Gretchen's Blog
-
Utter Humble Thanks *!!!*
I rarely take time (though should! – cognitive dissonance anyone?) to
do the thing always recommended by Traditions of Wisdom to live a life
of true abundance, fearlessness and inner prosperity:::which is to
concretely NAME the things that bring beauty, joy and inexorable smiles
to my heart and face. Or, more commonly put, light candles instead of
throwing cusses at the darkness.
This is a SERIOUS supplicatory THANK YOU for literal things that
reminded me - in the past 48-72 hours - to stop and catch the scent of
marigolds when I have been busy stinging my own self with my inner bee,
instead of drawing pollen for soon-to-be-sweetness (honey) from their
yellowgold (sunlight metaphorical) graciousness.
Less fluffily put: Things that single-handedly not only buoyed me when
I was kicking around a side of the emotional pendulum it’s not fun to
hang out in (but was powerless to legislate emotions for evacuation of
self from said uncomfortable feeling-zone) but these angels injected
joyful cheer and reinstated a can’t-rub-off-with-brillo smile (as much
as brillo - challenging situations - will try).
(Um, so I guess I am a compulsively fluffy author. That certainly wasn’t less fluffily put!)
: Saran Wrap’s voicemail yesterday. Was mystically profound in the
sense that it could not have come at a more perfect time nor echoed
more precisely the flares in my heart spurtily leaping in happy, lit,
can-see-for-miles, love and gratitude for her. gretchy gretch loves you
sg.
: Dave F. – he doesn’t even know it but he grounded me and I want to reach through the screen and hug him.
: Anna - for reminding me why making new friends is so much fun.
: (It is written on page one of the manual for growing up; everyone
knows that little kids thrive! on the idea of making new friends and
they are always overjoyed, pictures of bliss, because making new
friends is better than cupcakes. Why that concept scares me (or
socially anxious people like me) sometimes is immaterial (of course a
conversation for a psychologically analytical entry!) but what’s
important is that I am seizing the opportunity and am SO grateful for
these new awesome marigold blooms presenting themselves…as long as I
follow through (and emotional reciprocity is there, which thankfully it
tends to be because I believe that for the most part, what we feel for
others is mirrored back to us).
: Danielle C. - some things bear repeating – for reminding me why making new friends is so much fun.
: Bess - …and for old friends made shiny new again and connecting with
me as if she could read my mind, reach in and hug the exact part in me
in need of it then.
: Steph – for loving me (and me her – oof is that proper English? ) in
a way only we share. Sacred friendship genuinely anchored in the
luminosity and abiding comfort-giving it is soul’s function to provide
to our human shell when its gets fragile (which it OFTEN does).
: Marc M. K. – for being a remarkably beautiful person who held a bit
of a mirror up to my own self and enabled me to glimpse things in my
self that I was afraid to see but am SO thankful for having allowed to
come up. What a treat it will be to meet him, someone clearly gorgeous,
not only from the music I’ve heard but knowing Sarah’s sensibilities
(the very ones which have won me over and put me down for the count and
to whom my trust has been given over) see such wondrous beauty in him
and that their souls are matched like magic, jigsaw, just-right pieces.
And Eddie, his bf, whose reputation as an awesome person whom Sarah
loves precedes him and makes me grateful and excted to meet in person.
: My aunt Joan – for modeling a true Buddha. She IS compassionate
unconditional lovingness and reached into the leaky tearful valve in me
and, as gently as a daisy petal is kissed by dew on a spring morning,
she kissed my hurt and my frog turned prince again.
: Dalip – oh my god my heart just did a lightning-speed summersault of
ecstatic thankfulness. If it weren’t for him, I very well may never
have come to see the humble love and beauty in myself he recognized and
tenderly believed in all along. Your heart – which thank god will
always be tucked safely, sacredly (impossible to overstate its value)
in my heart - is my staff. Your light is morning to my every night
time. It is impossible to adequately name the gratitude I have for our
moon and sun love affair. You are the daffodils under my snow.
: Jeni – I have fallen in love. :) (For our peanut butter bedsandwich
last night which was pure 100% happiness. The prefect toy to offer my
inner child and distract, with positive reinforcement, from the energy
of tantrum my heart had been fixated on.) Jeni is the smile curative to
ANY AND ALL inner yuck zones. ;).
