Look at me, I'm womanly.
My hips are the same size as my bust.
look at me, I'm womanly,
60 years ago my body is one young men would lust.
look at me I'm womanly,
I get creases around my eyes.
look at me, I'm womanly,
my thighs aren't the desired size.
look at me, I'm womanly,
and I shall never be stick thin.
but to me that doesn't matter,
because the most beautiful things come from within.

by John Greenleaf Whittier  (1807 – 1892)

“As the Spirits of Darkness be stronger in the dark, so Good Spirits which be Angels of Light are augmented not only by the Divine Light of the Sun, but also by our common Wood fire: and as the celestial Fire drives away dark spirits, so also this our Fire of Wood doth the same.”

        COR. AGRIPPA,
           Occult Philosophy, Book I. chap. v.

“Announced by all the trumpets of the sky,
Arrives the snow; and, driving o’er the fields,
Seems nowhere to alight; the whited air
Hides hills and woods, the river and the heaven,
And veils the farm-house at the garden’s end.
The sled and traveller stopped, the courier’s feet
Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates sit
Around the radiant fireplace, enclosed
In a tumultuous privacy of storm.”

                                       EMERSON

The sun that brief December day
Rose cheerless over hills of gray,
And, darkly circled, gave at noon
A sadder light than waning moon.
Slow tracing down the thickening sky
Its mute and ominous prophecy,
A portent seeming less than threat,
It sank from sight before it set.
A chill no coat, however stout,
Of homespun stuff could quite shut out,
A hard, dull bitterness of cold,
That checked, mid-vein, the circling race
Of life-blood in the sharpened face,
The coming of the snow-storm told.
The wind blew east; we heard the roar
Of Ocean on his wintry shore,
And felt the strong pulse throbbing there
Beat with low rhythm our inland air.

Meanwhile we did our nightly chores, —
Brought in the wood from out of doors,
Littered the stalls, and from the mows
Raked down the herd’s-grass for the cows;
Heard the horse whinnying for his corn;
And, sharply clashing horn on horn,
Impatient down the stanchion rows
The cattle shake their walnut bows;
While, peering from his early perch
Upon the scaffold’s pole of birch,
The **** his crested helmet bent
And down his querulous challenge sent.

Unwarmed by any sunset light
The gray day darkened into night,
A night made hoary with the swarm
And whirl-dance of the blinding storm,
As zigzag, wavering to and fro,
Crossed and recrossed the wingàd snow:
And ere the early bedtime came
The white drift piled the window-frame,
And through the glass the clothes-line posts
Looked in like tall and sheeted ghosts.

So all night long the storm roared on:
The morning broke without a sun;
In tiny spherule traced with lines
Of Nature’s geometric signs,
And, when the second morning shone,
We looked upon a world unknown,
On nothing we could call our own.
Around the glistening wonder bent
The blue walls of the firmament,
No cloud above, no earth below, —
A universe of sky and snow!
The old familiar sights of ours
Took marvellous shapes; strange domes and towers
Rose up where sty or corn-crib stood,
Or garden-wall, or belt of wood;
A smooth white mound the brush-pile showed,
A fenceless drift what once was road;
The bridle-post an old man sat
With loose-flung coat and high cocked hat;
The well-curb had a Chinese roof;
And even the long sweep, high aloof,
In its slant spendor, seemed to tell
Of Pisa’s leaning miracle.

A prompt, decisive man, no breath
Our father wasted: “Boys, a path!”
Well pleased, (for when did farmer boy
Count such a summons less than joy?)
Our buskins on our feet we drew;
With mittened hands, and caps drawn low,
To guard our necks and ears from snow,
We cut the solid whiteness through.
And, where the drift was deepest, made
A tunnel walled and overlaid
With dazzling crystal: we had read
Of rare Aladdin’s wondrous cave,
And to our own his name we gave,
With many a wish the luck were ours
To test his lamp’s supernal powers.
We reached the barn with merry din,
And roused the prisoned brutes within.
The old horse ****** his long head out,
And grave with wonder gazed about;
The **** his ***** greeting said,
And forth his speckled harem led;
The oxen lashed their tails, and hooked,
And mild reproach of hunger looked;
The hornëd patriarch of the sheep,
Like Egypt’s Amun roused from sleep,
Shook his sage head with gesture mute,
And emphasized with stamp of foot.

All day the gusty north-wind bore
The loosening drift its breath before;
Low circling round its southern zone,
The sun through dazzling snow-mist shone.
No church-bell lent its Christian tone
To the savage air, no social smoke
Curled over woods of snow-hung oak.
A solitude made more intense
By dreary-voicëd elements,
The shrieking of the mindless wind,
The moaning tree-boughs swaying blind,
And on the glass the unmeaning beat
Of ghostly finger-tips of sleet.
Beyond the circle of our hearth
No welcome sound of toil or mirth
Unbound the spell, and testified
Of human life and thought outside.
We minded that the sharpest ear
The buried brooklet could not hear,
The music of whose liquid lip
Had been to us companionship,
And, in our lonely life, had grown
To have an almost human tone.

As night drew on, and, from the crest
Of wooded knolls that ridged the west,
The sun, a snow-blown traveller, sank
From sight beneath the smothering bank,
We piled, with care, our nightly stack
Of wood against the chimney-back, —
The oaken log, green, huge, and thick,
And on its top the stout back-stick;
The knotty forestick laid apart,
And filled between with curious art

The ragged brush; then, hovering near,
We watched the first red blaze appear,
Heard the sharp crackle, caught the gleam
On whitewashed wall and sagging beam,
Until the old, rude-furnished room
Burst, flower-like, into rosy bloom;
While radiant with a mimic flame
Outside the sparkling drift became,
And through the bare-boughed lilac-tree
Our own warm hearth seemed blazing free.
The crane and pendent trammels showed,
The Turks’ heads on the andirons glowed;
While childish fancy, prompt to tell
The meaning of the miracle,
Whispered the old rhyme: “Under the tree,
When fire outdoors burns merrily,
There the witches are making tea.”

The moon above the eastern wood
Shone at its full; the hill-range stood
Transfigured in the silver flood,
Its blown snows flashing cold and keen,
Dead white, save where some sharp ravine
Took shadow, or the sombre green
Of hemlocks turned to pitchy black
Against the whiteness at their back.
For such a world and such a night
Most fitting that unwarming light,
Which only seemed where’er it fell
To make the coldness visible.

Shut in from all the world without,
We sat the clean-winged hearth about,
Content to let the north-wind roar
In baffled rage at pane and door,
While the red logs before us beat
The frost-line back with tropic heat;
And ever, when a louder blast
Shook beam and rafter as it passed,
The merrier up its roaring draught
The great throat of the chimney laughed;
The house-dog on his paws outspread
Laid to the fire his drowsy head,
The cat’s dark silhouette on the wall
A couchant tiger’s seemed to fall;
And, for the winter fireside meet,
Between the andirons’ straddling feet,
The mug of cider simmered slow,
The apples sputtered in a row,
And, close at hand, the basket stood
With nuts from brown October’s wood.

What matter how the night behaved?
What matter how the north-wind raved?
Blow high, blow low, not all its snow
Could quench our hearth-fire’s ruddy glow.
O Time and Change! — with hair as gray
As was my sire’s that winter day,
How strange it seems, with so much gone
Of life and love, to still live on!
Ah, brother! only I and thou
Are left of all that circle now, —
The dear home faces whereupon
That fitful firelight paled and shone.
Henceforward, listen as we will,
The voices of that hearth are still;
Look where we may, the wide earth o’er,
Those lighted faces smile no more.

