In these very dry, very windy times I present my poem Belongings written 7 years ago when a fire raged a mile from our Hollywood Home and caused me to recognize what was really important in my life: Love, Friendship and Art. Wishing everyone a safe time. Here is the poem: Two ridges away deer and coyote, tree and underbrush are Drowning in an angry sea of flame, two ridges away. Away the wind! Helicopter heroes and exhausted firemen belie our held-in terror With their consciences, to care at risk of their life and home and family What we might have to leave behind--our home full of its treasures. What should we take with us that we could not bear to return to, Buried in ash or ash itself? Crisis creates clarity amidst confusion: I must grab my art. What I have created are not possessions, they are belongings To show I am alive or once I lived and so I live in them. We stack up paintings I’ve put my brush upon to leave the Trace and texture of my heart, but the largest paintings are not Fit to take: they will not fit. I tell myself we have high-res photos, But does that resolve the high dilemma of leaving them behind? I stack up single copies of each music score I’ve bled and wept and gloried into existence, Thin representatives of a whole life’s work, Held in one arm like a wounded child in wartime. Beloved doggie Winston, his leash, a bit of food are safe By the door for instant rescue. I need his non-verbal, Unconditional love more than shelter, knowing that it shelters me. And my true domicile housing my most priceless belongings (my essence and my memories) he to whom I choose to belong And he to me, for all the lonely years that I had longed for him, My dear husband takes my computer lovingly apart to preserve The new symphonic work in which I preserve the memories of an Exiled, ancient Chinese poet, who once amidst the flames and wars and Vastness of China, had longed for the gardens of home. Hearing the sound of a Jade Flute floating on spring breezes, Squeezing his poet’s heart with memories of the Parting Ceremony Where he and his loved one broke the willow branch And gave each other one half of it for remembrance’s sake, Knowing that they’d never see each other again, goodbye. The notes, the breeze, the sweet parting lie enclosed in the Microchips and memory of a machine, my child most vulnerable of all. Meanwhile firemen risk their personal memories, their snapshots of Weddings and newborns and long lost grandparents to save Our hills and homes from painful partings, but sad to say They cannot rescue six hundred plus the aching acres of our treasured Park, Dante’s roost, the carousel safe. Ray saves my fragile poems in between The painting frames. Irony can iron out the wrinkles but how does it manage to make creases in the fabric that simply won’t come out? I inspect and introspect what matters most and call some friends To see if they are safe, fingering jewelry that I may never see again, And put a precious few inside my special lacquer box, asking myself What possessed me to possess so much? I choose only a few photos Wondering why they call to me, “Take me, leave that one here”, crying from Their frames, jealous of each other, like siblings, begging not to be abandoned. I cannot take everything, I put my homemade wedding album on the stack of music scores, Wondering if these now so solid walls will sear and so I seem to see Potentialities of flames that shimmer and overlap the solidity of material Things, but brush away the thought as thought can make reality come true. If it burns, will I ever recall that flower pillow I was so fond of that I just had to Have it, making excuses at the store for what a bargain it was, the stack of Hat boxes with sixty-seven hats, multiple personalities contained. Have they contained the fire? I contain myself first but worry Will long suffering plants hate me when I leave them behind? They waited to be watered and gave us oxygen, do they deserve to die? I dare not think about the pianos, they have lived and breathed My breath of music in quiet midnight hours, dear friends and true Belongings that I wrench from my grasp, orators to be burned at the stake For what they said with impunity on less fiery nights. Yes, crisis creates clarity amidst confusion: Love, friendship, family, Pets and Art are my belongings. At last we are safe, the TV News Yaps on, keeping hot spots alive to sell pharmaceuticals at commercial break. And I embrace the knickknacks I would have sacrificed in the bonfires of Vanity and hold within my heart my true belongings, bracing myself for Winds of change, still knowing what I would choose and did. Life is choices, twists and turns, decisions, fires and embers. At least I have learned I do not belong to my house, My house belongs to me. Love, Friendship and Art are my belongings. Copyright ©2007 Carol Worthey
Posted on: Thu, 15 May 2014 01:23:40 +0000
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