| Theresa Cecilia Garcia-Newbill |
I'm walking up the path to the Cloisters,
the one by Fort Tyron Park near Jewish
Memorial Hospital where we spent an
afternoon having my chin stitched up after
that nasty fall I took in the hallway of our
art-deco apartment building on Arden Street.
The trees are still standing their ground
except for the few sick ones that now lay
dead and broken in fragments across the trail.
The clouds are still moving steadily across
the river and I'm naming them with the same
knowledge you passed along to me.
I'm still sucking on watermelon candies and
tootsie roll pops, but I miss the chocolate
shortbread cookies you used to get me, the
ones that made me smile when I was feeling
down. The child is stirring Dad, against the
winds that run wild moving empty swings.
The world might go to war and I'm scared
even as I think about that blue-winged
dragonfly we once saw low-flying then
darting upward in winter. And I dream about
the wonders that will bewilder some once this
story is told.
Maybe that's why I seek some kind of blessing
through poetry. I stop and take in the
scenery of the woods and the stonewall that
brings your memory from afar with the same
fleeting happiness I once had while smelling a
pink carnation.
If I write with velocity it's because I'm mindful
of the fact that I'm dying. Cancer may not be
eating away at me as it did you but I can feel
my body shutting down slowly and without
compassion. Mamma Della says she's got some
kind of gris-gris bag waiting on me at the Botanica.
You remember Mama Della, don't you dad? The
Santera who claimed she was under the protection
of the thunder god Chango. The one who kissed
my forehead after Elegua claimed me as a child
of his own. As I reach the end of this path I
feel perilously unanchored.
Yet I still remember to release while I take in
small breaths.
the one by Fort Tyron Park near Jewish
Memorial Hospital where we spent an
afternoon having my chin stitched up after
that nasty fall I took in the hallway of our
art-deco apartment building on Arden Street.
The trees are still standing their ground
except for the few sick ones that now lay
dead and broken in fragments across the trail.
The clouds are still moving steadily across
the river and I'm naming them with the same
knowledge you passed along to me.
I'm still sucking on watermelon candies and
tootsie roll pops, but I miss the chocolate
shortbread cookies you used to get me, the
ones that made me smile when I was feeling
down. The child is stirring Dad, against the
winds that run wild moving empty swings.
The world might go to war and I'm scared
even as I think about that blue-winged
dragonfly we once saw low-flying then
darting upward in winter. And I dream about
the wonders that will bewilder some once this
story is told.
Maybe that's why I seek some kind of blessing
through poetry. I stop and take in the
scenery of the woods and the stonewall that
brings your memory from afar with the same
fleeting happiness I once had while smelling a
pink carnation.
If I write with velocity it's because I'm mindful
of the fact that I'm dying. Cancer may not be
eating away at me as it did you but I can feel
my body shutting down slowly and without
compassion. Mamma Della says she's got some
kind of gris-gris bag waiting on me at the Botanica.
You remember Mama Della, don't you dad? The
Santera who claimed she was under the protection
of the thunder god Chango. The one who kissed
my forehead after Elegua claimed me as a child
of his own. As I reach the end of this path I
feel perilously unanchored.
Yet I still remember to release while I take in
small breaths.
| The Power of Release |
| A Wiccan spiritual write The Kindred |
The kindred walk past spattered mosses
where sweet brims of purest water cockle
fresh blades of fine grass. Valleys of blue
Lucerne's yawn and rise beneath the
darkness of a gallows tree as a circle of
hands hang silently suspended.
The soul descends to bond, mending
differences, as the dry tears of Isis kiss a
chameleon's skin where a beacon of light
has gathered under the Dog Star and where a
praying mantis conducts a search for a single
green leaf.
With the trust of rosy hands still dancing in the
sight of Heaven, they would come back to the
same spot throughout the years, scattering ashes
of loved ones whose laughter had soon faded
yet regenerated back to wonder with the
innocent floating energy of their loving touch.
where sweet brims of purest water cockle
fresh blades of fine grass. Valleys of blue
Lucerne's yawn and rise beneath the
darkness of a gallows tree as a circle of
hands hang silently suspended.
The soul descends to bond, mending
differences, as the dry tears of Isis kiss a
chameleon's skin where a beacon of light
has gathered under the Dog Star and where a
praying mantis conducts a search for a single
green leaf.
With the trust of rosy hands still dancing in the
sight of Heaven, they would come back to the
same spot throughout the years, scattering ashes
of loved ones whose laughter had soon faded
yet regenerated back to wonder with the
innocent floating energy of their loving touch.
