Creative Edge Letter Box On Line #4

I'm new to the net and excited about it's potential for exchange of creative ideas. I found your web page and decided to respond to your invitation to submit something. I'm an Anglican Priest working in a Baptist Church in England. I wrote the poem in the summer of last year. I woke in the night because I was restless and somewhat agitated about a relationship with a friend and colleague. The night was so electric as I gazed out of my bedroom window into space. I saw myself in my multidimensional context. Awestruck by the night sky, drawn to the sensual intimacy of my sleeping wife and deeply aware of my craving to articulate the feelings of my inner self. I was suddenly gripped by the image of my tears being jewels which made them precious and gave me a sense of well-being. I slept well after writing the poem without working on it at all. It's one of my favorites.

THE NIGHT IS TREMENDOUS BLUE

The night is tremendous blue,
dream blue,
believers blue,
and you lie still,
so still,
your body like a warm pool
ripples at my touch.
You sleep,
I weep my weary prayer
and somewhere
the words weave themselves
into golden globes
jeweled with tears
hanging from the ears of God.

Hadge Hughes.
hadge@netcomuk.co.uk

Sandpoint, ID

Fennis wolf is a story I heard in the mountains of Northern California, used to encourage children to carry in firewood. The story was effective. With a few nights traveling on the 'information highway' I have been able to track the myth from Scandinavia to Germany and (perhaps) even Ireland. The Myth concerns the giant wolf Fenis, Fennis, Fenris, Fenrir who was prophesied to run wild in Ragnorok (the twighlight of the god's) in the 'Fimbulvetr' (the winter without end) and devour Odin, the king of the god's (Norse variety). I no longer have any doubt how we were motivated to bring in the firewood. I amuse myself in the winter trying to learn more about poetry. This is an attempt to convey a child's dread.

Fenris (or Wolf's Winter)
It was a time when the snows did not stop. The wheat stores were short. The women had little for their mills. The children grew hungry and their fathers' hollow-eyed. Thieves were killed without mercy, for mercy was as scarce as the bread in that season. In the chill of dawn, the wolves came down. It was not bad at first, but in the harshest time, the big wolf, the wolf of stories, the wolf of tears, was sighted. His eyes were red, not unlike the fire, and his breath stank of flesh... man flesh. It was then the old woman came forward and said in an aside, "It is the Fenris Wolf, the wolf, I fear, and so should you." It runs through the forest, yet no man can see it, until it is upon him. My dears, if he is running; it is his winter. Hold your children close, be kind to your husband. Should Fenris claim this winter, the gods will lay asunder all you hold dear, save your fear. Beware, if he closes.
How large is the wolf, mother?
I've heard it said
his great paws spread
beyond our furthest border

What's become of my brother?

We both felled wood
yesterday... yet this day...
please tell me, mother
where is my brother?

Granddad's sword is drawn

Did father say
where the old folks lay
the bones are gnawn
and gone this day

Has no one seen my brother?

The spears are set
facing outward
fierce points long
black iron strong

What color is the dawn?

Grandma said what we can't see
could be the things that set us free
does the cold wind howl
or the great wolf growl

I hope not

The fire feels warm,
mother,
just answer me
my mind set free

Has no one seen my brother?

Jon Ruffatto
riveratz@digital-cafe.com

Soquel, CA

Near the end of 1993 I almost died. Spent most all of 1994 recovering. Back in 1986 I joined MCAP--Monterey County AIDS Project. I can and have told many stories why I joined. All of them containing some grain of truth. However, reaching into my spirit, I don't really know why I did what I did. I obeyed some deep impulse. Once involved, I became drenched with death. Sat and watched men and women die, was present when some died. Those experiences nearly a decade ago and my own near-death gave me a perspective that is best expressed in a poem I wrote titled Dying by Inches.

Watching the number of people die from AIDS, my experience was that we all die as we have lived----up to a point. That point is when decay takes over and it was never pretty or edifying to me.

DYING BY INCHES
Everyone's counting, measuring, recording,
life being long lists and statistics.
By accident I turned, I turned
into a driveway, an accidental turning,
ninety degrees, turning my life.

Seeking a friend's home I found
instead my doctor's house among things,
he measures heart beats, blood pressure,
blood sugar, and fatigues. I am exhausted.
We met accidentally for moments,
in which he looks, head cocking to a side.
"How are you feeling?" An appointment was made.
The inching already begun became noticeable.
Some say there are no accidental turnings,
all turns return measured in mortality.

It became a time of machines testing, defining.
It became a time of great tentacled, tabled, tracked machines.
Machines that towered mute above me
or else crouched gurney-side winking digital,
operated by technicians and doctors that seemed,
at moments, to be no more than jolly extensions
of closed circuit probings and measured evaluations.
The machines at peace in compassion and wisdom;
compassion, in that they serve all equally;
wisdom, in that they know their limited use.

A heavy metal table where I huddled, my loins shivering scuddy,
subject to technicians administering an enema
Barium enema Great Barium Reef, I think,
hysterical for humor and denial of condition.
An x-ray vision on a black and white monitor,
watching my colon, an old curled caterpillar,
slowly fill with night spewed slow motion.
The cavity filled, x-rays taken with me
in desperate beefcake poses, only moving inches,
holding my breath as told then being told to breathe.
Then holding my breath then turning just an inch again.
A shadow, something darker than night is seen
could be scar tissue, a tumor, could be anything:
such as death in residence in an intestine.