We tread the paths their feet have worn,
We sit beneath their orchard trees,
We hear, like them, the hum of bees
And rustle of the bladed corn;
We turn the pages that they read,
Their written words we linger o’er,
But in the sun they cast no shade,
No voice is heard, no sign is made,
No step is on the conscious floor!
Yet Love will dream, and Faith will trust,
(Since He who knows our need is just,)
That somehow, somewhere, meet we must.
Alas for him who never sees
The stars shine through his cypress-trees!
Who, hopeless, lays his dead away,
Nor looks to see the breaking day
Across the mournful marbles play!
Who hath not learned, in hours of faith,
The truth to flesh and sense unknown,
That Life is ever lord of Death,
And Love can never lose its own!

We sped the time with stories old,
Wrought puzzles out, and riddles told,
Or stammered from our school-book lore
“The Chief of Gambia’s golden shore.”
How often since, when all the land
Was clay in Slavery’s shaping hand,
As if a far-blown trumpet stirred
Dame Mercy Warren’s rousing word:
“Does not the voice of reason cry,
Claim the first right which Nature gave,
From the red scourge of ******* to fly,
Nor deign to live a burdened slave!”
Our father rode again his ride
On Memphremagog’s wooded side;
Sat down again to moose and samp
In trapper’s hut and Indian camp;
Lived o’er the old idyllic ease
Beneath St. François’ hemlock-trees;
Again for him the moonlight shone
On Norman cap and bodiced zone;
Again he heard the violin play
Which led the village dance away.
And mingled in its merry whirl
The grandam and the laughing girl.
Or, nearer home, our steps he led
Where Salisbury’s level marshes spread
Mile-wide as flies the laden bee;
Where merry mowers, hale and strong,
Swept, scythe on scythe, their swaths along
The low green prairies of the sea.
We shared the fishing off Boar’s Head,
And round the rocky Isles of Shoals
The hake-broil on the drift-wood coals;
The chowder on the sand-beach made,
Dipped by the hungry, steaming hot,
With spoons of clam-shell from the ***.
We heard the tales of witchcraft old,
And dream and sign and marvel told
To sleepy listeners as they lay
Stretched idly on the salted hay,
Adrift along the winding shores,
When favoring breezes deigned to blow
The square sail of the gundelow
And idle lay the useless oars.

Our mother, while she turned her wheel
Or run the new-knit stocking-heel,
Told how the Indian hordes came down
At midnight on Concheco town,
And how her own great-uncle bore
His cruel scalp-mark to fourscore.
Recalling, in her fitting phrase,
So rich and picturesque and free
(The common unrhymed poetry
Of simple life and country ways,)
The story of her early days, —
She made us welcome to her home;
Old hearths grew wide to give us room;
We stole with her a frightened look
At the gray wizard’s conjuring-book,
The fame whereof went far and wide
Through all the simple country side;
We heard the hawks at twilight play,
The boat-horn on Piscataqua,
The loon’s weird laughter far away;
We fished her little trout-brook, knew
What flowers in wood and meadow grew,
What sunny hillsides autumn-brown
She climbed to shake the ripe nuts down,
Saw where in sheltered cove and bay,
The ducks’ black squadron anchored lay,
And heard the wild-geese calling loud
Beneath the gray November cloud.
Then, haply, with a look more grave,
And soberer tone, some tale she gave
From painful Sewel’s ancient tome,
Beloved in every Quaker home,
Of faith fire-winged by martyrdom,
Or Chalkley’s Journal, old and quaint, —
Gentlest of skippers, rare sea-saint! —
Who, when the dreary calms prevailed,
And water-**** and bread-cask failed,
And cruel, hungry eyes pursued
His portly presence mad for food,
With dark hints muttered under breath
Of casting lots for life or death,

Offered, if Heaven withheld supplies,
To be himself the sacrifice.
Then, suddenly, as if to save
The good man from his living grave,
A ripple on the water grew,
A school of porpoise flashed in view.
“Take, eat,” he said, “and be content;
These fishes in my stead are sent
By Him who gave the tangled ram
To spare the child of Abraham.”
Our uncle, innocent of books,
Was rich in lore of fields and brooks,
The ancient teachers never dumb
Of Nature’s unhoused lyceum.
In moons and tides and weather wise,
He read the clouds as prophecies,
And foul or fair could well divine,
By many an occult hint and sign,
Holding the cunning-warded keys
To all the woodcraft mysteries;
Himself to Nature’s heart so near
v That all her voices in his ear
Of beast or bird had meanings clear,
Like Apollonius of old,
Who knew the tales the sparrows told,
Or Hermes, who interpreted
What the sage cranes of Nilus said;
A simple, guileless, childlike man,
Content to live where life began;
Strong only on his native grounds,
The little world of sights and sounds
Whose girdle was the parish bounds,
Whereof his fondly partial pride
The common features magnified,
As Surrey hills to mountains grew
In White of Selborne’s loving view, —
He told how teal and loon he shot,
And how the eagle’s eggs he got,
The feats on pond and river done,
The prodigies of rod and gun;
Till, warming with the tales he told,
Forgotten was the outside cold,
The bitter wind unheeded blew,
From ripening corn the pigeons flew,
The partridge drummed i’ the wood, the mink
Went fishing down the river-brink.
In fields with bean or clover gay,
The woodchuck, like a hermit gray,
Peered from the doorway of his cell;
The muskrat plied the mason’s trade,
And tier by tier his mud-walls laid;
And from the shagbark overhead
The grizzled squirrel dropped his shell.

Next, the dear aunt, whose smile of cheer
And voice in dreams I see and hear, —
The sweetest woman ever Fate
Perverse denied a household mate,
Who, lonely, homeless, not the less
Found peace in love’s unselfishness,
And welcome wheresoe’er she went,
A calm and gracious element,
Whose presence seemed the sweet income
And womanly atmosphere of home, —
Called up her girlhood memories,
The huskings and the apple-bees,
The sleigh-rides and the summer sails,
Weaving through all the poor details
And homespun warp of circumstance
A golden woof-thread of romance.
For well she kept her genial mood
And simple faith of maidenhood;
Before her still a cloud-land lay,
The mirage loomed across her way;
The morning dew, that dries so soon
With others, glistened at her noon;
Through years of toil and soil and care,
From glossy tress to thin gray hair,
All unprofaned she held apart
The ****** fancies of the heart.
Be shame to him of woman born
Who hath for such but thought of scorn.
There, too, our elder sister plied
Her evening task the stand beside;
A full, rich nature, free to trust,
Truthful and almost sternly just,
Impulsive, earnest, prompt to act,
And make her generous thought a fact,
Keeping with many a light disguise
The secret of self-sacrifice.

O heart sore-tried! thou hast the best
That Heaven itself could give thee, — rest,
Rest from all bitter thoughts and things!
How many a poor one’s blessing went
With thee beneath the low green tent
Whose curtain never outward swings!

