THE RICH LADY ON THE HILL

Her name was Mrs. Whitaker. She lived in a two story white house, surrounded by green lawns and a formal rose garden. She had floor to ceiling windows, lace curtains, plum velvet drapes, silver bowls and Aubusson carpets. An invitation to her house put one, however temporarily, in the upper echelon of Prunewhip, Vermont's social register. When I was four Mrs. Whitaker gave a formal tea for the women of the Ladies Aid Society and my grandmother was invited. She took me along, scrubbed until I was raw, tortured into a state of sausage curls, strangled by a high-collared white blouse - as W.C. Fields said on his deathbed, "All in all, I would rather [have been] in Philadelphia."

Before my grandmother rang Mrs. Whitaker's doorbell (she had a doorbell!), she lined me up against the side of the house and said, "When we are inside, if you see anything unusual, don't talk about it unless someone else talks about it first!" She said it in her, "Disobey this and you will be found floating face down in the Walloomsac River" tone of voice.

We were ushered into Mrs. Whitaker's drawing room and immediately I saw something most unusual. In fact, I had the best view in the house of this most unusual sight, since I was several feet closer to the floor than the other guests. Scattered around the drawing room floor were small irregular lumps, each one covered by a lace doily.

I was so mesmerized by this display (oh so many years later this would become Installation Art...), I barely noticed the single-breasted (blue serge stretched over girdles that turned two breasts into one formidable rampart), mustached women cooing over me and passing me cookies. I waited until they were deep in conversation and pulled up a doily. Sure enough, just as I suspected, a petrified cat turd white with age.

Now this was unusual! In my limited experience, people did talk about unusual events. I sat in corners for hours on end listening to women talk about the antics of drunken husbands, newly weds who gave birth to extremely large premature babies, the idiots from California who tapped the elm trees in their front yard, etc. etc. This was more unusual than any of that, as far as I was concerned. I waited avidly for someone else to talk about the petrified cat turds cum doilies so that I could talk about them also. No one ever said a word.

I left this grand social event with the renewed conviction that grownups were part of some strange species I would never understand.

STARCOW

The 1970s was the era of affirmations and prosperity consciousness. Groups of people danced in circles chanting "I AM HEALTHY, I AM PERFECT, ALL THE LOVE AND ABUNDANCE OF THE UNIVERSE IS FLOWING UNTO ME." I never made it very long at one of these sessions, to which I had been dragged by an enthusiastic friend, because my bullshitometer would be clanging so loudly, I had to escape the pain.

Nevertheless, in my own way, I have sought happiness and self-improvement. Today I realized that I am a STARCOW. That stands for Sick, Tired, Anxiety-Ridden, Crazy Old Woman. I accepted it. I started to like it. I could see myself, in a field in Vermont, bathed by light of moon and stars. My udders are withered and they hang low, my mottled hide is baggy, my future most uncertain - but oh, I am so beautiful - I am such an exquisite bit of mosaic in the body of Eternal, Universal Isness.

Once I embraced myself, once I accepted that I am a STARCOW, the negative judgments and conflicts I have been feeling with other people and with life itself, began to fall away. Maybe he is not a STARCOW. Maybe he is a SUDBARP (Scared, Uptight, Denial-Based, Angst-Ridden Politician). Maybe she is a DOPE (Defensive, Opinionated, Pretentious, Egomaniac). We are all something. Very few of us are Buddhas. But we are part of the mosaic-of-is. We are perfect. We don't have to become perfect to be perfect. LIfe does not have to be perfect to be perfect.

O Blessed World of Oatmeal

grits gesthemane
blue baboons balloons moons
behind the world
above the fallen stars
of Ferlinghetti's
enormous
courageous
muddy boots
of cumming's Spring
we love
no caring
death may come
with Wordsworth's
daffodils.

OFF MY MEDS

PHYSICAL METAPHYSICAL DADA DOO DADA*

dear einstein,

no time,

all life death earth air fire water
beds toilets ravioli
be
simul-heinous salvation

we are
anunciated starvelated, inebriacious ballerinas
Bibles barking door-to-door

as
wholly holy guacamole hooked and hooking
nookie-selling neon smokey town down corners,
beans to home and dominoes.

fumbling, tumbling lenten-lentil cheering
all the teams from here to here.

caucus, bacchus, pontiff, sacradental
wholly holy colostocomical donations.

grateful stately succulent jumping from a cake
this evening Year’s New Moose Lodge goosing,
now

stumbling down the garbonzo chain gang
garbage road of grace.

hanging by the neck until alive!

ambiguously ever after,

sincerely you,
arupa


*In an age where irrationality, materialism, and militarism have taken over – is it not time for a Nouveau DaDa movement? Let’s all Dadadadadada up and down the streets – in our golden slippers.

Poems du Jour

The Least of These

Jesus

you got the shakes
picking up butts
on 13th Street,
some of them are long,
God is good.

Tennessee splits a
6-pack with you along
the banks of
Sweetwater Branch,
it’s all good.

Except Keesha’s on a rampage
wants your butt hanging from
a rusty tent pole
you head up stream,
fill a water bottle at the bus depot
for JC so he can boil his
colostomy bag,
out here
where You live.

_______________________________

Jane 6:13
stringbean hub
of the wheeled universe
comfort me..
long and green and cool
straight out of the can
or hanging on a dusty vine
in somebody’s grandmother’s garden.

HONORING PAINFUL LEGACIES

This week our nation honored the 100th anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire. I remembered an elderly woman I met at a bus stop some thirty years ago. We began to exchange pleasantries. She then introduced herself, first telling me her name and then telling me that she was a survivor of the Triangle fire. She told me the story. She cut her thumb on a piece of machinery and was sent downstairs to get bandaged. While she was gone the fire broke out. This woman had children and grandchildren. She was retired from owning her own dress shop. She had traveled the world with her husband. Still, 65 years later, she defined herself as a survivor of that fire.

I began to think about why certain events become how we define ourselves. In my case, I define myself as a person who survived growing up in a violent family. All that I have done - all the therapies I experienced , all the spiritual journeys I have gone on, the works of art and writing I have created, and even my current occupation as a provider of homeless services are and have been a response to my childhood and part of my healing journey.

In my case you will never hear me say, "It was worth it." I would cheerfully refund everything I have gained as an artist and a human being to have spared my family the horrors we experienced. It was not worth it. Still, it is so important to honor and to make use of painful legacies. Otherwise, all that pain becomes useless and meaningless. It is wasted.

So, my friends, do not waste your pain regarding yourself as unfortunate or seeking solace at the bottom of a bottle. And when you do, turn the experience into a play, a song, a poem, or a foundation for helping other troubled souls.