallissey

July 3, 2022

Veronica Hallissey has been writing since the 1960s, with her poetry published in a variety of small press magazines. Born into a farm family in Lockport, NY, and educated at the University of Buffalo and other midwest institutions, she brings and unusual point-of-view to her poetry, combining strong natural images with a deep spiritual language. She lives in Ramona, CA.
The twig bent. . from where I come. . .

I have delayed posting because of ill health. Also because I wondered if what I have been involved in has been so much busy work. At times we have to confront and reassess. And because I am heavy with verbiage, there is much verification. Not all bad and some even passable. I have written on this subject of thought before but feel it necessary to repeat. To think is a real gift given and work it is. It is a practice most avoid.

I remember three compliments given taken to heart. My brother in law, who said he liked asking me questions because he knew I researched and young friend Mark who said he saw me with only one face, never changing from private to public and our David who when he received his phi beta kappa key turned and gave it to me because he said I earned it because I never closed the books.

Since I am in the decade leading to a hundred years, I take stock in reading journal entries. I have to because I cannot believe this life.

January 7, 1988   journal . . . I write, Cannot sleep after reading Albert Schweitzer and the section on parallel lives, and Buddha with no satisfaction. I read what others were thinking but nothing new. I left the book with the feeling that not a one of those learned men spoke with any authority. This is not to dismiss the good that they did in life at all.

But none had experienced anything to have them think other than what was rote. Nothing original. No one said that when he experienced what was written resulted in new thought. Or if disagreeing, why? What if anything rocked the brain’s marbles into new thought. It amounted to compilation of thought as a lump of clay and dead.

The rote delivered was that Jesus was not influenced by Buddha. Even considering the times and their own progression among humans, we learned we are the sum of who has gone before us. Just as Buddha also had something happen in his enlightenment under the Bo tree.   Who is self made?

How could Jesus not be influenced, whether by having an open mind at birth or whether at baptism his head or mind was opened? Or as a young man making his way from place to place where Sages puzzled the sacred arguments with no closure, he must have concluded causes for man’s lack of progress?

What I hunger for is someone to say because of this happening, my thinking changed and so my life. I do not wish to dismantle illusions for many are legitimate and necessary. I have come to conclusions wrought by footwork, muscle and heart and cosmic intervention to have my body and limbs seize on me.

I see also those in power were not even vetted for common sense. Who play on the fears of common man who have not been encouraged to think on their own.   All that is required is for their hard earned dollars to line the pockets of fear mongers who promise to take care of them so they pocket more workers’ dollars.

Questions we should always ask of ourselves and others. And take the time necessary to think them through.    Is it life giving or life taking.? There is no argument with the answers, now is there? As complicated or simple as we are able to think. But listen carefully to how you answer.

May you walk in good conscience, deeply rooted. In whatever world you walk in.

photo taken by
Kathy Qualiana of my brother,
her father, Stanley

June 27, 2022

Veronica Hallissey has been writing since the 1960s, with her poetry published in a variety of small press magazines. Born into a farm family in Lockport, NY, and educated at the University of Buffalo and other midwest institutions, she brings and unusual point-of-view to her poetry, combining strong natural images with a deep spiritual language. She lives in Ramona, CA.
Cancel Culture Leaves a God Vacuum. . .

Journal entry March 11, 2021. . . My thoughts this morning when watching Morning Joe as reported in The Atlantic. Discussed what is happening to Christian Belief or Religious Belief with the then emerging cultural canceling and caretaking of the ex -president Trump. He gained popularity by saying he will take care of you but meaning he would not allow anyone else take your whatever belief and abscond with it.

If there was any truth in such a statement, HE would abscond with your belief and you would have a new one and that would be a Trumpism. We seem to let loose of the mythological god and are woke so to speak. Lots of things to fill this space, and one of them is political. Whatever party is chosen, we fill it in depth by how much energy we have. We can fill it with learning whatever makes us curious. I gave chase to books and religious dogma and hoped what knowledge I gained would make it work for me.

I started with building a philosophy to understand the enigmatic behaviors of my parental family. Growing up with siblings put a path in front of me. Marrying early, commitments played a conscientious role. Because of circumstances, children were my primary commitment determining my choices. In the current era, much does enter one’s vacant space giving rise to behavior which is violent in many ways.

With what troubles our world and our country, we see the fragility of our democracy in peril. The health of the world constantly deserves our concern with epidemics like the Covid one we still face. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, democracies shattered with autocratic convulsions with power at play. And we all know the unrest with high prices, vacant shelves, and gun violence leaving catastrophic carnage every week in our lives.

In that space where a previous life had a god or many to worship, this empty space has emptiness that waits for a name. Have we made a difference in this life by depth, kindness in relationships, determination to do good in actions that makes our contribution an enhancement of humankind? I wish for partnership to the undergirding of ethical structure that holds the Universes in mythological hands but Magnificent Heart. To call it Magnificent Heart is inadequate, but we have no words I know of so this will have to do with open potential.