As one who held herself a part
Of all she saw, and let her heart
Against the household ***** lean,
Upon the motley-braided mat
Our youngest and our dearest sat,
Lifting her large, sweet, asking eyes,
Now bathed in the unfading green
And holy peace of Paradise.
Oh, looking from some heavenly hill,
Or from the shade of saintly palms,
Or silver reach of river calms,
Do those large eyes behold me still?
With me one little year ago: —
The chill weight of the winter snow
For months upon her grave has lain;
And now, when summer south-winds blow
And brier and harebell bloom again,
I tread the pleasant paths we trod,
I see the violet-sprinkled sod
Whereon she leaned, too frail and weak
The hillside flowers she loved to seek,
Yet following me where’er I went
With dark eyes full of love’s content.
The birds are glad; the brier-rose fills
The air with sweetness; all the hills
Stretch green to June’s unclouded sky;
But still I wait with ear and eye
For something gone which should be nigh,
A loss in all familiar things,
In flower that blooms, and bird that sings.
And yet, dear heart! remembering thee,
Am I not richer than of old?
Safe in thy immortality,
What change can reach the wealth I hold?
What chance can mar the pearl and gold
Thy love hath left in trust with me?
And while in life’s late afternoon,
Where cool and long the shadows grow,
I walk to meet the night that soon
Shall shape and shadow overflow,
I cannot feel that thou art far,
Since near at need the angels are;
And when the sunset gates unbar,
Shall I not see thee waiting stand,
And, white against the evening star,
The welcome of thy beckoning hand?

Brisk wielder of the birch and rule,
The master of the district school
Held at the fire his favored place,
Its warm glow lit a laughing face
Fresh-hued and fair, where scarce appeared
The uncertain prophecy of beard.
He teased the mitten-blinded cat,
Played cross-pins on my uncle’s hat,
Sang songs, and told us what befalls
In classic Dartmouth’s college halls.
Born the wild Northern hills among,
From whence his yeoman father wrung
By patient toil subsistence scant,
Not competence and yet not want,
He early gained the power to pay
His cheerful, self-reliant way;
Could doff at ease his scholar’s gown
To peddle wares from town to town;
Or through the long vacation’s reach
In lonely lowland districts teach,
Where all the droll experience found
At stranger hearths in boarding round,
The moonlit skater’s keen delight,
The sleigh-drive through the frosty night,
The rustic party, with its rough
Accompaniment of blind-man’s-buff,
And whirling-plate, and forfeits paid,
His winter task a pastime made.
Happy the snow-locked homes wherein
He tuned his merry violin,

Or played the athlete in the barn,
Or held the good dame’s winding-yarn,
Or mirth-provoking versions told
Of classic legends rare and old,
Wherein the scenes of Greece and Rome
Had all the commonplace of home,
And little seemed at best the odds
‘Twixt Yankee pedlers and old gods;
Where Pindus-born Arachthus took
The guise of any grist-mill brook,
And dread Olympus at his will
Became a huckleberry hill.

A careless boy that night he seemed;
But at his desk he had the look
And air of one who wisely schemed,
And hostage from the future took
In trainëd thought and lore of book.
Large-brained, clear-eyed, of such as he
Shall Freedom’s young apostles be,
Who, following in War’s ****** trail,
Shall every lingering wrong assail;
All chains from limb and spirit strike,
Uplift the black and white alike;
Scatter before their swift advance
The darkness and the ignorance,
The pride, the lust, the squalid sloth,
Which nurtured Treason’s monstrous growth,
Made ****** pastime, and the hell
Of prison-torture possible;
The cruel lie of caste refute,
Old forms remould, and substitute
For Slavery’s lash the freeman’s will,
For blind routine, wise-handed skill;
A school-house plant on every hill,
Stretching in radiate nerve-lines thence
The quick wires of intelligence;
Till North and South together brought
Shall own the same electric thought,
In peace a common flag salute,
And, side by side in labor’s free
And unresentful rivalry,
Harvest the fields wherein they fought.

Another guest that winter night
Flashed back from lustrous eyes the light.
Unmarked by time, and yet not young,
The honeyed music of her tongue
And words of meekness scarcely told
A nature passionate and bold,

Strong, self-concentred, spurning guide,
Its milder features dwarfed beside
Her unbent will’s majestic pride.
She sat among us, at the best,
A not unfeared, half-welcome guest,
Rebuking with her cultured phrase
Our homeliness of words and ways.
A certain pard-like, treacherous grace
Swayed the lithe limbs and drooped the lash,
Lent the white teeth their dazzling flash;
And under low brows, black with night,
Rayed out at times a dangerous light;
The sharp heat-lightnings of her face
Presaging ill to him whom Fate
Condemned to share her love or hate.
A woman tropical, intense
In thought and act, in soul and sense,
She blended in a like degree
The ***** and the devotee,
Revealing with each freak or feint
The temper of Petruchio’s Kate,
The raptures of Siena’s saint.
Her tapering hand and rounded wrist
Had facile power to form a fist;
The warm, dark languish of her eyes
Was never safe from wrath’s surprise.
Brows saintly calm and lips devout
Knew every change of scowl and pout;
And the sweet voice had notes more high
And shrill for social battle-cry.

Since then what old cathedral town
Has missed her pilgrim staff and gown,
What convent-gate has held its lock
Against the challenge of her knock!
Through Smyrna’s plague-hushed thoroughfares,
Up sea-set Malta’s rocky stairs,
Gray olive slopes of hills that hem
Thy tombs and shrines, Jerusalem,
Or startling on her desert throne
The crazy Queen of Lebanon
With claims fantastic as her own,
Her tireless feet have held their way;
And still, unrestful, bowed, and gray,
She watches under Eastern skies,
With hope each day renewed and fresh,
The Lord’s quick coming in the flesh,
Whereof she dreams and prophesies!
Where’er her troubled path may be,
The Lord’s sweet pity with her go!
The outward wayward life we see,
The hidden springs we may not know.
Nor is it given us to discern
What threads the fatal sisters spun,
Through what ancestral years has run
The sorrow with the woman born,
What forged her cruel chain of moods,
What set her feet in solitudes,
And held the love within her mute,
What mingled madness in the blood,
A life-long discord and annoy,
Water of tears with oil of joy,
And hid within the folded bud
Perversities of flower and fruit.
It is not ours to separate
The tangled skein of will and fate,
To show what metes and bounds should stand
Upon the soul’s debatable land,
And between choice and Providence
Divide the circle of events;
But He who knows our frame is just,
Merciful and compassionate,
And full of sweet assurances
And hope for all the language is,
That He remembereth we are dust!

At last the great logs, crumbling low,
Sent out a dull and duller glow,
The bull’s-eye watch that hung in view,
Ticking its weary circuit through,
Pointed with mutely warning sign
Its black hand to the hour of nine.
That sign the pleasant circle broke:
My uncle ceased his pipe to smoke,
Knocked from its bowl the refuse gray,
And laid it tenderly away;
Then roused himself to safely cover
The dull red brands with ashes over.
And while, with care, our mother laid
The work aside, her steps she stayed
One moment, seeking to express
Her grateful sense of happiness
For food and shelter, warmth and health,
And love’s contentment more than wealth,
With simple wishes (not the weak,
Vain prayers which no fulfilment seek,
But such as warm the generous heart,
O’er-prompt to do with Heaven its part)
That none might lack, that bitter night,
For bread and clothing, warmth and light.

