Mother And Daughter — Love Liberates 2 comments

Road Trip, Wisconsin, St John's, Joy's Birthday, Greune Joy and Her Mom, Virginia –“I am living, I remember you.” (Image by kenne)

I am living,
I love you,
I remember you,
I am you.

You liberated me,
You will never die
You are the spirit,
You are eternal.

— kenne

*****

“love.
she liberated me to life,
she continued to do that.
and when she was in her final sickness
i went out to san francisco
and the doctor said she had 3 weeks to live,
i asked her
“would you come to north carolina?”
she said yes.
she had emphysema and lung cancer,
i brought her to my home.
she lived for a year and a half
..and when she was finally in extraneous
she was on oxygen and fighting cancer for her life
and i remembered her liberating me,
and i said i hoped i would be able to liberate her,
she deserved that from me.
she deserved a great daughter
and she got one.

so in her last days, i said
“i understand some people need permission to go…
as i understand it you may have done what god put you here to do.
you were a great worker,
you must’ve been a great lover
cause a lot of men and if I’m not wrong
maybe a couple of woman risked their lives to love you.
you were a piss poor mother of small children
but a you were great mother of young adults,
and if you need permission to go,
i liberate you”.

and i went back to my house,
and something said go back —
i was in my pajamas,
i jumped in my car and ran
and the nurse said “she just gone”.
you see love liberates.
it doesn’t bind, love says i love you.
i love you if you’re in china,
i love you if you’re across town,
i love you if you’re in harlem,
i love you.

i would like to be near you,
i would like to have your arms around me
i would like to have your voice in my ear
but that’s not possible now,
i love you so go.
love liberates it doesn’t hold. that’s ego.

love liberates.”

― Maya Angelou

You are a function of this total galaxy,
bounded by the milky way,
and this galaxy is a function of all other galaxies.
You are that vast thing that you see far off, far off with great telescopes.
You look and look and look,
and one day you are going to wake up and say,
“why, that’s me!”
And in knowing that,
you know that you never die.
You are the eternal thing that comes and goes
that appears now as John Jones, now as Mary Smith,
now as Betty Brown and so it goes, forever and ever and ever.”

~Alan Watts

Traveling I-10, Again 1 comment

“The Dining Room Table,” A Still Life — Images by kenne

In a little while we will be leaving Tucson, driving to San Bernardino to be with family as we celebrate the life of Virginia Chapman, Joy’s mother.

Since Virginia’s death, we have spent time reading Marie Howe’s powerful book of poems, “What the Living Do.” In a time of grief, her poems provide instruction for the living, one of which I share with those who follow this blog:

The Dream

I had a dream in the day:
I laid my father’s body down in a narrow boat

and sent him off along the riverbank with its cattails and grasses.
And the boat — it was made of bark and wood bent when it was wet —

took him to his burial finally.
But a day or two later I realized it was my self I wanted

to lay down, hands crossed, eyes closed. . . .
Oh, the light coming up from down there,

the sweet smell of the water — and finally, the sense of being carried
by a current I could not name or change.

— Marie Howe

Virginia 2006-08-10-02 bloig