You also make independent study a daily habit because to parent one needs to do one’s very best. To accompany you in this venture, you choose a mentor, visible or invisible as you contribute to life as best you can. This is life in the vernacular, being woke as you must be. Your progeny will push against you, the Goad, and you will not run away. It may take a hundred years to do this but you will do this and you will be proud.

I scribed the teacher’s ending to the entry paraphrasing March 11, 2021. . ‘it was so hard going. We knew you hoped one of the children would be sick to stay home from school, because you had no energy to continue the study. Yet you did when the door closed and went to the desk to begin again. And to hold yourself together because you were filling the vacuum that already was a hole deep in your heart. We still talk of the world you wanted to fill with meaning that would keep mankind warm when the night came knocking on his soul and asked, who is home?’

((and I will answer (I wrote) a God Participant, whose potential is undetermined. I have secured the children and now we begin. Building a world on loam and soil whose bedrock will be the foundation whose housing will not shift. We are guided and give good guidance to our commitments. And do what we must. Thank you for the guidance. And trust.’ ))

Amen and amen.

artwork by Claudia Hallissey

June 8, 2022

Veronica Hallissey has been writing since the 1960s, with her poetry published in a variety of small press magazines. Born into a farm family in Lockport, NY, and educated at the University of Buffalo and other midwest institutions, she brings and unusual point-of-view to her poetry, combining strong natural images with a deep spiritual language. She lives in Ramona, CA.
Times Such As These . . . . how many???

(I am running out of words and energy at this time nearing the terminus of my life. I find that what I have written in the past of these earth shaking events are words that still wring my heart to shreds. And yours, too. I cannot find other words to tell their story. Our language does not hold them for me. We are heartbroken that there is another occasion to repeat them.)

Times Such As These

I lock up the room
and pocket the last remnants
of words laying about
unattended.

Fearful that pieces
of my heart
may be found
scattered among them.
And why not?

Times such as these
leave us with little salve
to heal the open wounds
which once were hearts.

For whom do we weep?
The children whose siblings
will no longer come to the table
to convey with no doubt
the events which took their innocence?

Or the parents
whose hearts were transplanted
when word came
that these unspent stars
were already breathing the rarified air
as heaven’s most blessed?

Look at us here.
Pleading that our children
will be safe as they try to understand
what we in our dotage
have not learned.

To resort to arms means death in any country.

May 25, 2022

Veronica Hallissey has been writing since the 1960s, with her poetry published in a variety of small press magazines. Born into a farm family in Lockport, NY, and educated at the University of Buffalo and other midwest institutions, she brings and unusual point-of-view to her poetry, combining strong natural images with a deep spiritual language. She lives in Ramona, CA.
All Who I ARE. . .

The Kabbalah, practiced before Judaism, states that death is not final. When the Sages died, they simply went into the next room. Seekers then could enter and ask their questions and converse. Scribing was done by the chosen seekers . I have scribed for a long time and many do and call it automatic writing with many trips to the bank. The difference is on how deeply one is able to focus. When questioned I was told it is a quirk of mind. The following was scribed on July 24, 1984.

“I asked. . . was it a different world? It was. It was a world where belief had the power of logic, where prayer was direct communication with what was the belief of the time, where the arch angels stepped between man and his desires and procured them for the supplicant. It was all these things and more. Man did not roam the earth without anchor at will or put his faith in machines which mimicked his mind. He conquered what needed to be conquered with the virtue within. He did these things because he did not know he could not do them. With all that he was, he could do anything.”

The following is a conclusion I reached by study and discipline and teaching by good scholars. The footwork was more than a half century trudged. Not a happenstance but a Given with due regard. I have no credentials but offer these to thought and explanation. It is my logic on our coats of many colors.

Joseph was one of many brothers. He was special to their father Jacob and was given a coat of many colors. This coat was envied by the brothers and caused jealousy. They talked of doing away with him.

The story is already written but what I am Given is a reason for this. I assume Jacob, the father, was versed in sacred scripture and conversed with peers. So when Joseph was of age, his father gave him a coat of many colors. To those of mind, it was because Joseph had memory of prior lives lived, in skins of many colors for the times chosen and worlds.

This was only a Given after many years of study. Skin color, race, geography, nationality, all the possessive fractions are these where humans are sensitive and have not worked out personal prejudices due at best to personal grievances. It is an area of mind and behavior where children are born indifferent and accepting of all and should be a Light to us. Hate and prejudice are first lessons taught from the beginning by parental grievances. It undermines all the insistence teachers preach on the values of love and kindness. Hate is for a child, gut wrenching, and the cause of much vomiting mornings before school.

