thoughts on a warm afternoon
Mar. 6th, 2007 05:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
butterflydreamingPerspective.
When I walk up a steep hill, if I look neither up to the distant crest nor down the slope, if I think only of the next steps ahead, I find the climb easier. On a precarious trail with switchbacks and steep drops, the rule of safety is "walk, or look". I like to stop and look, to see how far along I've made it up the path, or to look around and take it the perspective at that point. It's a look, only, an observation. There is only forward.
My birthday is weeks away. It's important not because I think of 35 as pivotal, but because I made a promise to myself back, back in the distance that comes due on the day I turn 35. I'm not thinking about that now. That's up ahead, at the crossroad, and I'm here at a point with such a wide, amazing view. I can look at the landscape and see where I have been, I can think about The Story Up Til Now if I want to, or I can look out at the wide sky and take in the breadth of it.
Do I speak in metaphors too often? Is that my way of being evasive? I write poetry because I'm trying to put a tap into the place of meaning, which is a place that doesn't have words. Trying to get to the sweet in the maple tree, as it were.
I wasn't always awake. I don't think I woke up until I was fifteen, though I had moments of lucidity before that. Like when I swore I'd never grow up. {smile} My little caterpillar self, wriggling along, destroyer of gardens. I touched magic early on, and have stayed with one hand against the wall of Dreaming's hedge maze ever since. I still too often daydream. Pain reminds me to pay attention. The points in my life that stand out are the ones marked with spots of heart blood. Even my first kiss was there to ease my tears.
I've been the serious, good but lazy girl, the reclaimed child in short skirts, the priestess to sorrow in black. I've been the wise woman. I've been the creature of Whim, getting into a car with a stranger, and I've been the agent of chaos, which was almost the same thing. I've been hope's fool. I've progressed. Where I am now and who I am now are not a sum of who I've been, because I am more than the sum of my past. Every moment has been a lesson. Every contact has daubed another color. I remember some more sharply than others, that's all. And of course, I'm still learning. A woman learns early about appearances, & a strong one finds power in the smoke and magic, but a smart one doesn't lose herself while trading masks.
When I walk up a steep hill, if I look neither up to the distant crest nor down the slope, if I think only of the next steps ahead, I find the climb easier. On a precarious trail with switchbacks and steep drops, the rule of safety is "walk, or look". I like to stop and look, to see how far along I've made it up the path, or to look around and take it the perspective at that point. It's a look, only, an observation. There is only forward.
My birthday is weeks away. It's important not because I think of 35 as pivotal, but because I made a promise to myself back, back in the distance that comes due on the day I turn 35. I'm not thinking about that now. That's up ahead, at the crossroad, and I'm here at a point with such a wide, amazing view. I can look at the landscape and see where I have been, I can think about The Story Up Til Now if I want to, or I can look out at the wide sky and take in the breadth of it.
Do I speak in metaphors too often? Is that my way of being evasive? I write poetry because I'm trying to put a tap into the place of meaning, which is a place that doesn't have words. Trying to get to the sweet in the maple tree, as it were.
I wasn't always awake. I don't think I woke up until I was fifteen, though I had moments of lucidity before that. Like when I swore I'd never grow up. {smile} My little caterpillar self, wriggling along, destroyer of gardens. I touched magic early on, and have stayed with one hand against the wall of Dreaming's hedge maze ever since. I still too often daydream. Pain reminds me to pay attention. The points in my life that stand out are the ones marked with spots of heart blood. Even my first kiss was there to ease my tears.
I've been the serious, good but lazy girl, the reclaimed child in short skirts, the priestess to sorrow in black. I've been the wise woman. I've been the creature of Whim, getting into a car with a stranger, and I've been the agent of chaos, which was almost the same thing. I've been hope's fool. I've progressed. Where I am now and who I am now are not a sum of who I've been, because I am more than the sum of my past. Every moment has been a lesson. Every contact has daubed another color. I remember some more sharply than others, that's all. And of course, I'm still learning. A woman learns early about appearances, & a strong one finds power in the smoke and magic, but a smart one doesn't lose herself while trading masks.
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no subject
Date: 2007-03-07 03:43 am (UTC)Today was amazing and beautiful. And this was a good tribute to that and you.
:)
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Date: 2007-03-07 10:00 pm (UTC)