Within our beds awhile we heard
The wind that round the gables roared,
With now and then a ruder shock,
Which made our very bedsteads rock.
We heard the loosened clapboards tost,
The board-nails snapping in the frost;
And on us, through the unplastered wall,
Felt the light sifted snow-flakes fall.
But sleep stole on, as sleep will do
When hearts are light and life is new;
Faint and more faint the murmurs grew,
Till in the summer-land of dreams
They softened to the sound of streams,
Low stir of leaves, and dip of oars,
And lapsing waves on quiet shores.
Of merry voices high and clear;
And saw the teamsters drawing near
To break the drifted highways out.
Down the long hillside treading slow
We saw the half-buried oxen go,
Shaking the snow from heads uptost,
Their straining nostrils white with frost.
Before our door the straggling train
Drew up, an added team to gain.
The elders threshed their hands a-cold,
Passed, with the cider-mug, their jokes
From lip to lip; the younger folks
Down the loose snow-banks, wrestling, rolled,
Then toiled again the cavalcade
O’er windy hill, through clogged ravine,
And woodland paths that wound between
Low drooping pine-boughs winter-weighed.
From every barn a team afoot,
At every house a new recruit,
Where, drawn by Nature’s subtlest law,
Haply the watchful young men saw
Sweet doorway pictures of the curls
And curious eyes of merry girls,
Lifting their hands in mock defence
Against the snow-ball’s compliments,
And reading in each missive tost
The charm with Eden never lost.
We heard once more the sleigh-bells’ sound;
And, following where the teamsters led,
The wise old Doctor went his round,
Just pausing at our door to say,
In the brief autocratic way
Of one who, prompt at Duty’s call,
Was free to urge her claim on all,
That some poor neighbor sick abed
At night our mother’s aid would need.
For, one in generous thought and deed,
What mattered in the sufferer’s sight
The Quaker matron’s inward light,
The Doctor’s mail of Calvin’s creed?
All hearts confess the saints elect
Who, twain in faith, in love agree,
And melt not in an acid sect
The Christian pearl of charity!

So days went on: a week had passed
Since the great world was heard from last.
The Almanac we studied o’er,
Read and reread our little store
Of books and pamphlets, scarce a score;
One harmless novel, mostly hid
From younger eyes, a book forbid,
And poetry, (or good or bad,
A single book was all we had,)
Where Ellwood’s meek, drab-skirted Muse,
A stranger to the heathen Nine,
Sang, with a somewhat nasal whine,
The wars of David and the Jews.
At last the floundering carrier bore
The village paper to our door.
Lo! broadening outward as we read,
To warmer zones the horizon spread
In panoramic length unrolled
We saw the marvels that it told.
Before us passed the painted Creeks,
A   nd daft McGregor on his raids
In Costa Rica’s everglades.
And up Taygetos winding slow
Rode Ypsilanti’s Mainote Greeks,
A Turk’s head at each saddle-bow!
Welcome to us its week-old news,
Its corner for the rustic Muse,
Its monthly gauge of snow and rain,
Its record, mingling in a breath
The wedding bell and dirge of death:
Jest, anecdote, and love-lorn tale,
The latest culprit sent to jail;
Its hue and cry of stolen and lost,
Its vendue sales and goods at cost,
And traffic calling loud for gain.
We felt the stir of hall and street,
The pulse of life that round us beat;
The chill embargo of the snow
Was melted in the genial glow;
Wide swung again our ice-locked door,
And all the world was ours once more!

Clasp, Angel of the backword look
And folded wings of ashen gray
And voice of echoes far away,
The brazen covers of thy book;
The weird palimpsest old and vast,
Wherein thou hid’st the spectral past;
Where, closely mingling, pale and glow
The characters of joy and woe;
The monographs of outlived years,
Or smile-illumed or dim with tears,
Green hills of life that ***** to death,
And haunts of home, whose vistaed trees
Shade off to mournful cypresses
With the white amaranths underneath.
Even while I look, I can but heed
The restless sands’ incessant fall,
Importunate hours that hours succeed,
Each clamorous with its own sharp need,
And duty keeping pace with all.
Shut down and clasp with heavy lids;
I hear again the voice that bids
The dreamer leave his dream midway
For larger hopes and graver fears:
Life greatens in these later years,
The century’s aloe flowers to-day!

Yet, haply, in some lull of life,
Some Truce of God which breaks its strife,
The worldling’s eyes shall gather dew,
Dreaming in throngful city ways
Of winter joys his boyhood knew;
And dear and early friends — the few
Who yet remain — shall pause to view
These Flemish pictures of old days;
Sit with me by the homestead hearth,
And stretch the hands of memory forth
To warm them at the wood-fire’s blaze!
And thanks untraced to lips unknown
Shall greet me like the odors blown
From unseen meadows newly mown,
Wood-fringed, the wayside gaze beyond;
The traveller owns the grateful sense
Of sweetness near, he knows not whence,
And, pausing, takes with forehead bare
The benediction of the air.

Written in  1865

1
I celebrate myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.

My tongue, every atom of my blood, form’d from this soil, this air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their
parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.

Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.

2
Houses and rooms are full of perfumes, the shelves are crowded with
perfumes,
I breathe the fragrance myself and know it and like it,
The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not let it.

The atmosphere is not a perfume, it has no taste of the
distillation, it is odorless,
It is for my mouth forever, I am in love with it,
I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and naked,
I am mad for it to be in contact with me.

The smoke of my own breath,
Echoes, ripples, buzz’d whispers, love-root, silk-thread, crotch and
vine,
My respiration and inspiration, the beating of my heart, the passing
of blood and air through my lungs,
The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore and
dark-color’d sea-rocks, and of hay in the barn,

The sound of the belch’d words of my voice loos’d to the eddies of
the wind,
A few light kisses, a few embraces, a reaching around of arms,
The play of shine and shade on the trees as the supple boughs wag,
The delight alone or in the rush of the streets, or along the fields
and hill-sides,
The feeling of health, the full-noon trill, the song of me rising
from bed and meeting the sun.

Have you reckon’d a thousand acres much? have you reckon’d the
earth much?
Have you practis’d so long to learn to read?
Have you felt so proud to get at the meaning of poems?

Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of
all poems,
You shall possess the good of the earth and sun, (there are millions
of suns left,)
You shall no longer take things at second or third hand, nor look
through the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectres in
books,
You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me,
You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self.

3
I have heard what the talkers were talking, the talk of the
beginning and the end,
But I do not talk of the beginning or the end.

There was never any more inception than there is now,
Nor any more youth or age than there is now,
And will never be any more perfection than there is now,
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.

Urge and urge and urge,
Always the procreant urge of the world.

Out of the dimness opposite equals advance, always substance and
increase, always ***,
Always a knit of identity, always distinction, always a breed of
life.
To elaborate is no avail, learn’d and unlearn’d feel that it is so.

Sure as the most certain sure, plumb in the uprights, well
entretied, braced in the beams,
Stout as a horse, affectionate, haughty, electrical,
I and this mystery here we stand.

Clear and sweet is my soul, and clear and sweet is all that is not
my soul.

Lack one lacks both, and the unseen is proved by the seen,
Till that becomes unseen and receives proof in its turn.

Showing the best and dividing it from the worst age vexes age,
Knowing the perfect fitness and equanimity of things, while they
discuss I am silent, and go bathe and admire myself.