Another measuring procedure, a sigmoidoscopy.
Another room, another table, another huddling,
obeying, moving slightly thus and so,
staring at a monitor, this in peacock color,
feeling, ignominiously, a tube inserted up my anus,
the meat red glistening walls a Disney sci-fi set
"That's normal," the technician-doctor voice,
"That's normal," and, "That," stopping our exploration,
taking pictures after careful focusing, "That is not normal."

"That?" I ask, with no voice, a thin white breath voice,
"That's it," he says matter-of-factly.
I stare at a malevolent rosebudding.
I may be looking at my monitor death.

After, dressed, stunned, sitting gingerly,
conscious that I've moved, that there is
a line, a separation of space between me and others:
I try my last hope in an effort to move back.
"What are the chances it is benign?"
The doctor looks at me stamped, open,
an inevitable face
"It is not benign," he states, "I'll risk my
professional standing, it is not benign.
You will need major surgery. It is not benign."
I am numb, something wild in me growing to my doom.

It becomes a time of havoc, of balefires,
of battlement shoutings, of half-hidden figures
withdrawing around dark corners, of limited
sight and sense, of sensible suggestions,
of insinuating fear: I am to be cut,
portions of me to be removed, analyzed,
then burned: something of me is to be smoke.
A time of awakening late at night
to whisper, say, hear the words: I have cancer,
I have cancer of the colon cancer I have cancer,
said breathy and quick over and over.

There is so much to read and sign, so much
to hear and try to comprehend, so many acts
that may be final; I want to say to my wife:
no matter what I'll find you. I don't. I smile.
The day rushes at me, at us, I am prepped-
shaved and sterilized. I am in a tiled hall
hearing sounds, seeing lights, lying on a gurney.
Alone, I breathe, no two breaths alike.
They say they are ready, my breath is short, shallow.

The operating room is brilliant metal and tile.
It seems so cold, the staff so friendly and informal,
busy about their jobs it is just a work place
for them, I think a fateful place for me.
The surgeon is shy, tall, courtly, quiet.
I want to say something memorable. I can't.
I am afraid. Someone is jabbing my arm,
having difficulty finding a vein. I want to be
of assistance that is the last thing I remember.

Then a moment when my faith, confidence, and resolve break
In the Recovery Room which I did not recognize
more a metallic cold hell with fires turned
to an awful achieving light that burns into my flesh
as a generous unforgiving pain; pain and voices
telling me in patient enunciation to breathe,
that I was not breathing hear me, Donald?-
My head turns too easily, I have no axis,
my head lolls through time,
through civilizations of pain.
My head rolls slowly toward death. Breathe. To know
the ultimate question is so tempting; breathe,
take a good breath, Donald, that's it. My head
moves an inch to see a woman with a wonderful smile.
She is by my ear, leaning on an elbow. In first seeing,

I know her life.
To know and know I know.
I breathe. It so aches,
this living.

My wife is suddenly there, talking of breathing;
her hands, her nails, clean and trim, making me think
of Amish women in bonnets doing good breathing.
I giggle and drift with Amish nails. Breathe.
I clutch her simple gift fingers hearing breathe.

I am taken to a room and left with night lights.
I lie awake drug-dreaming. I throb.
Nurses and aides come and go.
I am amazed at their everyday beauty,
at the life curves and planes.
I throb, the pain leisurely spreading. I am alive,
I will live, I will know. I will be afraid.

Finally, dawn coming, first day of cancer recovery,
first day of not knowing.
Finally the fear is not that I'll die,
but live, live with the illumination of a shadow self;
self that hides behind the knowing and the deed.

I inch up a ladder of pain to sit giddy,
look out a window to see
the tragic elegant reach of a cypress;
In a sepia dawn light, a bird, a thrush,
Swainson's or Hermit, hops outside my window.
We look at one another, wonder in the air.
The thrush poses atop a mini-boulder, stands
in subdued beauty for a long time, staring.
I breathe shallow and watch. We both are so still.
Away, catching the first morning sun, so slanting,
a sprinkler starts stuttering,
arcing long jets of crinkling tinfoil.
Is everything so electric, so unbearably beautiful?

Slowly, staring, breathing, listening, I recover.
Like a shaft of delicate glass, I begin walking.
I practice daily, becoming stronger, an end in mind.
There is a place I know I want to go.
A mountain meadow full of tall grass.
Harding grass Phalaris Aquatica, native to Europe.
I want to go there and take everyone.
Everyone I've ever seen or known or loved.
Everyone, all of them, and we'll take our time.

The hike is steep and long and the young
and the impatient will wait for the old and for me.
The dead will be carried tenderly in memory.
We will hike, we will get to that meadow
where the grass is awned waist high.

I will wade, a dot, one for so many.
I will wade legless to a knoll, the grass making
an important crunch sound underfoot,
then whispering whips around my thighs
as I move slowly to find a spot to stand.
The grass has a sun blasted beige color
tinged with a subtle mauve seen far off.

There I will stand and watch the wind.
I want to watch it coming across,
bending the tall grass in a sheen.
I want to watch it approach near,
scattering awn in a promise,
I want to see it be with me
then turn and watch it disappear.

I want to watch it, I want to watch it,
I want to watch it by the inches.

Donald Marsh
marsh@cruzio.com

Thank you for your creative offerings!

I invite readers to share their own creative works (poems, stories, images, comment, etc.) in Letter Box On Line (LBOL). I look for work and comments I feel support understanding and encouragement of the creative process, and hence, the process of life.

The Editor