Day starts with a baby possum in the door screen,
put it on a tree branch in the backyard,
for mama to find,
get in the car with a run,
soon we are caught in traffic…
but then this song comes on our car radio…
and living is sweet
Tag: nature
Daily Prompt: The Glass : oscillating dualistic
Looking with eyes shut. A cup appears. It shines and comes to focus and out again, as an image in a cloud. Clear then vague, at one moment, and then gone. Life is this way. Rain falls and awakens the smell of the earth in all of her sweetness. This is when the cup is full. As the new moon approaches on the 10th of May one can feel emptiness as if one is holding an empty cup within. The moon then slowly pulls around again and again to reveal her fullness. The ocean waves respond to the wane and waxing that naturally show us the motif of a full or empty cup; and within the emptiness is a void. In this darkness one can find the bliss of creation and dance into fulfillment. The fullness of too much cake with too much frosting, at first, brings the joy of taste and pleasure… only to burden the body with a belly ache,. Expressing the empty cup and enduring days of sadness will be altered by a few full pints of beer with friends and music. To ask the question,
“Is the glass half-full or half-empty?”
It is an absurd question of duality and death. It can never just be one or the other, half-full or half-empty; for it is always oscillating dualistic within the continuity of time eternally. An impossibility to answer. It will be hot and sunny or cold and foggy, fires will burn and snow will fall. This too will pass…as a body & mind feels and thinks, as a sun dies another is born, as also another pint is filled with beer into an empty pint glass…
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I pour my beer upon the earth…in celebration!!
To “the untamed divinities of nature-the oceans, the deserts, the magma at the earth’s core and the powers of storm and rain… the old pagan nature Gods [Goddesses] have not altogether been subdued by the world unification plans of god, the Economy.”
– James Hillman
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This is a Praying Mantis theme song.
But It can hale true!
I listen to a diversity of songs all the time. What I like best about songs are when they talk to me. I talk with them so why not them with me. I use them in my posting as highlighters to accentuate the theme of my postings. If you trip through my musical posting they will tell you a story… oh my I revealed myself again. I think you can do this with most writers.
When songs talk to you it is important. I call it synchronicity listening. At the appropriate time a song comes forth and you know it’s talking to you. Why, you must think about it to find the answer: not take it lightly, it has meaning. One song that did this recently is Love Buzz. It was years ago when I first heard it!
Nirvana brought it back from the dead. A band named Shocking Blue created the original recording of this song. I like both but prefer the original. I like the depth of Mariska Veres vocal style. It sounds like the dark Goddess graphing me by the heart into the underworld. I feel this song is about the power and even imperfection of love and the overwhelming seduction and abuse of it, but It can hale true!
I posted the song on my Facebook a few days back. Then I went out to the local pub and a friendly DJ played the song as soon as I drank my first pint. Stunned, I felt the hairs on my back go up. I realize that stepping out for the night was a good thing.
We were meant to be where we were at that time and place in history. With so many opportunities available at the time, so much going on with old and new friends it was the place to be. Life in general was being shady.
I realized when the song played that life is a real bitch sometimes, but I am gracefully loved and being taken care of.
I love songs!!! This one of the Praying Mantis theme songs.
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Blissful Heart : Sonic Reducer
“Lots of people I know have bootlegged tapes of performances and if they play it I will be transported back sometimes with happiness, sometimes with horror.” ~ Chris Bailey,The Saints
This image takes me back to when I was 17. My eyes are closed with an inward feeling-look upon my face. It is the feeling of a blissful heart. This picture was taken by my first boyfriend who was a semi-professional photographer, graphic artist and print man. It became a romantic nuance when he took my picture. At the time I was young, foolish and in love with him. Looking at the image my face shows reflection, mockery and beauty. Time has taken its toll. I am a survivor of one crazy life, but with continuity I can still call upon the youthful and blissful heart of my youth.
This picture takes me back to a time during the 1970’s when mom and dad were alive. This is when taking a walk with your boyfriend meant something special. I was an open blossom of life fresh as a daisy, rose or yellow dandelion.
