I Am No Longer Denied!

Just a quick entry here -- and jumping back to the subject of my first blog: being denied the right to vote in last month's election.

Saturday, I received a postcard from the Registrar of Voters informing me that my "case" has been decided and I am now a registered voter in Riverside County. Wow, what a mess I created by simply trying to pick up my voting material!

So, that little drama is over. More poetry posted in the next day or so!

Continuing to Fall

More of my 22 part poem, "The Fall". It's amazing that it was so long after my accident that I wrote this. It was as though I was possessed. And it felt like a huge burden had lightened when I was finished with the fevered writing.

To complete the profile -- and give you information that might explain more of why I continue to write about chronic pain -- the history of my injury:
1-I fell while skinning in Mammoth California in 1973;
2-First surgery to repair damage to my neck was in 1984;
3-Second surgery to repair more damage was in 1988;
4-Third surgery was in 2004;
5-Forth surgery is on the horizon in a few weeks, 2015;
6-Fifth surgery may be needed in the near future.

Hope you find some insight in the following parts of the larger poem... or at least enjoy the poetry! The next four parts:

FOUR: Initial Withdrawal

From fear
new life is born,
from breach
fragmented spirit
lurches to awareness.
No longer the fallen,
now the one who watched
breathes and trembles
in confused silence
as the broken shell
is brought back to life.

     Inside the familiar,
     a changeling squirms,
     adjusting the new cloth
     to its pink & wet form,
     finding its place of comfort
     in unfamiliar skin.

Healed and whole
the guise is mounted,
the task begun,
the charade set forth.

FIVE: Living It

And when the sun shines
   it smiles;
When its cold it frowns;
When hunger calls
   it whimpers...
   fine imitation of life.

It's skin tastes of harshness,
It's tears smell of fear,
It's voice goes unanswered,
It's needs unheard.

And when it smiles it
   feels nothing;
When pain calls it hides;
When questioned it
   flashes intelligence
   in frightened, shuttered eyes.

It's days taste of horror,
It's nights smell of ice,
It's heart is emptied,
It's mind focused grace.

It's numb in vacuum now,
It's days finely honed,
It's faults black-edged patches,
It's intent obscured by stone.

SIX: Disbelief

Animation of limbs
by pulleys and gears
creaking and grinding
in mechanical response.
Prescision tuned
to jup and spin,
balanced for normalcy;
programmed intelligence
shines in diode-eyes.
Aluminum skin insulates internal strife,
cushions the churning
of organic wheels,
tempers the carbolic
scent of friction --
padded disk burning
slowly against metallic
firmness of bone.
Alloy comprised of
blood and steel
seeps like oil
from frozen joints;
the winding screech
of tortured metal
resounds in the
hollow mechanism.

SEVEN: The First Step of Pain

Awaken slowly,
     child of mine,
You've slept too long;
     the day is well begun.
Wake from your
     thousand-year rest,
Your prince has come;
     look quickly before he's gone.
So long you've remained
     encased in metal,
Hidden from this life;
     hidden fro yourself.
Fear flows from you
     like tears, child,
Like rain in spring;
     sustenance for what will come.
Awaken quickly,
     daughter, my child,
And taste this new sound;
     the weight and pain of grief.

And So It Began

As part of The Story of Why I'm Writing About Chronic Pain, I present to you a twenty-two part poem, which many of you may have already read, called "The Fall". It took me eighteen years to find words to describe the day I had a life-altering snow skiing accident when I was fourteen and then it came pouring out of me in one night... the middle of the night of October 12, 1991.

I hope this explains a bit about the journey I've been on all my life. At the very least, I hope you enjoy the poems! And, so as not to deaden your eyes or brains, I post here the first three of the group.

ONE: Skirting The Edge

Crystal day --
blue wind whispering
scent of snow,
warmth of ice,
calling, calling my name.

From the top,
the world was held
in terrible silence,
the beating rush
of blood in my limbs
the one constant --
and the bitter blueness
of winter sky
free of storms,
free to hwol
in frigid welcome.

Crystal day --
blue and white and
so very, very high;
such moments we danced,
such arabesques
the white blueness
promised with it's
frozen kiss.

[][][][][]

TWO: Losing Balance

Soft.
Smooth and soft
and terribly wrong;
eternity held in my hand,
a fractured second split.
Suspended on the moment,
on the sloping razor-edge,
the high-wire snapped
beneath my feet and
Earth mated blindly with Sky.

     And the stone sank
     slowly to the bottom
     of the frozen well
     and tubled quicker
     than gravity would perceive
     and plummeted from
     the edge of the world,
     drifting slowly
     (so unbearably fast)
     into the Abyss...
     into the maw of the Dragon...
     and was swallowed whole.

Soft.
Too soft and smooth.
For an eternity
a scream echoed denial--
then was silenced
by the sudden spin.

[][][][][]

THREE: Falling

Carnage
in mind
melts from
ice to skin
to churning blueness --
sulfur the only scent,
copper and rust
cloy to bitten lips.
Death in a whirlwind
of silence;
only the heat
of lost breath
crashed from brutalized lungs,
only the swallowed
scream of fear
tumbling like
a lost galaxy
in paralyzed throat.
Carnage
from quiet --
a broken morning
claws bits of
the whole onto sheets
of pure white.
What was whole is sundered;
the one who lived is lost.