Welcome is every ***** and attribute of me, and of any man hearty
and clean,
Not an inch nor a particle of an inch is vile, and none shall be
less familiar than the rest.

I am satisfied - I see, dance, laugh, sing;
As the hugging and loving bed-fellow sleeps at my side through the
night, and withdraws at the peep of the day with stealthy
tread,
Leaving me baskets cover’d with white towels swelling the house with
their plenty,
Shall I postpone my acceptation and realization and scream at my
eyes,
That they turn from gazing after and down the road,
And forthwith cipher and show me to a cent,
Exactly the value of one and exactly the value of two, and which is
ahead?

4
Trippers and askers surround me,
People I meet, the effect upon me of my early life or the ward and
city I live in, or the nation,
The latest dates, discoveries, inventions, societies, authors old
and new,
My dinner, dress, associates, looks, compliments, dues,
The real or fancied indifference of some man or woman I love,
The sickness of one of my folks or of myself, or ill-doing or loss
or lack of money, or depressions or exaltations,
Battles, the horrors of fratricidal war, the fever of doubtful news,
the fitful events;
These come to me days and nights and go from me again,
But they are not the Me myself.

Apart from the pulling and hauling stands what I am,
Stands amused, complacent, compassionating, idle, unitary,
Looks down, is *****, or bends an arm on an impalpable certain rest,
Looking with side-curved head curious what will come next,
Both in and out of the game and watching and wondering at it.

Backward I see in my own days where I sweated through fog with
linguists and contenders,
I have no mockings or arguments, I witness and wait.

5
I believe in you my soul, the other I am must not abase itself to
you,
And you must not be abased to the other.

Loafe with me on the grass, loose the stop from your throat,
Not words, not music or rhyme I want, not custom or lecture, not
even the best,
Only the lull I like, the hum of your valved voice.

I mind how once we lay such a transparent summer morning,
How you settled your head athwart my hips and gently turn’d over
upon me,
And parted the shirt from my *****-bone, and plunged your tongue
to my bare-stript heart,
And reach’d till you felt my beard, and reach’d till you held my
feet.

Swiftly arose and spread around me the peace and knowledge that pass
all the argument of the earth,
And I know that the hand of God is the promise of my own,
And I know that the spirit of God is the brother of my own,
And that all the men ever born are also my brothers, and the women
my sisters and lovers,
And that a kelson of the creation is love,
And limitless are leaves stiff or drooping in the fields,
And brown ants in the little wells beneath them,
And mossy scabs of the worm fence, heap’d stones, elder, mullein and
poke-****.

6
A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands;
How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more
than he.

I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green
stuff woven.

Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,
A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropt,
Bearing the owner’s name someway in the corners, that we may see
and remark, and say Whose?

Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the
vegetation.

Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic,
And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones,
Growing among black folks as among white,
Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I
receive them the same.

And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves.

Tenderly will I use you curling grass,
It may be you transpire from the ******* of young men,
It may be if I had known them I would have loved them,
It may be you are from old people, or from offspring taken soon out
of their mothers’ laps,
And here you are the mothers’ laps.

This grass is very dark to be from the white heads of old mothers,
Darker than the colorless beards of old men,
Dark to come from under the faint red roofs of mouths.

O I perceive after all so many uttering tongues,
And I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths for
nothing.

I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men and
women,
And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring taken
soon out of their laps.

What do you think has become of the young and old men?
And what do you think has become of the women and children?

They are alive and well somewhere,
The smallest sprout shows there is really no death,
And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the
end to arrest it,
And ceas’d the moment life appear’d.

All goes onward and outward, nothing collapses,
And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.

7
Has any one supposed it lucky to be born?
I hasten to inform him or her it is just as lucky to die, and I know
it.

I pass death with the dying and birth with the new-wash’d babe, and
am not contain’d between my hat and boots,
And peruse manifold objects, no two alike and every one good,
The earth good and the stars good, and their adjuncts all good.

I am not an earth nor an adjunct of an earth,
I am the mate and companion of people, all just as immortal and
fathomless as myself,
(They do not know how immortal, but I know.)

Every kind for itself and its own, for me mine male and female,
For me those that have been boys and that love women,
For me the man that is proud and feels how it stings to be slighted,
For me the sweet-heart and the old maid, for me mothers and the
mothers of mothers,
For me lips that have smiled, eyes that have shed tears,
For me children and the begetters of children.

Undrape! you are not guilty to me, nor stale nor discarded,
I see through the broadcloth and gingham whether or no,
And am around, tenacious, acquisitive, tireless, and cannot be
shaken away.

8
The little one sleeps in its cradle,
I lift the gauze and look a long time, and silently brush away flies
with my hand.

The youngster and the red-faced girl turn aside up the bushy hill,
I peeringly view them from the top.

The suicide sprawls on the ****** floor of the bedroom,
I witness the corpse with its dabbled hair, I note where the pistol
has fallen.

The blab of the pave, tires of carts, sluff of boot-soles, talk of
the promenaders,
The heavy omnibus, the driver with his interrogating thumb, the
clank of the shod horses on the granite floor,
The snow-sleighs, clinking, shouted jokes, pelts of snow-*****,
The hurrahs for popular favorites, the fury of rous’d mobs,
The flap of the curtain’d litter, a sick man inside borne to the
hospital,
The meeting of enemies, the sudden oath, the blows and fall,
The excited crowd, the policeman with his star quickly working his
passage to the centre of the crowd,
The impassive stones that receive and return so many echoes,
What groans of over-fed or half-starv’d who fall sunstruck or in
fits,
What exclamations of women taken suddenly who hurry home and
give birth to babes,
What living and buried speech is always vibrating here, what howls
restrain’d by decorum,
Arrests of criminals, slights, adulterous offers made, acceptances,
rejections with convex lips,
I mind them or the show or resonance of them-I come and I depart.

9
The big doors of the country barn stand open and ready,
The dried grass of the harvest-time loads the slow-drawn wagon,
The clear light plays on the brown gray and green intertinged,
The armfuls are pack’d to the sagging mow.

I am there, I help, I came stretch’d atop of the load,
I felt its soft jolts, one leg reclined on the other,
I jump from the cross-beams and seize the clover and timothy,
And roll head over heels and tangle my hair full of wisps.

10
Alone far in the wilds and mountains I hunt,
Wandering amazed at my own lightness and glee,
In the late afternoon choosing a safe spot to pass the night,
Kindling a fire and broiling the fresh-****’d game,
Falling asleep on the gather’d leaves with my dog and gun by my
side.

The Yankee clipper is under her sky-sails, she cuts the sparkle
and scud,
My eyes settle the land, I bend at her prow or shout joyously from
the deck.

The boatmen and clam-diggers arose early and stopt for me,
I tuck’d my trowser-ends in my boots and went and had a good time;
You should have been with us that day round the chowder-kettle.

I saw the marriage of the trapper in the open air in the far west,
the bride was a red girl,
Her father and his friends sat near cross-legged and dumbly smoking,
they had moccasins to their feet and large thick blankets
hanging from their shoulders,
On a bank lounged the trapper, he was drest mostly in skins, his
luxuriant beard and curls protected his neck, he held his bride
by the hand,
She had long eyelashes, her head was bare, her coarse straight locks
descended upon her voluptuous limbs and reach’d to her
feet.