I threw away most of all the pictures Mike took of me. This particular image was rolled up in a paper towel container. My mom saved it for me. I found it recently due to spring cleaning, thank you mom. My wild ways and rebellion, that came a few years later, did not get to this image. I destroyed all images from high school and my school books. Today I am glad to see how I once was. My body has changed and beauty has faded but I still feel the same in my heart. A blissful heart is still youthfully present. I don’t deny that anymore, not now, not ever again. As I have learned recently this is the relationship between my Maiden and my Crone.
The song below is what Mike and I listened to at that time with a little help from our friends. In the 1970s pot was everywhere and mostly free. (ya… I am not talking to my generation here but for the youngsters who may not know this..)
As you may well know…this song came later… it was fun too. Maybe punk rock was or is a kinda rebirth or something!? Yet now I can blend both parts of myself together.
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Built by the Knights Templar?
A March 2013 post. I am working on a project to bring my art out of the dark and into the light. This reminded me of exploring art, religiosity, and depth psychology.
It is always interesting when a symbolic painting painted from years ago comes forward to reveal itself. I remember what the Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung said,
“…that when creating art from an unconscious or spiritual place one should share it with others or the public…”
Yet, I do because as Jung points out, when one does it can touch someone else and affect a chain of events that have meaning.
Last night while watching the History 2 channel. I came upon a TV series. In general, it is about an unearthed structure that may have been built during the medieval period on American soil. It is a remarkably interesting topic for me. As I watched the program a special moment happened. I call them synchronistic moments. This structure seemed familiar to me.
As many ancient buildings, it is in tune with the four directions and with the sun, moon, and stars in the night sky. The Knights Templar focus was on the divine feminine and for them it was the star Venus and also the symbol of the egg.
On this particular structure on American soil there is an egg shape stone that lights up at a certain time by the sun. This holds great meaning symbolically when understanding the Goddess.
As I was watching this program I looked at the clock below the TV screen and noticed the time was 11:11.
Numerologists believe that events linked to the time 11:11 appear more often than can be explained by chance or coincidence. This belief being based on the concept of synchronicity. Some authors claim that seeing 11:11 on a clock is an auspicious sign. Others claim that 11:11 signals a spirit presence.
Knowing this I had to listen to what I was watching with more intent. Then the image of a watercolor painting I did years ago came to my mind. At the time when I created the painting it was based on my inspiration. I was working with the American Indian Medicine wheel that is based on the four directions: North, East, South and West.
I also placed a triangle shape over the threshold of the building of my watercolor. The building I imagined was also built of stone like the structure in the history channel.
At the time I created this simple watercolor I was thinking of it as a holy place that I would like to build on a large piece of land in a natural setting.
I am now content to share this story. To think about it and this new experience of what it is saying to me now. What is it saying to you the reader?
So be it, I shared my story Mr. Jung!!
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Lovely hearth
It was a cold winter’s night, like this one, when I heard a soft knock on the door. I was alone. I did not see my kitty Dudea around. When she gets outside she makes a similar sound on the front door when she wants in.
“Ok Dudea, just a minute!”
I got off the couch from the warmth of the fire while reading a book and listening to some Jazz. Yes my blissful moment was interrupted. I opened the door. I looked around and I did not see my kitty,
“Hello, it is very cold tonight. The rain is coming down. I only have this scarf to keep me warm. I smelled the fire smoke from you home. Would you mind if I stood in front of your fire to warm up?”
I blinked and then blinked again.
“Sure!”
He came in the house with a push of the wind and the smell of the earth came in with him.
“Oh what a lovely hearth you have my dear!”
“Thank you!”
The elf then became very still and quite. He has been with us for about five years now. I do not bother him. I only touch him to clean him. I have heard that the “little-folk” come and go and sometimes stay. Their time frame is much different then ours.
This evening is much like the one five years ago when our little elf came to rest; by the fire, by our hearth.
