mary, mary

oh my those scraggly legs & paws let me kiss them all over / tide pool / my companion, my friend / a little lichen love / Winnie surrounding by new, fresh green / we pretend we're in the forest / a palette of lichen colour / the crescent beach beautiful


What I want to say is
that the past is the past,
and the present is what your life is,
and you are capable
of choosing what that will be,
darling citizen.

So come to the pond,
or the river of your imagination,
or the harbor of your longing,
and put your lips to the world.

And live
your life.

Mary Oliver, Red Bird

there's a kind of sadness that lives in me that feels not so much as sadness, it feels like a kind of awareness - a super heightened awareness. I use the word vigilance (hyper vigilance) because it feels right, it fits. I feel always braced, ready, on high alert trying to protect the world around me and to protect my own much loved tribe (which extends beyond the walls of 29 Black Street). Having Doug in my life for the past nearly 4 years has helped tremendously with this burden/responsibility of care & protection I carry around & hold onto much too tightly, he willingly holds some of it for me, and that helps. I have a lot to hold onto. I'm afraid to let go. I'm afraid to loosen my grip.

I think about Winnie dying every day, at least 6 times every day - it's crazy I know. But she is 14.5 years old. She is a very senior dog. The time will come sooner than later, bless her shaggalicious heart & soul. My friend Missy D, my love. I will miss her, I will ache for her. I will want to smell her, put my face in her belly after she's gone and fall asleep there breathing in and out with her. The thing is she's absolutely fine, healthy, happy, eating well. We go on two walks/strolls a day, sure she's a little slower lately, I think she's a little deaf ... but she's fine - really. I have no reason to suspect an end is near except for the fact of her very senior age. But I can't help but believe I need to get ready, 'cause that Sadness is a comin' and I better be shoring up (or trying to) the walls of my heart so I will cope better with that sorrow, with that grieve. So I won't miss her so much. So I won't feel so lost when she's gone. 

I'm so happy she lives so vividly here on this blog & that she will live on here forever, she will live in my heart forever & ever ... but oh, my how I will miss her. How I will miss my morning walking companion. Thank goodness for young Samuel who I know is waiting in the wings to become my next true love, & to try and fill her big shaggalicious paws on each early morning jaunt :-)

mary, mary ... Mary Oliver I love you, you give me strength I've forgotten that I had.

From the complications of loving you
I think there is no end or return.
No answer, no coming out of it.

Mary Oliver, Thirst