The runaway slave came to my house and stopt outside,
I heard his motions crackling the twigs of the woodpile,
Through the swung half-door of the kitchen I saw him limpsy and
weak,
And went where he sat on a log and led him in and assured him,
And brought water and fill’d a tub for his sweated body and bruis’d
feet,
And gave him a room that enter’d from my own, and gave him some
coarse clean clothes,
And remember perfectly well his revolving eyes and his awkwardness,
And remember putting piasters on the galls of his neck and ankles;
He staid with me a week before he was recuperated and pass’d north,
I had him sit next me at table, my fire-lock lean’d in the corner.

11
Twenty-eight young men bathe by the shore,
Twenty-eight young men and all so friendly;
Twenty-eight years of womanly life and all so lonesome.

She owns the fine house by the rise of the bank,
She hides handsome and richly drest aft the blinds of the window.

Which of the young men does she like the best?
Ah the homeliest of them is beautiful to her.

Where are you off to, lady? for I see you,
You splash in the water there, yet stay stock still in your room.

Dancing and laughing along the beach came the twenty-ninth
bather,
The rest did not see her, but she saw them and loved them.

The beards of the young men glisten’d with wet, it ran from their
long hair,
Little streams pass’d all over their bodies.

An unseen hand also pass’d over their bodies,
It descended tremblingly from their temples and ribs.

The young men float on their backs, their white bellies bulge to the
sun, they do not ask who seizes fast to them,
They do not know who puffs and declines with pendant and bending
arch,
They do not think whom they ***** with spray.

12
The butcher-boy puts off his killing-clothes, or sharpens his knife
at the stall in the market,
I loiter enjoying his repartee and his shuffle and break-down.

Blacksmiths with grimed and hairy chests environ the anvil,
Each has his main-sledge, they are all out, there is a great heat in
the fire.

From the cinder-strew’d threshold I follow their movements,
The lithe sheer of their waists plays even with their massive arms,
Overhand the hammers swing, overhand so slow, overhand so sure,
They do not hasten, each man hits in his place.

13
The ***** holds firmly the reins of his four horses, the block swags
underneath on its tied-over chain,
The ***** that drives the long dray of the stone-yard, steady and
tall he stands pois’d on one leg on the string-piece,
His blue shirt exposes his ample neck and breast and loosens over
his hip-band,
His glance is calm and commanding, he tosses the slouch of his hat
away from his forehead,
The sun falls on his crispy hair and mustache, falls on the black of
his polish’d and perfect limbs.

I behold the picturesque giant and love him, and I do not stop
there,
I go with the team also.

In me the caresser of life wherever moving, backward as well as
forward sluing,
To niches aside and junior bending, not a person or object missing,
Absorbing all to myself and for this song.

Oxen that rattle the yoke and chain or halt in the leafy shade, what
is that you express in your eyes?
It seems to me more than all the print I have read in my life.

My tread scares the wood-drake and wood-duck on my distant and
day-long ramble,
They rise together, they slowly circle around.

I believe in those wing’d purposes,
And acknowledge red, yellow, white, playing within me,
And consider green and violet and the tufted crown i

People stare at me with confused eyes
They ask to know where my secret lies
They wonder where I found my gait
They love the way I articulate
The softness of my arms
My captivating youthful charm:
This is my woman
The woman I have become
All these and more, are my woman

I walk with a quirky poise
People whisper, and it's a delightful noise
The smile on my lips
The curve of my hips
They say I've always been this cool
But honey, do not be fooled:
This is my woman
The woman I have become
All these and more, are my woman

They see fire in my eyes
They say I'm for keeps 'cause I'm a prize
There is a grace in my vibes
Something good to imbibe
The warmth I bring
The joy I bring:
This is my woman
The woman I have become
All these and more, are my woman

There is something about me
How did I come to be?
The reason behind my womanly pride
The reason for my sedate stride
My aura, as that of a beloved emperor
My shoulders high like that of a conqueror:
This is my woman
The woman I have become
All these and more, are my woman

They say I am a mystery
There's definitely more to me
In the stillness of my mind
In the presence of my kind
I become more of the woman I am meant to be
The best of me you are yet to see:
This is my woman
The woman I have become
All these and more, are my woman

*** with me is so amazing      
Hey, I’m just Paraphrasing      
However, I was listening to the artist, Rihanna singing this song      
As the song kept plugging along      
Not meaning to come on too strong      
With respect do not get me wrong      
I’ve often wondered, is *** of the body more powerful than *** of the mind      
And no, I do not have a feminist ax to grind      
I will choose my words on this topic and remain kind      
Well, at best that I can      
From my perspective related to this issue between woman and man      
Making love to the female body its ******, it’s pleasurable, and certainly it’s thrilling      
But once nature’s release has been prefilled      
The mind needs a dose of endorphins to be instilled      
Are you still with me on that concept      
I’m speaking for me who needs the combined effect
      
*** WITH ME IS SO AMAZING
With someone capable of emotional grazing      
Blind dates, we talk about our passions or dreams      
Clothes still on, however, he gets what you mean      
Do we take this night one step farther      
We slept together      
Heated and passionate under silk covers, yet, he knew nothing about the weather      
We were definitely birds of a different feather      
His arms were not even that strong      
His brain got duller as the night prolonged
      
*** WITH ME IS SO AMAZING
Sometimes is not all about trailblazing      
Computer Dating      
Keyboard translating      
Breathless words of debate      
Soulful elate      
No physical contact to rate      
But wait      
You can type on computer keys from sunrise to sunset      
If you cannot be bipartisan with words than you can’t articulate      
A break to give since we’ve just met      
Between you and me it’s now mental Russian Roulette      
Spinning my mind landing on red      
Keep your mouth closed as you lay in my bed      
Enticing words danced across my screen      
Pulling me in was all a squandered dream      
We’ll never again experience emotions under the covers      
****** of no analytical bonding from a distance lover      
Once again, a horse of another color 
     
*** WITH ME IS SO AMAZING
In the midst of me praising you as our eyes are glazing      
One night stands      
First of all, you’re taking your life into your own hands      
No commands        
Sedated and scented juices mingling of its passion galore      
Lust filled desires and so much more      
No demands      
Talking on the go, and making no sense, well I be ****      
What a waste of a slam bam and thank you ma’am      
Mental *** on the brain I know it may sound insane      
But my God, it makes me rain      
Intellectual simulations have always been such a turn on      
Take me to task and then I’m far gone      
Rainbow coalitions      
I do not have any petitions      
Never in favor of anyone’s competitions      
Just me, my words, and I      
Reaching for that academic all time high      
Coming at you as I’m ******* with you      
The next morning, I would have told you a thing or two      
Something old or maybe something new      
It all depends on if I’ve pitied a fool      
Not my game, not in my arms      
Not fooled by undercover charms      
Capture my mind until the ringing of my alarm      
Wow, did we really just talk all night long      
Arms were very strong, your mind kept me warm while we discussed society’s storms      
One night stands      
Never with an intelligent man      
He needs a briefcase or a blueprint plan      
He could execute with his own mind      
On his own time      
Using his own dime      
Then he’s ready for my mind      
No prophylactics needed      
Once you gyrate my mind you’ve succeeded      
Feeding me words from the depths of your cerebral cortex to the powers that be      
Lightening my mind up like a Christmas tree      
Now you got me down on my knees      
Thanking you, as I please      
Was it good for you as it was for me
      