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Daily Prompt: Toot Your Horn
This prompt is an interesting one. Promoting me is one of the most uncomfortable things for me to do. I will try. I like my smile and my creativity. I like the watercolors I create and the children I created. I like my body. It gives me pleasure. I like that I am an intuitive and that I perceive synchronicity. I like myself when I am on WordPress because it helps me to write and make new friends. I’M an honorable and fiery character that can be trusted. I stand up for what I believe and this helps me to feel good about myself. I just learned that the pain we hold in our bellies is not always a bad thing. I am happy that I struggle with the pain of being an independent thinker. I am a purple wild flower and I like the scent I give to the world.
Oh ya Toot Toot…
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Box Canyon Road the magical place
When times get boring and I have had enough.
I take a ride up Box Canyon Rd.
Image of Yucca Plant in Box Canyon.
Box Canyon Road begins at the corner of Lake Manor Drive and Valley Circle Blvd. It ascends a hill overlooking the San Fernando Valley.
It leads into the old Santa Susanna Pass Road. It is a wild ride that contains the feelings of how ‘the San Fernando Valley’ once was when I was a kid.
The desert meets the rolling hills of rocks, dirt, wildflowers, and herbs. This is a place of mystery too. It was once the hang-out of the notorious Charles Mansion family who used to creepy-crawl through-out houses in the ‘Valley’.
Yet, this doesn’t spoil it for me. I drive on Box Canyon Road on rainy days. My favorite time is on foggy mornings when the clouds meet the hills.
The earth opens up with fragrant softness. Is there a valley down below or the end of the earth; a drop into vast whiteness because when you look up you see the same view.
Any time you go there the Lady-Face rock will greet you. There is a ranch halfway up Box Canyon Road that I dream of owning.
The view from the house I am familiar with and the barn there is a place for horses.
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My own mind is my own church
“The more unnatural any thing is, the more is it capable of becoming the object of dismal admiration… But if objects for gratitude and admiration are our desire, do they not present themselves every hour to our eyes?
Do we not see a fair creation prepared to receive us the instant we were born-a world furnished to our hands that cost us nothing? Is it we that light up the sun; that pour down the rain; and fill the earth with abundance?
Whether we sleep or wake, the vast machinery of the universe still goes on. Are this thing, and the blessings they indicate in future, nothing to us?
Can our gross feelings be excited by no other subjects than tragedy and suicide? Or is the gloomy pride of man become so intolerable, that nothing can flatter it but a sacrifice of the Creator?”
Mom’s Rose Watercolor by Hudley Flipside
The above quote is written by Thomas Paine taken from his pamphlet The Age Of Reason. It is in reference to his ideas of Christianity as a mythology. In this time of “prepping” for the end of the world, I find myself comforted by the words of Thomas Paine.
What a brilliant and honest mind. His unique innocence is clothed as an adult with a knowing that prevails in his writing, as he writes,
“My own mind is my own church.”
If anything is to come in the days ahead , I hope like Paine, that we as human beings will let go of our religious mythologies.
If not forever, maybe for a while. See the real world around us as the continuity of nature. That feelings of love and acts of integrity and honesty are the best that we have to share with each other. To be grateful for a drink of water or a smile from a friend or child.
We are our own church and we hold our own truths; it can be a beautiful childlike innocence-a purity of our childhood that is ever-growing with us into our adulthood as something honorable. We are our visions and our inspirations.
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A Personal Journey With Persephone- The Crone.
The menopause is probably the least glamorous topic imaginable; and this is interesting, because it is one of the very few topics …to which cling some shreds and remnants of taboo. A serious mention of menopause is usually met with uneasy silence; a sneering reference to it is usually met with relieved sniggers. Both the silence and the sniggering are pretty sure indications of taboo.
~ Ursula K. Guin
Halloween and Day of the Dead, the next six months are all about autumn and winter, which is the dying and the silence of nature. This is symbolic in some places of the world more than others. I know that while living on the east coast in Rochester New York I distinctly experienced this pulling in and introspection of the seasons, this brings me to Persephone.
In Greek mythology she is the daughter of Demeter who is raped by Hades king of the dead. A godly deal is made between Demeter and Hades. For 6 months of the year Persephone lives with her mother above the earth during spring and summer, and for 6 months during autumn and winter she lives with Hades.
Even though she was raped this is what the Gods agreed too.
Stencil by Hudley Flipside
“She held the keys to heaven and hell.”
