I used to think I knew who I was writing to. I used to think it was decided. I used to think it was just a matter of time and patience and trudging through all the metaphorical shit that one must certainly trudge through to get back to where one began.
And then slowly, ever so slowly, that thought--that bone-deep belief slipped right out the soles of my feet. It slipped out on long walks home and as I stood on the hardwood floor of my very own kitchen cleaning dishes and making dinners of little more than cheese and bread and wine. That thought now litters the ground on which I stand, I'm knee deep in it, but it's not in me--not anymore.
So now I'm left to wonder not just who I'm writing to, but how it is we'll meet.
How will the love story begin?
Maybe it'll be a long look across a crowded bar. Maybe you'll sink me before I even know your name.
One can hope.
I think, the thing is, whether it's a massive clusterfuck or that long-held-look--it'll do.
Yours in anticipation. Always yours. Already.
Yours.
...
in quotes, Uncategorized
It took my twenty-something years to learn how to love myself, I don't have that kinda time to convince somebody else. | Daniel Franzese
trees and naves.
I sat in church shivering, my green coat draped over my shoulders.
There wasn't enough oil to heat the church. So we sat there, shaking a little, cold, but lit by that nameless thing that tethers one to the pew, that makes one kneel before the alter in awe, and begs thanks for how small we feel when under the nave of the church.
The mass was fast--the father needing to get to the next service at the parish's sister church. But in the middle of the accelerated unfolding of ritual the priest gave a homily on global warming--how even if the science is soft, it is an experiential thing and at this point the experience of it cannot be denied, and how we as people who love God--who love our fellow man--must also love the earth, must love this gift of a place that was never ours to keep.
"I can never get over when you're on the beach how beautiful the sand looks and the water washes it away and it straightens it up and the trees and the grass all look great. I think having land and not ruining it is the most beautiful art that anybody could ever want to own."
I love that quote.
I love it most especially because it was Andy Warhol who said it. Bet you didn't expect that? I know, it gives it a punch.
When I returned to Brooklyn after the storm I tried to figure out if the winds and rain had accelerated the loss of leaves in such a way that that's what my eye was registering, or if we'd really lost so many trees.
The cutout of green against sky transformed.
There were places where the loss was obvious--the body of the majestic thing now splayed across a street. Desperate roots still clinging to sidewalk.
The trees sing a song in New York. And this week there's less music. Small deaths.
Against the loss of human life, the loss of a tree is a small thing, we all know this. And yet, this week, it has been there at the unearthed trunks and exposed rings of oaks and elms that people have gathered with offerings of small and silent questions: How long was this tree here? How much did it see? And why did it fall--why this one and not that one?
The mantles of God multitudinous. The places in which we we feel our own size and worth extending far beyond pews and naves.
the best thing i saw yesterday:
Yesterday I walked from Carroll Gardens to midtown Manhattan. It took about 2 1/2 hours. I'm going to do it once more today and then spend the night with a friend in Queens where the F train is in service. You can imagine I saw quite a bit on my sojourn. Walking through a powerless (and relatively empty) lower Manhattan was certainly a sight. But nothing compared to this--this thing that I'm quite certain had nothing to do with the hurricane or its effect. Outside of University Hospital many of the patients lined the sidewalk, candy on their laps, and children paraded past, gathering goodies from each. What a gift. God, what a gift--for the children, for the patients, for the parents, for me watching from the other side of the street. What lessons learned there in that parade of small children.
It was the loveliest thing I've seen in a good long while. It'll be an image I carry forward for years. A Halloween with more meaning. More. More life. More generosity. The kind of more one is always searching for--right there on Henry Street.
My New York// Halloween is a thing in this neck of the woods + the aftermath of Sandy