*** WITH ME IS SO AMAZING
Mind now resting in a dreamy phase, body has now been thoroughly praised      
Here comes the aftermath of sweet melodies to conversations      
Moaning out all kinds of pronunciations      
Affirmations      
Aspirations      
French words with exclamations      
Giving me perceptual palpitations      
From the knowledge of head ministrations      
Climbing the psychological throne once again      
While whispering words in my ear as my mind adheres      
Once mental energy has been locked in      
Slow dancing, and then a thrusting rush as we begin      
Words of revelations      
Taking my mind beyond the constellations      
To the height of my glorious crown      
I’ve created, rested, and now the essence of my intellect is winding down      
Mental capacity has once again been meticulously interrogated      
Hearts of the minds now segregated  
    
*** WITH ME IS SO AMAZING
Sweet words whispered to your male ego, minds blazing        
Perceptual notations moving inside of me      
Bending me over, as you lick up and down my womanly creed      
A passionate quick kiss as your mind sinks into my intellectual abyss      
From my mind to your fathom lips      
Seductively gyrating my hips      
Raising the nature of your hard ****      
Love and Hugs        
Soft tongue bathing your body, massage oil, and caressing rubs

Hey Delilah, whatchu doin tonight
I'm comin right over, we gotta get over our lives..our lives

Hey Delilah, take my hand it is strong
Its gonna get over, we gotta get over your howl..
the sound..of fear

Heed the call now
It's waves resonate in you
shredding the soul
many steps we walk through..to the tune

Circular Paths, streets are callin wild
Resides in our heart
Our vibrational soul
in the while, for awhile, all our days

It would be a sin against my God to live in ignorance of your touch
Feel the Divinity of your womanly warmth, of your warmth
To Explore your innermost fathoms
and the Reflection of Desire in your eye
Found in the sensual meditation of your gaze,
in the night

Our Bodies belong together
The story of their union was told
Long before our birth on this earth, in the old, it was told

Like David on the roof top
For you a man would die in war
So meet me by the hillside
We'll grow old, in the shadow of the wood

Away from tired world notion
of what is right or good
Lay with me next to gurgling streams
Adorned with Gold
Whose gaiety of movement
it will match our own
Finding ******* freedom in the forest
The air both sweet and pure

WE CAN BE TOGETHER
THERE LOST IN TIME
HEED MY CALL IT IS WILD AND WARM IN YOUR EYE,
IN YOUR EYE THROUGH THE NIGHT

HEYAHA!

What I am I don't Know!
I run along Rivers and stand naked in snow
Climb Waterfalls, Smile in Trees, and Howl at the Moon
Surf on the Dunes
Swim in the Sea
Lie on the shore in the breeze
If you should ask me I don't know ask me again
I'll never know my friend

You want something from me
a guarantee
Not mine to give
Falling right over, we gotta get over the fear
of the fear

Feel these arms, they can take you down
fold you right up in the valley of womanly streams
Lost in the waters, Life is a dream

There is nooo goin back....From whence we came
Time is like a river wild, untamed, untamed
Endlessly moving forward
into stratums unknown
Make the most of this moment or ever, forever, feel the pains of cowardice alone

The past is like a window
Burns HOT like the sun
Everyone makes choices and hopes they're not wrong

Life is like a river with so many streams
We all go into the ocean drowning with dreams
With dreams left unsaid

It's been awhile, we're gonna find it again
A human connection, Life is dominated by sin
The material
The desire for more, are we here to acquire a Mate?
A family, a woman, a house?
A couple share their drink


Listen to the river of sand
The torrent of Maia
The reign of illusion, found in your hand
Desire
Are we man enough to face it?
To seize our fates?

We live, as cowards, surviving in shadow
What is our personality, Id or the Ego
Liar...Livin in Time

Standing in the Present Moment
Ignoring my Father again
all things come to an end my friend, your lonely soul therein

Deadened tissue of the heart
nothingness invading
wink of the light
rapturous smile, earthly delight, breeds tomorrow's sorrow

Livin' on the last straw
cresting a turquoise wave
Risking the razor's edge of our fall
Dying with a Song on stage
Sensual desire,
wrapped in the spirit,
touched by the Dark, touched by the Light
Hundred million reasons to fight

Rain Wash this age away
Leave me naked in the wind as I came, as I came
Spread cushioned by the bedding of green moss
Birthed in a forest, sonic cataclysmic sound
Consequence, all our dreamin and dreamin and dreamin around

The cog revolves around the wheel
Fire dancer breathing still
In the harmonium of the heart
Into the night we fly to survive

they tell us not to be defined
by our bodies
yet my innocence is tied
to my *****'s status
my appeal tied
to the circumference of my thighs
though beauty may come
in all shapes and sizes
it is only recognized
as the number on the tag
of that little black dress
you match with heels
that cut into your ankles
and lead to stares
that cut into your confidence
"compliments" rain down
and you're not given an umbrella
or at least a ******* raincoat
so you end up drowning, sopping
wet with your sexuality
your ability play down your education
and play up your physical attributes
so my worth is tied
to how much i can disappear
my careful use of measuring cups
reading labels like books
but let me tell you,
there is nothing sensous about
shoving a spoon down your throat
and salads may be ****
but i can't have *** with you
when my blood sugar is this low
while you admire
my "womanly" curves
i am haunted by what it took
to get my stomach to lay flat
so **** the desire for delicate wrists
these expectations are too heavy to carry
in these ******* coach purses

Her scent
is not by fair Channel
for she is nat-u-ral...

her perfume
is soap and flannel
soiled diapers
and form-u-la...

fresh baked bread
and apple pie
White wine
and lem-on-ade

cookies and milk
and chicken soup
hot baths
and hair in braids

for she wears her womanhood
                         in perfume no coin can buy.

My hands shake so much that every time I touch glass, it breaks and leaves blood running through the lines in my palms.
This has happened so often that my psychic tells me she's unable to tell my future because the lines in my hands are so stained that they can't be read anymore.
You see, what she's really trying to tell me is that my psyche is so damaged from lack of oxygen due to drowning in this anxiety.
So don't you dare call this femininity because it isn't very womanly to crave unconsciousness any time I'm alone.

If femininity is synonymous with being beautiful then tell me how it's beautiful to have attempted to die twenty-one times,
Or how two hospitalizations lead me out of the waters of my depression but yet still left me drowning in the ocean with anxiety.

This is not feminine and this is not beautiful, this is my mother screaming that I'm crazy and my father claiming "we're only doing this because we love you,"
This is my anxiety and I in a water-filled box that decreases in size until my head is crammed against the top and the only way I can go is down,
This is my anxiety tied like bricks to my ankles with the sole purpose of holding me under;
This is NOT womanly or feminine or beautiful.

So I beg of you, do not refer to me with metaphors about bodies of water because I don't need a reminder to let me know I'm drowning,
My ****** hands tell me enough about that.

(with poems from the Chinese translated by Arthur Waley)

My bed is so empty that I keep on waking up.
As the cold increases, the night-wind begins to blow.
It rustles the curtains, making a noise like the sea:
Oh that those were waves which could carry me back to you!