My mentor, the Nazarene, could only speak of life everlasting. To the each, the subject varied and had meaning only to the thoughtful. Others let those who were paid big monies do the discerning. Logic prevailed and the only viable answer was the skin of many colors.

I wrote All Who I Am in the summer of 1982. It was only recently I ventured the poem onto my blog . I identified with the black woman running late with breasts flapping onto bare skin to the anger of the mate waiting . . .related to the man walking his camel in the desert being harvest for the flies, identifying with the Polish woman kneading her bread . . . I am relating to all in the poem and knowing them intimately not as second skin, but intimate skin through many lifetimes.

It will be said that my imagination is vivid. And that was a Given also, that imagination is memory with icons signifying their substance. Another time for that subject. Our memory banks are full of treasures for those who will focus within the closet of themselves for treasure hunting. The only requirement?

Only a bucket of courage and hopefully a support system. And lots of Amen and Amen.

May 17, 2022

Veronica Hallissey has been writing since the 1960s, with her poetry published in a variety of small press magazines. Born into a farm family in Lockport, NY, and educated at the University of Buffalo and other midwest institutions, she brings and unusual point-of-view to her poetry, combining strong natural images with a deep spiritual language. She lives in Ramona, CA.
I Take Your Hand. . .

0bservations from an almost 50 year old mother to 3 sons in their late twenties. . . Journaled in June of 1980—— now an aged, almost 91 mother with a very tired head and a compromised immune system sporting a half dozen conditions ready for a nap . . . May, 2022

As a mother, it never occurred to me to ask them if their homework was done. That was their responsibility.

They never asked if the laundry was done. That was my responsibility.

Clothes were never a priory with me. The boys wore long or short sleeve jerseys with khaki pants. So if they went missing and the police were called, I would not appear dim but could tell them what they wore. Not the colors, but the cut of the cloth.

I remember always their joys, their agonies and their laughter and talks. Memories are the bridge to the futures of progeny. Best we clean up memories before they begin to leak into futures.

Of recent times we shy away from pulling up a chair to listen to a friend’s or beloveds concerns lest we be practicing medicine without a license. Mostly it is because we are at a loss because of time or just don’t want the involvement. And it costs to become emotionally involved with an Other. Not only does one share the agonies, but one must confront oneself. ( ( true then, sounds like work? It is. . ))

There is a superficial comfort to be gained by psychologically labeling a loved one’s problems. It relieves one of responsibility to help solve the problem. Or just pretending it does not exist.

A time before television came into our homes and stole our prime time evenings, we had time to sit and chat with a beloved and share ourselves which helped alleviate the explosion of a problem and contained it within the concerns of two who shared hearts.

Because the burden was halved it did not erupt and was virtue of love salved with its healing ointment. A differing perspective was heeded and shown an avenue that shared concerns absolved. Such was the healing proffered by neighbors and beloveds before the technology invaded lives and took from humans the responsibilities and privileges of being humane.

The pendulum of progress will find its balance but we must seek it. ((I do not wish to give up my library at hand always with my computer. Nor do I wish to whiteout the typos my numbing fingers display with earnest and sincere desire for professional work. Each must draw the lines for ourselves.)) Our respect and love for humanity must be our first concern.

With rising costs for counseling and medical services, it behooves all of us to render what we once considered our blessed obligation, to serve one another. Isolation compounds problems into catastrophes. We are wise to know which ones we cannot handle. But drama is what families are about and as life complicates itself and us, we must again protect prime time for people whose needs are prime.

I Take Your Hand . . .

Come, I take your hand.
We go to places where
our hearts share dreams.

Sometime back, in histories
having no years,
we trod places where paths
had not been worn.

It was a good time,
seeing how we formed lives
with no lesson plans,
loved with no time
and lived fully aware.

We remember now
when the hands of the clocks
tell us we have only so much time;
only so much to check emails,
to see bank statements,
and to note how many Likes
from those we don’t know.

And only so much time
before the next commercial break
and then we might have time

to love one another?

September 2016

artwork by
Claudia Hallissey

((comments edited by VRH))

May 11, 2022

Veronica Hallissey has been writing since the 1960s, with her poetry published in a variety of small press magazines. Born into a farm family in Lockport, NY, and educated at the University of Buffalo and other midwest institutions, she brings and unusual point-of-view to her poetry, combining strong natural images with a deep spiritual language. She lives in Ramona, CA.
You Will Fall In Love With Your Earth. . .

Tell me what it means. . .

With the leaking draft of the early consensus of the Roe v Wade controversy, suddenly confronting me are meanings of words and phrases I have used and hopefully explained my meanings. I truly don’t know if my meanings relate to what you think about the subjects I’ve written.

I would like to know what you think. Not what you have read that someone else has thought. No doubt it was the basis of your studies as well as mine. And then you have spent time in a quiet place and given yourself to the process of thought. Over time it helps us form conclusions as well as give more substance to other questions.

