My mother died on January 25, 2011. She had been ill for years, and this last time she’d gone to the hospital in congestive heart failure it was clear she would not recover. Kept comfortable by the hospital staff, we waited around her bed for her last breaths.
Later, after several phone calls, a visit from a friend and more calls, I had my time alone and was up quite late. As I sat outside in the quiet of the January night watching the snow gently fill the air and fall in a soft blanket on all around me, the poem came to me in nearly one complete piece. I carefully went inside and tiptoed to my desk and quietly went back outside to the swing, wrote it down slowly, line for line, all as if I was afraid I’d scare it away, all the beautiful words I’d been thinking, or maybe I’d break it, like a bubble. I changed very little in a rewrite.
I read this poem at her memorial. And I had decided I would go through with my poetry reading, just two days after my mother died, because it was an opportunity to share her with others to read the new poem.
I could never encapsulate 85 years of a life into one blog post or one photo or one poem, so I won’t even try, but I want to share this. The photo above is the one we placed in our mother’s casket, her wedding photo from 1946 when she was 21 years old. The little scrap of red in the lower left corner is the shirt she wore, the one she loved best, and I knew she’d want to be remembered in it; our mother was one who could wear a red chiffon blouse in her casket and be proud.
About My Mother
Regardless of the many outstanding qualities any person may have
we are essentially remembered for only one of them.
In my mother, all would agree
this one would be her remarkable beauty.
All through her life the compliments trailed her
as she carefully maintained “the look”, her look, so glamorous,
from tailored suits to taffeta dresses to palazzo pants,
hair perfectly styled, nails manicured and painted
a collar set just so, cuffs casually turned back,
hair worn long, past the age of 50,
a dark, even tan and shorts into her 80s,
lipstick always perfectly applied,
and even at 84
people marveled on her perfect skin,
dark curly hair,
and big bright smile.
I see that smile
when I see my sister smile,
and I see my mother’s active, athletic bearing
when I look at my brother,
and her gray eyes are mine.
In each of her grandchildren
and great-grandchildren
I see her round face,
graceful hands, pert nose,
proud upright posture
and a million other of her features and habits
and in all of us
her wild curly hair
is part of her legacy to us.
When we look at each other from now on
we will see the part of her she gave to each of us,
this little cluster of people who came from her
and who were her greatest treasure,
and when she looks at us from wherever she is
she will know that
she cannot be forgotten.
They traded Andrew McCutcheon
and I had to call my brother and
hear his side of the story,
I don’t care what the Pirates do
or really anything about sports
but my brother lived for it all
and I liked to hear
his normal voice discussing
games and stats and history
as if it was the history
of the world,
his voice,
the one without the
vodka or Jack Daniels,
quick and clear,
humorous,
alive,
but he is not.
I will not call,
but I will enjoy that moment
that might have been.
Every once in a while we want to share a moment with someone who has died, and sometimes this is painful if we’ve momentarily forgotten they are gone. I knew my brother had died when this moment came up, but still I wanted to hear his answer, and that voice speaking from who he might have been. My brother died in 2016, somewhat unexpectedly, but perhaps not considering his lifestyle. Through the years, even back to his teens, I had grown so tired of the rambling drunken conversation that though I really don’t pay any attention to sports I would hear some nugget of information that I knew he would talk about. The Pittsburgh Pirates really did trade Andrew McCutcheon, who seemed like a great guy as well as a good player and was extremely well-liked by the team and the city which was how I recognized what this trade was news. I knew Mark would have a lot to say about this one.
I just drafted this poem and for the moment I’m pleased with it. I may find some things to change about it in time, though. I don’t mind letting poems evolve.
My garden waits under a blanket of spring
gently rippled snow comforting the earth
drowsing buds protected undercover
will burst and pour forth
hot, humid mornings, big yellow spiders, baskets of green beans
this heavy cover now protects, will melt and nourish.
When I look at my garden, surprised at all its hillocks and gulleys remembered full of life and covered so deeply and densely with growing things, I wonder how the miracle ever happens again that I have baskets of beans and tomatoes just a few months later when all seems frozen and gone. It’s really not. As one of those ironies of nature where unrelated processes fit together like a puzzle to make a whole ecosystem, it’s the icy blanket of snow that would seem to smother and freeze and end the potential that actually keeps the spark of life warm.
I don’t want to be
colorblind,
I want to paint
what I see,
the colors of our faces
like flowers,
not different
but tones of each others’
faces
as we turn toward the light,
we blend so beautifully.
The illustration above is a sampler of all the shades of pastel I’ve used while painting portraits and sketches of people of all different “colors”, skin tones and ethnicities. Tell me, who is “black” and who is “white”? And what does “colored” mean?
In truth, we are all “colored”. Each of our faces has the darkest and lightest tones and all those in between, and even some colors we’d be surprised to find in skin tones. I can tell you that all the colors I smudged there have appeared in the highlights and shadows and mid-tones of every face. It largely depends on where you are standing in relation to the light.
Some people have suggested that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream of black children and white children going forward hand in hand, the ideal of seeing a person not for the color of their skin but for the content of their character, had the goal of a “colorblind” society. That’s a noble ideal on one hand, where we just don’t notice the color of a person’s skin in any situation and go on from there.