Suddenly she was awake. She could feel a cool breeze on the cheek that wasn’t warm on her pillow. She could smell the damp fields, the waterlogged moorland and the aftermath of recent rain. The action of rain on wood or stone seemed to release particular vapours wholly the province of the night in a small town. There was also the not entirely welcome residue of the past evening’s cooking from the kitchen below. But such sensory thoughts were overwhelmed by the rush of conversation clips; these from a day of non-stop voices that had invaded and now occupied her consciousness. She had listened furiously all day, often fashioning questions as the listening proceeded, keeping it all going, being friendly and wise and sensible and knowing. She could hear her tone of voice, her very articulation in the playback of her memory. It was so difficult sometimes to find the right tone, that inflection suitable to different aspects of ‘talk’. She didn’t want to appear pompous or too serious. That would never do. The thing was to be light, but intelligently light so her colleagues would say to one another – ‘Helen is a treasure you know: brilliant person to have on the team. You can always rely on her. ’ She knew she was often anxious for approval, for a right recognition of her efforts, to be thought well of. ‘Doesn’t everybody?’ she thought wistfully.

There was a momentary flurry of what Helen often dreaded when she found herself awake at night – yesterday’s embarrassing moments. These invariably began with ‘Am I wearing the right clothes?’ It was Caroline’s jacket that came to mind first. That mix of informal but simply smart that can only be bought with serious time and a clear conscience with the credit card. Her favourite blue affair (mail order) with big pockets and the slight pattern on the hem suddenly seemed very ‘last year’. Anna had chosen all-over black, loose trousers with a draw string, no jewellery, but flashy sandals and make up. She’d painted her toenails green. Helen did make up – a little, but not to travel in. She knew she had the right shoes for a long day. Then, those first conversations with Paul, who she’d never talked to outside a meeting before. ‘Keep it light, Helen’, she’d say, ‘Don’t say too much – but then don’t say too little.’ She had found herself – her independent womanly self, speaking with an edgy tone she didn’t always feel happy about. As she spoke to Paul about the coming evening’s football – he’d brought it up for goodness sake – she found herself being funny about the inconsequence of it all, then remembering the passion with which people she knew and loved followed the intricacies of this sport. She saved an own goal with some comment about the game’s social significance she’d picked up off some radio interview.

As the long journey had proceeded she’d been able occasionally (thankfully sometimes) to fall into observation-only mode. There was this sorting of images into significant, memorable, able to forget about, of no consequence at all. She’d been caught by the strange geometry of yellow cones that seemed stitched onto the rain-glistening road surface. There had been a buzzard she’d glimpsed for a moment, a reflection of Sally in the window next to her seat, that mother and her new born in the Ladies at the services, the tunnels of dripping greenery as the coach left the motorway for the winding minor roads, then the view of a grey tor on distant moorland followed instantly by the thought of walking there with her sketchbook, her camera and his loving company, with his admiring smile as he watched her move ahead of him on the path; she knew that behind her he was collecting her every movement to playback in his loneliness when they were apart.

Oh how she wished for his dear presence in this large half-cold bed, as the dark of night was being groped by dawn’s grey. There and there, and now the pre-dawn calls of local birds before that first real chorus of the dawn-proper began. She thought of them both on their last visit to this ancient countryside, being newly intimate, being breath-takingly loving, warm together for a whole night, a whole day, a whole night, a whole day . . . the movies in her mind rolled out scenes of the gardens they’d visited, the opening they’d attended, all that being together, holding hands, sitting close together, sitting across from each other at restaurant tables (knees touching), always quietly talking, always catching each other’s glances with smiles, and his gentle kisses and slight touches of the hand on the arm. She began to feel warm, warm and loved.

As she was drifting back into a shallow sleep she remembered his voice recite (in the Rose Walk at Hestercombe) that poem from the Chinese he loved . .

Who says
That it’s by my desire,
This separation, this living so far from you?
My dress still smells of the lavender you gave:
My hand still holds the letter you sent.
Round my waist I wear a double sash:
I dream that it binds us both with a same-heart knot.
Did you not know that people hide their love,
Like a flower that seems to precious to be picked?

There's a difference between looking and
seeing.

You can look at me,
but I wonder more
what you see.

Brown eyes,
brown hair,
barely more than
five feet tall;
my feet are small,
as are my hands;
my teeth are straight,
thanks to braces;
shoulders been broad
since I swam,
but my figure
is much less athletic
than it used to be.

I could look
at myself
and point out
a million flaws.
My forehead is much
too big for my liking,
my cheeks are too red,
my top lip is so
skinny it barely
exists,
and, if you ask me,
my waist line
could afford
to look a little more
like my upper lip.

My looks are far from perfect.
Not saying I'm hideous,
but I don't look
in the mirror
to find
America's Next Top Model,
or anything close,
at least not until
my face is perfectly painted,
flaws concealed under
a combination
of moderately priced makeup and
a rather crafty hand.

When I look,
physical imperfections
and inadequacies
stare back at me.
My overly expressive
light brown eyes
give me an
omnipotent glance,
and they beg me to
turn away,
to close them,
to put them to sleep
so that I can
see.

When I see,
it's like a whole new me.
I'm a human being
whose physical flaws
are diminished by
an overly giving, compassionate
heart,
a brain
filled of logic & curiosity,
a chest
swollen full of
endless giggles,
a throat
storing sarcastic words mixed in with
empathetic phrases;
down within me
I see
the woman
who still at times
looks and feels
more like the girl
whose heart has been broken
too many times to count
but still, despite her
womanly pessimism,
yearns optimistically
to love again.
Within me I see
a woman with confidence
and also insecurity,
ambition and fear,
tranquility and rage,
hope and despair;
I see dreams,
wishes,
prayers,
meditation;
I see a beautifully
complex soul
trapped in a world
that begs it for
simplicity and
conformity.

I guess when I look
I only get a glimpse
of the body
that feels the need
to be perfect,
to work out a little more,
to weigh a little less,
to fix her hair the right way,
and to dress in the right clothes.
The self-conscious me
who still fears being weird,
who cares what others think,
who worries if my parents are proud.

But when I see,
out comes the woman
who says
**** the status quo,
I can't be put in a box,
I'm beautiful the way I am,
and nothing stands
between
me
and achieving
my
dreams.

When I look,
I don't see,
but when I see,
I see me.

I feel the brim of my glasses graze my nose,
and I know,
even once I take 'em off,
my vision
is better
than ever.

Once upon a harvest moon,
a timid gnome encountered a boisterous baboon.
“Whacha up to tonight?!” the baboon slurred,
yelling loud enough that the whole town heard.

‘You got this man,’ the shy gnome thought,
because for a baboon, she was kind of hot.
“Not much, ya know,” stated the gnome,
“I’ve just been hanging out at home.”

“Well that ain’t fun!” the baboon cried,
“You’ve gotta have fun, life’s supposed to be a crazy ride!”
Embarrassed, the gnome replied with a fib,
“Tonight was a fluke! I got out, I’m no Squib!”

Laughing she stated, “I think you’re a liar.”
“Oh really?” He retorted, “My pants aren’t on fire.”
She laughed, “HA HA HA! Good one honey,”
the baboon didn’t realize his joke was not funny.

Drunk as a skunk, she had no clue,
the meadow she was in was not Club Blue.
The gnome, however, thought things were going well,
trapped in the clutches of her womanly spell.

Being a bit nerdy he didn’t get out much,
the poor gnome had never even felt a woman’s touch.
Feeling bolder he decided to take a chance,
until he realized that the baboon had peed her pants.