: On this note – God gave me the healing grace of other little kiddos
yesterday to erupt and overwhelm me in glee EXACTLY when I needed it.
On dingy sardine-packed subway elevator of 168th St and Broadway, as I
listened to beautiful music at full pitch in my headphones, I hovered
over two little children, a boy and girl, no more than four years old
each. It was clear they were fraternal twins (which was soon confirmed
once I did begin chatting with their beautiful and warmly personable
mom) as each child held the hand of their mommy, one at each of her
sides. As I was about to comment, on their sheer adorableness, to them
and their mom, my smile beginning to overtake my face, because of how
innocently happy and – well just perfect cute little kiddies they were
- the little boy, who had been looking up at me all along, grinning
more and more widely like he was in love with seeing me there right
then, just gently took my hand in his. OH MY GOD how ridiculously sweet
and I melted on the spot. As if that wasn’t yummy enough, his sister
then, with her free hand, the other still gripped in mommie’s, did the
same. A garland of love had become of the four of us. “Strangers” were
at once transformed into a connected ring of love, whose colors swirled
over me like a care bears rainbow, in the infinite gift of the present
moment.
: my brother Daren – for our phone call and making me yearn for our
next visit! Reminding me where my home also is and how much I am in
rapture every time I am there, both in location and with his voice.
: my sister, Lauren – they say nothing is forever and everything
changes. Obviously this principle exempts identical twins, blessed with
the bond we share, whose love is more constant than the Unmoved Mover.
: Dolly Parton (for personal reasons I won’t go into here. She is a daily savior for me. Yes, I mean this!)
: my Ipod shuffle this morning – like the Pink song goes, “If God were
a DJ and life is the music, get on the dancefloor ... something
something ( I forget exactly the lyrics!)” - Anyway, yes my Ipod
shuffle this morning, on my bus then subway commute from Jersey City,
for letting GOD DJ and selecting approximately the eight to ten songs
that my personal soul tailor could not have more ideally designed for
the mood I was in and needed to be carried along.
: Evan – for sweating me ;) (in a mannerly polite way) and whose emails always hit the spot.
: Jason – for respecting mutual attraction in an appropriate way and
honoring my primary relationship while still wishing to play in the
fields of our whimsical compatibility.
: Burris – another brilliant halo-headed hipster of loving kindness, an
angel in charmingly sweet and innocent suitor’s clothing. A dear friend
who ALWAYS says the right thing and is a high-wattage smile catalyst.
: Danielle S. - for not even knowing it but whose comments on something
were very comforting, made me feel validated and way more human and
perfectly natural and ok to feel things I do.
: Steven - who has become my cherished confidante and dear friend and
filled a place in my heart that I can only describe in neon letters
synonymous with love.
: for Magnolia cupcake frosting! Holy shit. Just holy shit. (There is
no such thing as feeling gloomy with this taste in your mouth!!!)
: for almost three days off coffee and living to tell about it. And
Yerba Matte as made by my inviolately gracious and nurturing
girlfriend, whose goodness of heart translates into absolutely
everything she touches. So, yes, food prepared by her always becomes my
favorite meal – or in this case, drinkable orgasm with the steaming
yerba matte she ever-perfectly, caretakingly makes sure is in my to-go
mug (well, hers that has so quaintly become the one she reserves for
me) as I blow out the door late as usual for the bus after a perfect
adults-who-are-in-love “sleepover” together. ;)
: and how can I end without bowing, with all the chivalry of legendary
knights, the balladry of an Elizabethan minstrel, the open hearted
humility of a seeker kneeling at the pew of *wow*, and all the excesses
of love the universe lets loose on the playgrounds of my sandbox heart,
to my Sarah, who isn’t mine but is uniquely hers, and God’s. For her
forbearance and consoling compassion, and for letting me share in the
beauty she gives to the world so much bigger than me, and that leaves
it surpassingly more beautiful than it was before her heartprints
danced in glitter upon it.