~ Elysium, Tartarus
Before Persephone was raped by a patriarchal culture that created this Greek story, she was queen of the underworld, destroyer and a great crone. My favorite image is of her wearing a black robe while stirring a cauldron. She has many names and Hecate is one of them.
Persephone is part of the turning triangle also known as the triple goddess Demeter: virgin, mother, and crone. If we break down the meaning of the word Demeter, we have meter “mother” and “delta” also known as “the letter of the vulva.”
“The Doorway of the Mysterious Feminine… the root from which heaven and earth sprang.”
Orphic mystics worshiped Persephone as Goddess of the blessed Dead.
“And now I come a suppliant to the Holy Persephone, that of her grace she received me to the seats of the Hallowed” Persephone answered” Happy and blessed one, thou shalt be god instead of mortal.”
Much of this information is passed on historically through the study of the Eleusinian mysteries. They are focused on the Homeric hymn to Demeter where Persephone plays her part especially at this time of the year. She is the older woman or crone.
This above introduction to Persephone is a way into my personal relationship with her. I am now walking towards the way of the crone. This particular autumn and winter are special to me because I am starting the walk of “Eleusis” or the advent towards the mysterious feminine where a doorway is opened to me. This winter is a full year since my womb became silent. Symbolically I see myself as a multi-colored-darkened flower that once bloomed, but now faces downward ready to fall towards the earth. It is a sad time but also a time of great change and power. I can feel it.
What I am experiencing parallels, as a synchronicity, with the current autumn and winter of 2012. I am sure that there are many other women walking this path now as well.
I do not find many stories about what I am experiencing which is why I am sharing my story. To find and nurture another or inspire and affirm with another… is my hope.
I am not ashamed of the subtle calling that pulls me on; it is an ancient one that I share closely with other women and my dear Persephone.
On my blog I have put up an image of an Owl. The image is taken from an ancient Greek coin used in the Eleusinian mysteries. Women involved in this ritualistic mystery wore these large coins on their heads. I am using my rendering of the image in a different way.
I am creating my own personal ritual by having the image tattooed on the top of both of my wrists. I will do this in the next two weeks as an action that symbolizes my personal journey in becoming a crone.
Since our culture ignores this part of a woman’s life, I found I needed to create this ritual and to bring forth my knowledge of Persephone and the owl as a cumulative experience.
March 2016
Five years have passed. Life is feeling normal again. I lost both parents and went through the worst of the worst. I visited the underworld and received help from a Jungian therapist to walk with me on my dark journey. ‘Art, writing and poetry’ is the healing force that pulled me into a new world. I embrace the triple Goddess within myself.
My libido is different. I see the world with new eyes. Life, pain, fear, love, desire all are different as new friends. I need less. I am close to nature and the elements. It is beyond words. Life is still challenging at times especially growing older. I do not feel alone and continue to work with such mysteries.
I am another woman who is initiated
bless all the women as well
before me and after me.
For this is the advent of the Eleusinian mysteries!!
Hudley’s Tattoos.
Sources: *The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets by Barbara G. Walker: *The Element Encyclopedia of Secret Signs and Symbols by Adele Nozedar: *Eleusis, Archetypal Image of Mother and Daughter by Carl Kerenyl.
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Nature has a conscience, An indirect editorial about rape via Nature Politics.
“My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pain / My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk.” ~ ~ John Keats
The trusting woods?
The unsuspecting trees
Brought out their burrs and mosses
His fantasy to please.
He scanned their trinkets, curious,
He grasped, he bore away.
What will the solemn hemlock,
What will the fir-tree say?
by: Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)
Can a fir-tree say anything to humanity? What is Dickinson projecting onto the hemlock and fir-tree?
“The trusting woods” is a statement of observation which is the perfect blending of the subjective and the objective. For a fir-tree to get big and strong means years of growth, trusting that the sun, rain and moisture from the earth will be dependable. The woods have all the natural processes for life and photosynthesis to occur, the seasons and the arch of the heavens brightly shown as confidence in an abundant life. How dependable nature is. Does humanity think often about the great relationship it has with the “trusting woods” for oxygen? Our world economy is rooted deep in the “unsuspecting trees.”