But does that truly bring justice to wrongdoing and change society in a way that makes the injustice people have suffered because of that color unacceptable? To suddenly begin to ignore the color of a person’s skin and jump immediately to integration is to jump right over the injustices done to people because of the color of their skin. It’s also ignoring an essential part of another person, shutting the door on a section of their life, a part that makes them distinctive. King did not use the term “colorblind” in any speech or written document, but his point is described by historians as a more “color aware” society where we recognize our differences, celebrate them and thereby heal through those very differences among ourselves.
When I create a piece of visual artwork I look for what makes the subject inspiring to me, what makes it distinctive, what makes me excited to share it with you. I like contrasts, I find what makes my subject different in its class, what makes it stand out from its surroundings. It’s my joy to find and share “the extraordinary in the ordinary”. If everything I painted looked the same, what need would there be for artwork?
Looking at people has always been like looking at a field of flowers for me—I find it hard to settle on one before I skip to another while I enjoy the visually exciting effect of all those different colors and shapes and heights and structures. Then I can can pause on each one and get to know each in its own unique detail.
When I rode the bus, long before I painted anything let alone a human portrait, I quietly studied all the faces around me for color and shape and texture, eye color, the hair that framed it, accessories and jewelry, and was often started by a stern expression of someone who didn’t understand why I studied them so intently. I was just looking for the things that made them unique and beautiful—not in the classic sense of beauty but in the classical sense, in that beauty is truth, in being true to who we are inside showing that on the outside, like the flower in the field that can’t help but be what it is.
If we are colorblind, we intentionally ignore some of the fundamental differences that make each of us irreplaceable. That denies a basic part of our personal existence and of human existence as a species; it denies a portion of our very identity as an individual.
That takes an awful lot of effort. Why not admit to our differences and get to know each other in full, and find the beauty in each of us. We have always been and will always be different from each other and might as well get used to it.
Colorful beaded necklaces, orange and apple green,
and pearls and plastic flowers,
a linen hankie with soft green lovers-knot lace edging,
a blue and white stripe pillow cover, real pillow-ticking,
a ruffled chair cushion,
what made these things so cherished
that they survived the years intact,
ready to be cherished again
even when similar things, in other hands
were broken, stained, discarded?
Were they curious heirlooms from a dear ancestor,
whose very touch caused an item to be cherished?
A gift from lover to beloved,
kept for the memory of a special night?
A young girl trying her hand at
the lovely things her nurturing grandmother taught her?
Jade beads purchased to match a special dress and kept “for good”,
just a glance at the box recalling a fond memory?
Though we’d like to choose noble symbols for our memories
we mark them with what is at hand, familiar everyday items;
the next generations may shake their heads and wonder
even as they set aside their own vintage memories.
What a variety of color, shape, pattern, object…this still life was totally unplanned and nearly unseen, carefully gathered and placed on a chair in an antique and vintage shop: a Lover’s Knot Lace-edged hankie, colorful beaded necklaces from various eras, a traditional pillow-ticking pillowcase. What preserved these items, I wondered?
A cardinal
flashing red in the bare winter landscape
innocent of my intent
I missed my shot, my camera open to receive too much light
yet it was then that I heard
of the shooting of other innocent birds
on this brilliant morning
colorful plumage
melodic chatter
gathered in a trusted place
a flash of red
too many left behind
others holding hands
closing eyes to run.
No.
Please let it not be so.
For those who can no longer fly
let our hearts fly to be with them
flashing red in the brilliant and bare winter morning.
My heart was heavy with the news of the school shooting in Newtown on December 14, 2012. I really was photographing the cardinal and missed my shot, and then heard the news. May we remember the innocent children, the adults who tried to protect them, and the families they leave behind.
The other day as I walked into Carnegie I saw the flock of Canada geese congregated along the creek and a small tributary in the center of town, doing goose things. At the same time I heard a familiar chittering and finally found the tiny shape of a kingfisher on the power lines above the creek, loudly scolding the geese and likely telling them to get out of his territory. They paid no attention, but the kingfisher did not relent.
The Kingfisher
Blending with the scenery, more chittering sound than sight,
you are more than just a bird fishing for an afternoon snack
but evidence of changes that have already come
and those certain to be.
Little indicator of the health of a stream
and by that the health of a community
and a region
your presence here means we have made change,
we have turned around and made right something we had spoiled
and we have made welcome not just for you
but for ourselves as well.
We can stop for a moment to appreciate
but you tell us to be ready for new accomplishments and adventures.
Even better awaits us.
Kingfishers are not large birds, barely larger than a robin but with a stubby tail and an almost top-heavy head, very protective of its territory along a waterway. They are small but bold, and are also known to be a harbinger of the health of a stream because they needs to feed directly from creatures that live in the water and will leave if there isn’t enough to eat.
Once Chartiers Creek was so polluted even plants died on its banks, but after decades of a ban on dumping and a mandate for cleanup the waters were safe to be in, to fish in and fish and other aquatic species began to return. I had been hearing a kingfisher’s chittering along the creek for a couple of years but the actual bird was hard to spot. Finally one March afternoon I saw the actual bird and photographed it diving into the water. We had reversed a century of pollution.
The kingfisher splashes into the creek.
I saw the kingfisher two days before my 2014 poetry reading celebrating the 110th year of Carnegie’s existence, and wrote the poem then and read it at my reading. Kingfishers also symbolize adventure and future accomplishments and tell you to be bold, so perhaps we’ve not only healed past ills, but also it may mean the best is yet to come.
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