Learning is a full time work. It is what I hurry to when supper is over and private time engulfs with hours of personal freedom. Like I, you have taken off work clothes and in comfort admit to the night that you are ready. For what is a personal choice.

For me it seems minutes when I look at the clock and wondering what happened to the evening. And as I type this, the phrase `life everlasting’ has meaning for me and I wonder if you have given thought to it. I wonder what has been added to your understanding and where it has taken you.

Most of the people in my growing up life were Christians and said the Lord’s prayer every day and some times many times a day. Included might be life everlasting as taught in Sunday School and said in conclusion to the prayer. What meaning does it hold?

It was in a bushel of phrases with the likes of `I remember’ and then, `why do I remember’ whatever has haunted me? When I did my best, why was my life not working? Why was I crying and why were they fighting and arguing? The bushel was filling up fast with questions when I was telling the big people in my life why I did not believe what they said when I knew what I knew. I was closer to my birth than they were so I remembered.

And when I came to `life everlasting’ it had meaning for me and it began with forever and ever amen and amen. And that did not mean lying on a cloud like many believed and were happy about. It seemed to me that they were happy.

So now I ask you what does `life everlasting’ mean to you. And how you came to that understanding. Does it mean forever and ever for you? Let me know because I am interested. I don’t look for essays just a comment or two.

We have been friends for a long time and I value our friendship.

Don’t Stare At The Moon…

Any farmer knows
you don’t stare at the moon too long.
You get a little soft in the head, they say.

What they really mean
is that magic overtakes you
and carries you to the place of green fields,
of orchards heavy with fruit
and cucumbers cultivated straight
as a shot of rye whiskey.

What they really mean is that the magic
will make you see fields to be seeded
and calves to be born
and worlds to be peopled.

What they really mean
is that you will fall in love
with your earth
and in awe watch the wheat weave its gold mat
right over your eyes.

It is a softness of the heart man fears,
for the myth must enforce
the hard head to blunt

the pain of life everlasting.

May 1987

art by Claudia Hallissey

May 5, 2022

Veronica Hallissey has been writing since the 1960s, with her poetry published in a variety of small press magazines. Born into a farm family in Lockport, NY, and educated at the University of Buffalo and other midwest institutions, she brings and unusual point-of-view to her poetry, combining strong natural images with a deep spiritual language. She lives in Ramona, CA.
Because of Love and Balance, not Fear. . .

On December 30, 2017 I wrote the following. I edit only for space and my comments in the writing since then . . .

I sat with my coffee and thought vengeance is mine saith the lord and took
it to say with my vision, ahhh yeah. There is balance and I will write it.
Vengeance is mine. And the need for a greater than who I am god was
necessary because man was where he was in growth and time. And to
teach this was a necessity to have an outside intelligence greater than the
knowledge man felt at the time.

When we take into consideration this balance, a growth commensurate with the intelligence sparking within, all things will be compensated. I need to go back to Emerson again to find the words to refresh. That all things will be balanced.

And what is taken illegally, unequally, taken and acknowledged as one’s own, will be consequential because the internal balance is weighed and known. There are consequences because no one gets away scot free.

Mentally cognizant or not, there is a measuring up at some point. There is no getting away with anything. Vengeance is mine, sayeth LIFE in total. There has to be this dictum or life in any form would no longer Be.

Throughout the universes, throughout , there is balance. There is intelligence that directs and dictates within the freedom of choice. Hoping against hope, life in any form will choose what is good for the All. There is no ‘it don’t matter’ dictum. It all matters and consequences are attached, individually and collectively.

The reason is growth and there is nothing junked. Everything is itemized and noted and destined for good. Or we would no longer Be.

I am not credentialed and do not have the proper words. In January, 2014 I wrote that Intelligence was the primary factor of all Universes. Nothing taken for granted as a non life because the least seemingly alive has what is still an unknown to look for. It holds desire within to unite with Life and ultimately grow to other forms of intelligence, other forms of life. I wrote of God In A Rock.

((I see the vengeance is mine concept as life begetting life, not out of anger or fear or desire to best the impossible. But to allow growth and ultimate life in the best capacity. And what that capacity will be, we do not know.

Having ventured onto this particular journey’s path, this step was the eventual one to be taken. It is not the only path nor only journey, but just as history has shown man’s footwork, nothing new seemingly is changed, just costumes and language.

Though physically unfit for this journey, hopefully please, my intent articulate.))

April 30, 2022

Veronica Hallissey has been writing since the 1960s, with her poetry published in a variety of small press magazines. Born into a farm family in Lockport, NY, and educated at the University of Buffalo and other midwest institutions, she brings and unusual point-of-view to her poetry, combining strong natural images with a deep spiritual language. She lives in Ramona, CA.