“His …He…He…He” enters the poem objectively. Actions that bring great conflict to the passivity of nature as “His fancy, He scanned, He grasped.” This is the rape of nature. The sixth line of the poem states that,” He scanned their trinkets, curious,” is an objective statement showing the desire of “He” for the trinkets. This word speaks of those things in nature that are precious; trinkets are the jewels of nature. Nature then becomes an object to be “grasped” taken and used for the “fancy” of “He.” He is the “Who” that has robbed the woods.
Dickinson uses the “solemn hemlock” in her poem as the one witness to the rape of nature. An action “He” does against the “woods.” A beautiful poisonous plant is alerted to this action against the woods. The hemlock has a conscience. The hemlock knows it is wrong, and the inward reaction is the feeling of being solemn. “He” is poisonous to nature. This is a contrary idea. It is commonly known that the hemlock plant is poisonous yet, in Emily Dickinson’s poem, the “hemlock” is the face of truth.
Nature has a conscience in this poem, and “He” does not.
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The Marriage of Heaven and Hell by William Blake
I only have a copy of this book from the library. It is one of the most valuable things in my heart.
I like this man because he attacks perfection. He attacks technology and he attacks big egos.
I think everyone should read this book. Blake is a humorist; he is very esoteric and clever.
He knows human nature best because he shows he has been burned emotionally by friends.
Betrayal is the great realism or knowledge of the heart.
Blake includes nature and art. What a remarkable creation. Why are all the interesting people dead… well maybe not so? I feel like he is around when reading his work.
Get it and make some wrinkles in your clothes. Go out and misspell something. Be imperfect in grammar and voice.
But never-never be insincere, greedy, or inhuman.
Read. Intelligence of the heart is the game he plays… and you got to have one to play Blake’s game of intelligence…brain, heart and honesty and William Blake.
I find so much decadence, arrogance and lying in the world today…How comforting it is to have Blake in the world to read.
2022 I now have my own copy .
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Mock Pee
Today I watched my beautiful white Himalayan male cat mock pee on the outside brick fence. Male cats turn backwards and then spray their territory.
The male cat does this by vibrating their tail. Mr. Po Po is different because he is a very clean cat. I know he learned the pee ritual from Flash our other male cat.
Flash does the real thing. He marks his territory all over the yard. This is what male cats do. Mr. Po Po is a very intelligent kitty.
I think he realizes that peeing around is a filthy thing to do, but he is respectful of the social ritual and etiquette required of all male cats.
It is an important ritual to uphold. So he mocks his territorial pissing. My son and I laugh about it all the time.
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Editorialize political debate, Mr Fuck and Squid Heads…
Autumnis Mantis
Outside of our French windows is a trellis over the patio. Across from this we have a pool fence. We put it up when the children were small for their protection. It is now a place for Praying Mantis. When the spring comes and the baby mantis break their egg sack, hundreds of babies run along the claw proof dark plastic mesh.
The first days of autumn brings me a great visitor; a big mama mantis on the pool fence. This is very odd in the middle of the day with the sun overhead. We watched her wobble about. Her back-end is quite large. She stirred her body many times as she moved using her long legs to balance her weight. I then decided to move her.
I usually do not interfere with nature. She is big and it took five months for her to get this size. I am sure she can take care of herself…but I love her so, and did not want to see her devoured by a cat. Some would see this as equal punishment for the many creatures she sucked the life force from. I do not judge nature.
I put my hand and arm out to her. She looked round at me with her large yellow-green eyes. The end of her spider legs reached out grasping the hair on my arm like cactus hair, pulling her towards me. She was aboard me.
Quickly she ran to my right shoulder than the left shoulder. Then she was on my head. I felt her weight on my neck, and she tickled me. I laughed aloud. Walking slowly towards the trellis I rest my head on the vines and flowers. It did not take long for her to skip jumping up to a branch. Now, she was almost camouflaged from my gazing green eyes. Later in the day she was gone from this spot. In my heart I knew she was nearby.
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Lavendar Beer and a Gnome
I read this to my son.
“Did this really happen?” He said.
I replied,“Maybe it did and maybe it didn’t !”
