The Blue Grosbeak at Jordan Dam, near Moncure, N.C.
***
The Late Years Forty-Three August 25, 2019
We have so many poisons now. It’s a wonder
we stay alive as long as we do. We kill on purpose
and by accident with our pesticides and
herbicides, by what we let out of our smokestacks
and car exhausts. Our big trucks do their share
with their diesel engines as they drag their logs
and tankers uphill. No wonder our emergency
rooms are crowded and we die before our time.
Still, I have lived this long: eighty-two years.
I can look at death and nod. Yes, eventually.
I recognize the land of the dead when I see it.
Broken rocks, all sizes, browns and greys. No
color. No vegetation. It had seeds, but it was
sprayed to kill any life, vegetable or animal.
Yet I hear a cricket, and then the true miracle:
the heart-shaped leaves of morning glory
outwitting a rock death, rain finally rinsing off
enough poison to bring forth something green
right at the edge. Leave those rocks alone, and
they will bring forth the undead, the vine, and
in time the pink, purple, blue buds, which will
open to the sounds of a bird’s hymn of praise.
Judy, while teaching at her Lifestyle Workshop for Writers on June 1. Photo by Elisabeth Plattner.
Usually I put up a blog on Sunday, but last Sunday, I went to the Emergency Room to see about this possible small stroke I had on Saturday. They did many tests, and no brain damage. Here's the poem. I just remembered to do my blog for last week. JH
***
The Late Years Forty-Two August 18, 2019
For my audience at South Regional on August 17, 2019
A curious conjunction. I had them
laughing, mesmerized, their eyes alight.
They wanted to hear every word I said,
but my words skittered away from me.
I said the wrong one, or the word I wanted
vanished while I tried to find another
one that would work. What overwhelmed
my mind that Saturday in the library I loved?
About ten women came, and my son Tim,
who brought me and also carried in the
box of books I wanted to sell. A lovely
librarian, Teresa, had everything set up,
even cookies and tea. She had a
sound man put a mike on me and
adjusted it. Women drifted in, eager,
curious, and I welcomed them all. Then
I transformed them, even while my
mind was playing tricks. Was I having
a stroke in the middle of my success?
By 4:30, I wanted to go home, but
they didn’t want to leave. Most stayed
talking while Tim packed up the books.
He brought me my yoghurt drink, and
our friend Virginia rubbed my back.
Slowly, I felt better. I pulled on a long-
sleeved shirt and wasn’t too hot as we
drove home in ninety-degree weather.
I rested while they made supper.
Afterwards I bathed and slept.
Judy by her hydrangea bush in early spring 2019
***
The Late Years Forty-One August 11, 2019
It’s so easy to worry, and I do.
About money, my health, my friends.
Then come the surprises. The credit
card company tells me I have money
with them which I didn’t know about.
They sent it to my bank. It’s teaching
time, but where are all my students?
I write to two of the silent ones. They
answer that, yes, they’ll take my class,
and one wants to take them both. I
Spend a day quietly to give my heart
time to heal, get back to normal. It
does heal. I rise early, breakfast as
usual, and take my morning walk.
The little bird sings to me before
sunrise. My friends see something
in me they value. They hang on,
let me see their agony. I wish them
courage. In this life we never get
to coast. It’s “work, work, if we
don’t work, we don’t get anything,
not even love.”* My Muse lives,
my health holds. I have enough
money. There are tears, but
laughter, too. Don’t forget
to give thanks.
* Joyce Cary, The Horse’s Mouth
Photo by Tim Hogan
The Late Years Forty August 4, 2019
Lacrimosa was the name for Mozart’s Requiem
in D Minor, played so often when we lose people.
Tearful. Full of tears. Yet we laughed when
Johnsie joined us. She’s still fighting her own
personal war with an enemy invading her
body. We hug her. Keely has brought a cake
to celebrate Dean’s birthday and mine, and the
halt of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, which is to
bring fracked gas and its accompanying
explosions into North Carolina. We’ve already
lost too many fervent souls. They fight and they
smile as long as they can. On other fronts, love
is demonstrated other ways. We have a leak
bringing down our ceiling plaster. I call Gene.
