I watched the river from afar, feeling the autumn breeze at my back, tempted by the cool current before me. I watched until my eyes blurred with confusion about what is possible ad what is not. Then, propelled by a drive that lacks logical reason but is oversaturated with a sense of being, I found myself taking methodically paced barefooted steps toward the muddy bank. As I neared the water, my feet sank into a slippery rhythm: step-slide-stop; step-slide-stop. Toes thus immersed in the chilly ripples, I paused and closed my eyes. There, in the darkness of my isolation, I welcomed her lapping kisses. Lulled by the sounds of falling leaves and the river’s gurgling breath, I lingered in the contrast between warm sun on my skin, overtaken by cold winds, dissipated again by warm sun.
She invited me into her melody and buoyant embrace. I dropped my coat back from my shoulders, caught in the bend of elbows. The sum promised peaceful blessings; the wind threatened regret. The river invited me again like the gentle lead of a lover’s hand and the promise of security.
My coat fell to the earth, a carpet of wet leaves, and my body moved forward. Forward more – and onward still more. my skin grew instantly taught from the icy bites, but the river, she sang to me, relaxing my muscles and luring me in deeper, and deeper, and deeper.
I leaned back and let her hold me. We cuddled. I disappeared in her love.
Sometimes I think in poetic phrases; sometimes I think in
long, explanatory paragraphs. And sometimes I think like a Mexican jumping bean
– sudden, staccato starts and stops… These thoughts have not rhyme nor reason.
All together they make for a busy mind that every now and then produces a gem.
But I really, really wish I could control it. And if I could,
I would stop it from time to time to experience the silence. Oh, yes! I would
welcome the silence!
I would welcome it, no doubt, with words in my head to
describe it. Some words would fall together in poetic phrases. Some words would
line up in long explanatory paragraphs. And some words, I’m sure, would jump
about without direction. All together they would fascinate me with the myriad
of ways that they create descriptions of the silence. But then I would really,
really wish again that I could control it. And if I could, I would once again
will it to stop.
I think this spontaneous thinking stuff is akin to
inspiration.
I’m jumping now, no rhyming here, no reason. Just hot,
cerebral energy popping me back and forth against the walls of my own mental
container.
When I became a teenager, my mother became politically
active. She propelled herself into the center of the women’s movement fighting
for the “ERA”. The ERA was the acronym for the Equal Rights Amendment. I was
mortified to learn that men and women did not earn equal pay for doing the same
exact job, even if they had equal educational training and the same number of
years’ experience. I just couldn’t believe that our country would legally
support such discrimination. I am still mortified, to be honest. When I was a
teenager, however, I was confident that the wrongs would be made right. I
believed, and so I was carefree as my mother threw herself into the cause.
Mom was often gone attending rallies and meetings. And when
she was home, she read and wrote poetry about women – self discovery,
empowerment, pride – these were her themes. She was busy and happy, and as
everyone knows, a happy mama makes for a happy family. Our house was buzzing
with intellectual chatter. Mom hosted gatherings of women on a regular basis.
The phone rang often and she would run to answer it, light up at the sound of
the voice on the other end, and delve into conversation that sounded to me more
like song. Books, magazines, and documents were scattered about the house, all
touting the same message: equal rights
for all. The frantic tap, tap, tap of Mom’s typewriter was a common,
soothing sound in the house.
Though I didn’t join her cause, this time in her life was
very influential on my own development. I took the message to heart. Equal
rights for all truly meant all to me
– not a gender distinction, but a concept that included racial boundaries,
economic boundaries, social, intellectual, and emotional boundaries. I didn’t
join Mom’s cause because I believed that she and her friends would win the
battle. I was innocent, naïve, and absolutely trusting in the ideology that
right would prevail. I didn’t yet know how unfair the world could really be.
When the ERA failed to pass in 1975, I was 15 years old. Mom
was devastated, but quickly bounced back with the hope that it would pass next
time around. I had already been formed by her efforts. She told me I could do
anything I wanted to do and I believed her. I was strong, curious, and
opinionated. Quickly discovering my own independence, I truly believed the
world was my oyster.
Years later, after countless discriminations based on my
gender had defeated me, I felt that the women’s movement had let me down. I
couldn’t do whatever I wanted to do! They had lied! And if I had known the
truth, I might have made different decisions.
I’ve come full circle now because I understand life as a
series of cycling circles that repeat and overlap like a spiral, all in the
process of slowly evolving into something new. We seldom recognize change as it
is happening, but are always surprised years later to look back and see how
different things used to be. I realize that I can’t do everything I wanted to
do, but I also realize how fortunate I am to live my life with a strong sense
of self and self acceptance. The women’s movement taught me to dream big and
reach for the stars. It taught me to believe in myself, and it taught me how to
stand up again, time and again, after defeat and disappointment. These skills
and attitudes are worth more to me than equal pay for any work I do alongside
men.
The men in this world have homes and cars and boats. They
have wives and an entitlement to arrogance. I don’t envy any of that. I covet
my own passions, passions that bled into me from my mother as she discovered
her own voice, her own strength, her own gifts and the joy of sharing them
throughout her life.
We should always fight for equal rights: it is moral and
humane and therefore the right thing to do. However, we must always know that
we are all different, and in our differences, there are inequities. But if you
believe in the ying and yang of the universe, you will see that in the end, these
inequities find their balance.
Remember when we got
caught in the rain? At first we gasped, pulled the back of our shirts up over
our heads, and ran for shelter. But the storefronts were all closed and there
was no shelter to be found.
Our jeans clung to our
legs like hungry little children. Hair stuck to cheekbones like slime slammed
against a concrete wall; T-shirts suctioned onto breast and belly.