-
Penny (song)
***
So I gathered up the seashells
and I spoke to the angels
and I threw a penny down a well
Only so I wouldn't have to feel
sad effects of the way she feels
Should have guessed that when you steal
from the one you love it's not the same when you give it back
Steal her heart then you give her a heart attack
Don't you know,
she doesn't want you back
There's still
dried blood on the knife in her back you put there
Life's still a roller coaster
but the tracks are safer now
And she likes it that way
so get away from her
She's found new dates
and mates to play with her
Now it's too late
to be what you were
So I gathered up the seashells
and I spoke to the angels
and I
kept that penny in my pocket
because change is good to have
and I guess she has.
***
© Gretchen Turner 2008
-
For Saraji --- Love, Thine Gretch(here’s-my-pleaseopenme-ke)y
OMG I just have to say that "BROKEN WINGS" JUUUSSSTTT CAME ON in this awesome cofffe shop I'm in! JUST _ AS _ I _ WENT _ TO _ SEND _ THIS _ TO _ YOU!!!!!! ({cosmictruthinourveins}synchronicity i love theee!)
Ok and here's your poem: x:Dx
Ghettoblaster Makemegiggle-master Red Rover Red Rover let Saraji Come Over
Ass in a Sling Get Your Freak on BlingBling Soul Slurping Swingdancing Gutter, Butter-stealing Trash(y) Queens-on-Love like God is a Junkie
For Sarah, November 23, 2008
Love,
Thine Gretch(here's-my-pleaseopenme-ke)y
***
She can be
(is all)
the man my hetero needs
and she is the goddess on which
my Sappho feeds
may I disappear in her mythical(?)
sargassus seaweeds
I don't need to be seen from again
I want! to get lost in her leagues of freedom
fathoms down I (tradesnorklefor)scuba-go
my Atlantis wants to be buried under her lavic volcano
to be discovered centuries later, yet moments ago
time warping dreamers just taking it hyperspeed
slowly…
Paradox drifters feeling forever in now
Oxymoronic gifters with silent longings out loud
Rat race seems won when you get off the tracks
Read set ready set ready set goalies
guarding each other with hockey sticks and bats
not saving each other
but saving each from joy(gay)bashers who'd still have us at the back
of the bus
stoned, and burned, and noosed, to the gallows
Well, this bus is magic
and I rejoice and cry out
how I've never been this stoned
and I don't flatter a closet
I've busted the mercury of her thermometer up my ass
(the red rising needed more space)
and my temperature keeps ascending fast
And she may ring (and even slit) my neck
with her garland of pulses (and a pirate's scythe to plunder my voicebox)
that we check when we're cheek to cheek
and crotch/cock to locket
and find we're beating,
nearly convulsing
the same electronica jitterbug erotica number
in jukebox wonderland symposium
Roseland throats
I can be so myself with her
god what a trip!
I love who I am and that
it needs no gift wrapping (synthetics)
No let-me-be-this-way since maybe she'll like it
this is all improvised, televised Saturday Night Live jump and jiving
We just happen to swing to the same ragtime synchs
and I know something soul-y
I don't have to just think it
There's a forest fire raging, a crop devoured by locusts
All our old conditionings needed purging to be ready for this
New growth has peeped its head in crocuses in our joints
mint and lime and clover (pink hearts yellow moons … magically delicious) greens
have mossed our skin and oops our underwear healing is showing!
I'm supposed to be doing homework, so to my obligations I go
but I had to offer this oblation, this ablution, this orison before so you'd know
that my heart's been undressed and it's not shivering in this Thanksgiving cold
it's staying, as fast as I can,
and warm
buried, morning after in an avalanche of sheets and holding her
my nose pierced at the septum with her scent
and my smile pressed to her shoulder.
*** -
shooting star
(maybe 1997?)
shooting star
or how you live
there's no right or wrong
just initiative
so curse the expletives, they possess the soul
as demons chide and misguide our goals
the point of no control
will prick
the one who finds it
don't get wheedled by this needle of disaster
i asked her what was the difference between that edge
and the edge of a razor
but the question didn't phase her
and with a slit
she quit on life
she said she felt like a clown
that wasn't funny anymore
the feeling she was looking for
was in another town
that could be found on a shooting star
sick of the escape
as she raped the bottles she got from the local bar
she always said life was a dream
i never did know what she means by that
but she was a fantasy to those who understood
because she did what she could to fill their cups
you know
life really is just a dream
because most of us never wake up.