Where To Go When The World Gets Loud

wpid-20150317_190811.jpg

Where To Go When The World Gets Loud

I continue to ask him to turn the volume down. I want it lower and lower. Perhaps I want it off. I cannot tell you the guilt I do not feel. I should want to know about Iran and the agreement which is there but will be fought over and fought over some more. And I have opinions but not the energy nor the desire to opine.

I do not want to hear the news right now. I was raised to use my brain and discuss and wallow in knowledge and knowing. My Facebook newsfeed yesterday horrified me. I now know things I did not know before. I hurt from reality more than I used to. Hiding is for cowards. And yet, I have a choice. Because the bruising from the world leaves me diminished and I cannot be and make and do and love under the weight.

And yet when I stay away,  I cannot pray and cry out about the things which are wrong and bearing down. So I step in and step out. A paradox of fear and trembling and licking the wounds. And exposing myself. And trusting Him to refuel my soul again and again. That is a cycle. Therein is the cycle. That is the refreshing and rebuilding and restoring He is known for.

+++++++++++++++++

I want to be wise and worldly and know. Until I don’t. The most interesting things orbiting around me are about Pluto. I ask him to turn the volume up. If Pluto were one of us, he would have a complex and wonder on his worth. Disney at least named a character for him. And they bury the story in the back end. A whole mass of creation which is in flux and looking for us to name it and give it its proper place in the systems of the galaxies.

They deem it a footnote. I deem it worthy of a poem.

++++++++++++++++++

When the world is loud. Abrasive. And harsh. The garden woos me to herself. And my pen’s siren call to write promises me too, that indeed, yes, there is a place of comfort and quietude. Of gentleness. Sanctuary, like the psalms.  An economy of words. I heard too much and hurt too much from hearing of brokenness and pain. I want my words to heal. And so I retreat to create. I learned of cancer and dementia, crumbling and cruel, nemesis of the living. Again. Coming through like the enemy on the march. They like to stomp on all my people. Or so it seems.

Peace like a river is in the scriptures. And He gives so many the call to write. And to listen well first. To need and want to be alone in the tapping out now. To run it all through the sieve of the pen. For good.

Social media has blessed me beyond and beyond. That is a magnified beyond. But it is loud. And I crave quiet.

******************************************************************

Join me on Friday as I release my first tiny letter. A weekly newsletter for subscribers via email. I hope you like Letter Number One. New content not found on the blog. Prose, poetry, prayer, photography, quiet words of grace for us.

Click the link to subscribe to elizabeth w. marshall, a quiet place for words.

Latin, Pooh and You

POOH

Latin, Pooh and You

My what strong genes you have
Tethered am I to you
By DNA
Born into your love for Latin and Pooh
Child of nearly another, child
Your words came to you, then, started their great exodus
Early
Dementia is mastering the art of thievery
We’ve drawn swords
Suited up for the battle
We rise up in tandem
Fight it off and hold on to syllables, dim and faded
Stammering and garbled
Eloquent elocution, always
Grammatically correct until the end

I’ve accepted the passing, in the twilight, not the dawn
Complicated
But the baton is here
(I confide often, blush at my age, late blooming wanna-be poet,
Fighting off shame)

My what strong love you have
Leaving breadcrumbs, poetic syllables
In your life’s wake
Marking the trail
Leading me beside the still waters
Leaving our time by the raging sea
See
I have learned to listen
To poetry and you
And to love Flannery and her peafowl
(I named a Black Maran after you)
Some things you tend to forget
But these are branded into the everlasting
World without end
Amen
Pooh, Latin, poetry, and Maggie the Black Maran hen

The Mirror

wpid-img_20140802_182507.jpg

The Mirror

I look back
My eyes jump, dart, make every effort to look away
From  the chain of our DNA
Sitting here in the polar cold
It is time, while there is still time

Fingers frozen, numbed by the January winds
Blowing up through the hundred year old pane of glass
I pause my own poetry
Raise the mirror that shows me more, of her and me
And of our love for poetry

And with my nose, whose tip is cold
And with my fingers fighting hard to write
I fight back
At war no more
With the past

Warmed by old words I may have read
But never truly heard
I raise high my white flag
And rest my eyes, in peace on the page which holds years of her steady work with words

The echo of her heart and mind, mirror image of bits of me
For she penned words of beauty, in the back of her chapbook
Beside the photograph of her
Beaming bright, dressed in canary
Her color, not mine
Before dementia came and stole so much
I could close my eyes and swear
Swear, these words were mine
But I would not take, what is not mine
But she has given me, parts of her
I swear

“She takes delight in emptying on paper an
image that haunts her and carving it until
its beauty and truth emerge. Only then
does the poem speak.”

I could close my eyes and swear

Love, Dementia

wpid-img_20140822_142639.jpgLove, Dementia

Remember.
You loved, remember
When, you loved
How you were loved
When love was first
Born in you

Your first born
Loves you, remember
When you loved
Young love was born in you
Once, remember

Love,
Dementia