We burst into laughter
and kicked off our shoes.
And then, oh baby, do
you remember?
I do.
And then we danced.
We held hands and
leaned back, each pulling against the weight of the other, and we set ourselves
to spinning. We spun with the escalating centrifugal force until our hands
slipped apart and knocked us each into our own twirling jigs. We threw our
heads forward and back and all around, whipping our hair into our spontaneous
choreography. Heel clicks high in the air, feet splattering puddles: we danced!
Oh, baby, we danced!
Heavy breath
punctuated by delighted squeals,
oh yeah, we danced.
You fell into a
puddle. Then you pulled me in on top of you. We wrestled in the water like two
young lovers at the sea side. Heavy breath punctuated by delighted squeals, oh
yeah, we danced.
In 1685 an young Scottish boy by the name of Charles
McAnally was playing on the bank of the PerthRiver
with some friends when they discovered a large earthen pot filled with money.
The father of one of the boys sent young Charles back to find his father to
help them divide the money amongst them. The father and the other boys stayed
to guard the money.
Charles ran enthusiastically back to his home. On the way,
he encountered a stranger on horseback. “What is your hurry?” the man asked.
Charles told the stranger what he and his friends had discovered and that he
was running back to get his father. The stranger told Charles that it would be
faster if he hoped on his horse and let him take him back to his house. The
young Charles trustfully mounted the horse and was taken, not to his house, but
to the port and put on a ship about to embark to America.
Several months later, 10-year-old Charles McAnally arrived
in Philadelphia.
He grew up on the estate of an unnamed man as a live-in unpaid worker. When he
became an adult, he married and settled on the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania. This is
how my ancestors came to be Americans.
I tell this story in March at the time of St. Patrick’s day
even though the origin is in Scotland,
not Ireland, because my
ancestors came from both Scotland
and Ireland.
the Irish stories are not nearly so dramatic. Charles McAnally is my ancestor:
he was the great, great grandfather of my great, great grandmother, Eliza
Potts. That is seven generations away from me. In a way, that isn’t so long
ago, and yet, not many of us can trace our roots that many generations back, so
I believe it is important to keep this story, sketchy as it is, alive.
This story was passed down through the generations orally,
but is also found recorded in an 1837 document by a Bishop in the Methodist
Episcopal Church, David Rice McAnally.
I met a homeless man in New York City while
working an internship at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine with the Omega
Liturgical Dance Company. I was 20 years old, trusting, naïve, and
impressionable. The young, skinny black man, just a few years older than I was,
captured me with his eyes as deep as the ocean. He didn’t speak very much, but
when he did, it was always something profound. He hung around my office and
offered a thought from time to time. Periodically he’d ask me a question and
seemed to ponder my replies. In time, we became friends. He sat silently with
me whenever I went to the Cathedral gardens and watched the peacocks. Between
long silences, we talked about the goodness of humanity in spite the violence
and injustice all around us. He was a mystery to me, and his resilience
impressed me greatly.
He drew pictures and gave them to me as souvenirs
. He signed them "Artooz Fungie". I finally learned that his name was Tino.
A few months into my internship,
I went to volunteer at a youth center in Harlem
that was actually housed in an abandoned building shared with drug addicts. My
friend, Tino, walked me into and out of Harlem
every day. I never knew where he went while I worked with the kids, but he never
failed to show up when I was ready to leave and he ensured I that I never
walked in Harlem unchaperoned by him. I was
moved by his kindness and naïve enough to never suspect that he had an ulterior
motive. He never gave me reason to doubt him; and now, nearly 30 years later, I
still do not doubt the sincerity of his kindness.
Still sorting through old boxes
and settling into a new home, I recently found this poem in my New York scrapbook and
I’m pretty sure I wrote it about Tino. It’s terrible, but nonetheless, I am
sharing it because it represents a young woman’s tender, safe, and protected
experience in a potentially dangerous environment. I am older, wiser, and much
less daring now than I was then, but the questions remain about that young
homeless man and really, about humankind: what is anyone’s source of
perseverance and endurance? What makes any of us move and love and think?
Oh righteous manof mystery’s tempting wink What makes you moveand loveand think? Cast a dream upon the moon a wish of silence to hushthe human’s dangerous brood. Oh righteous manof humble peace and quiet rest, what is your sourceof breath, your heart
Note: written on a cold winter night in mid-December
I don’t have to have shoes. Cold mud is my least favorite
sensation, seconded by a cold damp hem on my jeans that knocks against my bare
ankles when I walk, but both are bearable, and neither lasts too long.
I so much savor the freedom I feel in my heart when my feet
are bare that it is worth it to me to bear the discomfort of cold mud and damp
hems. When the ground is cold and muddy, everything about my body is miserably uncomfortable.
I mean, it’s spikey, icy rain that creates the muddy ground after all, and I
don’t like how that feels on my nose and in my bones.
I stray. My point here is that I don’t have to have shoes. I
have thick soles so rough surfaces do not bother me. In contrast, I find that
the many textures of the world serve me with miniature foot massages all
through the day. Tingle, mingle, surprise! Hot, cold, tiny prickles, dull, wide
thumps. It makes me aware of my environment and puts me in touch with the
interaction between the earth and me – even the every day dull moments that
make up my life. I get this constant loving touch from the earth all through
the day. These sensations coming to my consciousness through the soles of my
feet provide for me an awareness that gives me a certain kind of energy that
pulsates in my soul
A secret massage – a dancing soul – oooh! Such joys!
I don’t have to have shoes, but I do have to go barefooted!