Mornings are foggy now.
I take the kid to school, I have my coffee, and I do my chores.
To day it is different.
I took the trash out. I hear laughing. An echo of laughter in the foggy morning.
I look round and see a shadow about three-feet tall. Then like a wisp of the wind a little green man is in front of me.
He has a green hat and green pants. His shoes are black and his coat-tail is purple. He pulls at my leg. He wants me to follow him to the others. I see others dancing and laughing. I join them. He now holds up a gold cup.
“Drink me lavender beer. From the lavender that grows under the pole, near the hole in the ground, ” said the green gnome.
I took a sniff. It smelled like lavender.
I then noticed the laughter stopped. The were all looking at me, waiting for me to drink.
I have read many a fairy tale to know that one should be very cautious about drinking anything from a gnome or fairy. Long silence. I will drink.
“This tastes very good. I love beer. I must say I never knew about lavender beer.”
Then I awoke in my living room. I was on the couch and the cats were sleeping ’round me. Looking out the French windows the fog lifted and the rays of the sun highlighted the lavender.
Fin
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Merge
The vine with purple flowers makes its way to our chimney every summer. By the cold of winter it declines and we pull it back. One year we let our home insurance lapse. The insurance agent came out and told us that we had to trim the bush back so it did not even touch our home. It was a fire hazard and we could not be insured. In California we do not have that many fires in the fire-place. As long as we do not let the insurance lapse the insurance agent will never know. The relationship between the red man-made brick and the lovely nature made vine well keep their date of summer merging.
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Yes, Someone Keeps Leaving Flowers On My Front Doorsteps.
1989
It was my true days of independent living on the east coast where I learned to be truly responsible for others besides myself. I was alone living in the maid’s room converted into an apartment of a four-story lovely old Victorian house.
“Can I buy you another coffee?”
I said to the man I called Desperado.
Walking to work I often saw Desperado. He also shared a room at the Victorian house. He hung out at the local coffee shop otherwise he hit the booze. He symbolized the furthest I have been away from California dreaming. That song synchronized embarrassment every time it played on the radio.
“All the leaves are brown, and the sky is grey. I have been for a walk on a winter’s day. I’d be safe and warm if I was in LA, California dreaming on such a winter’s day.”
Rochester, New York has humid-hot-thunder storms in the summer and freezing in the winter. Walking through tunnels made of snow made me shiver; sometimes the two native American chiefs were lying on the street. One evening they recited Edgar Allen Poe’s The Raven. Broken bottles framed around them as they shouted,
“Vainly I had sought to borrow,
From my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore.”
Then they chanted together,
“We went to the best colleges in the country!”
They made me laugh.
I just listened and observed that autumn and winter. The only time my eyes lit up was when I went to the local bar. One, two, three, four shots turned upside down. Neat upside-down.
It was not to set me up for a quick date. It was a friendly gesture of east coast drunks. I felt safe here where the men danced together.
My white nurse outfit and nurse shoes took me to the untouchables of the city. I was not cared about, so I tried to care about others, those that were almost dead to the world.
One late evening while walking back to my apartment from work, a New York detective greeted me. The neighborhood was blocked off with yellow tape.
“Nurse, could you step over here I need to talk to you?”
“I am not a nurse. I work at the local Visiting Nurses Association as a Home Health Aide.”
He then asked where I lived, and I told him.
“Miss, a woman was murdered across from your home. Have you noticed anything unusual over the last few days?”
“Yes, someone keeps leaving flowers on my front doorsteps.”
He smiled, but Mr. Detective did not seem interested and then said quickly,
“A body was dumped in the large trash dumpster across from where you are now living… we need you to call this number if you see anything unusual.”
He handed me his card.
I was screaming in my head as my heart raced. Thinking to myself,
“That dark alley… the one I walk by every night?”
I had enough of serial killers on the west coast. Did they have to follow me here as well? I was not so far away from home as I imagined.
Darkness is everywhere.
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Scarlet Poem
The color scarlet is deep, rich and vibrant
It is what I need
it pulls me
and in this
I find balance
nourishment and satisfaction
something new and
hopeful.