He has lost sight in one eye. A retina got
detached. He guides Tim by their smart phones
through the steps to stop the leak. Tim had
planned to sleep in, but he calls Gene to
learn how to stop the leak. Gene describes
that he needs to blow down a clogged pipe, but
how to do that? Finally, Tim finds a way, and a
lot of gunk come out and then the water
that had been blocked. The air-conditioner
works again, and the wet ceiling dries. We
take a long breath. If only we could save
Johnsie, bring back sight in Gene’s eye.
Judy by Emma Tobin, late 2018, teaching a class.
The Late Years Thirty-Nine July 28, 2019
The human body has its ways
of sending messages, especially
when aging. I know when I need
to slow down, rest, listen, obey.
I had these messages years ago.
I’d have vertigo then. Nothing
to do but lie flat. I learned to
drink self-heal tea–better than
Dramamine. Now it’s afib–
my heart racing. I drink lemon-
peppermint tea, take deep breaths,
forget about work, sleep if possible.
Then allow myself a lazy day:
read a novel, write in my diary.
How I love to work, get things
done. I remind myself that
everything can wait for a day.
“Take a load off.” “There’s no
rush.” The work I want to do
will be there tomorrow and the
next day. I slept. I rested.
I listened. I healed again.
Photo and sign by Keely Wood. A hot day in Moncure, N.C.
***
The Late Years Thirty-Eight July 21, 2019
I was thirty-eight when I had that dream.
I was sitting in a circle with black women,
and someone stabbed me in the back.
A nightmare which has come alive
in my mind again, but of course it has
happened before–in the intervening
years. I use my ingenuity and courage
and make things happen: a small press,
a major library program for new writers,
a statewide writers organization where
all are welcome, giving a death blow
to the clique mentality. It’s no wonder
I was hated. I didn’t publish them. I
Interfered with their power base.
Or here, I wanted to protect my
neighbors from coal ash poison, and
in years earlier, formaldehyde, plus
other causes of cancer. I lost John
Cross, who was always willing to help,
and Terica, endlessly inventive about
how to fight fracking and coal ash
dust, and Cora, who told me she
loved me as if she knew people who
didn’t. I wouldn’t change what I’ve done
even if I live among those who stab
me in the back when they can. I forget
more. I can’t go and do as much as
once. Yet here I am. Help me or
harm me, but let me do my work
while I live.
Photo of sunrise from Jordan Lake Dam on New Year's Day 2019 by Ellen Tinsley, DVM
The Late Years Thirty-Seven July 14, 2019
It is quite true that the artist, painter, writer or composer starts always with an experience that is a kind of discovery. He comes upon it with the sense of a discovery; in fact, it is truer to say that it comes upon him as a discovery. It surprises him.
–Joyce Cary, Art and Reality, p. 15.
What then do all these words mean
that come upon me–years of them now?
I listen. I record. I respect, nay, I honor
that mysterious flow. As to Eliot’s vision
of how a new voice will become part of
the tradition that has gone before and change
it all, I’m hesitant to claim to be that
important. Besides, he says, such poetry
won’t be personal, and mine definitely
is. My friends and children, my chickens
and hydrangea bush, the little blue
grosbeak who sings to me at six in the
morning–at sunrise time–when I go to
walk, are personal, or are they? Does the
bird’s insistent call when the sky is pink
all the way around, red, and even green
in places, and he waits to hear me sing,
“I see you!” does that stay personal
or does it change into a token of eternity?
What happens to the words I hear in
my ear and baptize with the water
of my spirit, which lifts me past my
balance problem, my lament that I can’t
do everything I did only eight years ago?
The answer comes easily now. I’m still
making discoveries, and they are
still in possession. I needn’t be afraid.
