Comparisons

the theory of another:

a reading of TMBG's Build a little birdhouse in your soul as a love ballad and likens the object of the song to this poem by E Dickinson:

   Hope is the thing with feathers
  That perches in the soul,
  And sings the tune without the words,
  And never stops at all,

 And sweetest in the gale is heard;
  And sore must be the storm
  That could abash the little bird
  That kept so many warm.

I've heard it in the chillest land,
  And on the strangest sea;
  Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.


People can be so great.

One Month on Earth

Dear Violet Maeve,

Your face is so familiar to me, as if I've known you all my life. I guess I was waiting for you here. As much as I feel certain I know every inch of you, I equally and utterly am in thrall of your total self-possession. You are so intent, so intelligent, so bright-eyed and aware - when you are not sleeping or screaming - that I wonder where you really came from and what you truly are. A wonder, a Buddha, a beautiful, wise, serene happy baby. That is what I want for you most of all - happiness. And fearlessness. Fearless Violet, you are going to move mountains. I would like for you to be curious and good, healthy and compassionate and sweet. I feel so lucky to be your mother. I can't believe what we've already become in just a few short/long weeks. Happy one month birthday, darling. Can't wait to find out what happens next. p.s. please sleep again like you did last night: up only once, brilliant girl!

Knowing When You Are In The Thick Of It

Knowing when you are in the thick of it is the only way possible to hold onto your sanity. If you can remove yourself one half step from whatever swallowing hole is sucking you down long enough to say, "this is what it looks like, this is what it feels like, to be frightened, to be slogging through", then you can survive and find your way out. And it isn't always this way - in fact, there are many possibilities, past and future. It's been quite another way during different periods of my life and those will come back around. If it is raining, I will see sunshine again. Even if it's been raining forty days, or another Biblical amount of time. The deluge does pass, eventually. Madness, I think, is not remembering the other. Other places, other Selfs that comprise ALL of one's reality. I remember everything. I know that this shall pass. And that I might even miss it, might even think back on it fondly, when I reach the farther side.