The Girl Can't Help It

2006-08-12T13:51:00.000-07:00

our newest arrival, Ina Aurelia

2006-02-27T06:40:00.000-08:00

Alex Underneath

2006-02-27T06:38:00.000-08:00

All in a Flooded Moment

All in a flooded moment,
the sun could rise
and announcing its intention
with storm filled eyes
climb slowly over the round
We fall and rise above it
searching, but not knowing why
the sun so bright were we to
follow it might
all in a flooded moment, rise.

2006-02-21T04:21:00.000-08:00

Among the Birds (2001)

......................................................................

If there's ever a way I'll find it when
my mind has lost control,
when my fingers are a battleground of lust.

When the bird drops from the sky
you know, something's begun.

2006-02-21T04:18:00.000-08:00

Promise

I would not leave a searching eye,
nor tear apart a bud
patience is my midnight sun,
to wait upon the word

2006-02-19T12:09:00.000-08:00

kisses

2006-02-19T12:00:00.000-08:00

I've been too tired lately to pry my brain into action. Six months pregnant with a toddler and all, I'm beginning to feel it in my bones. But upon checking out the status of my neglected bog I saw that two new comments have been posted in my absence. That's enough to get me going again. I think I'm addicted to feedback. You can hear it in the way I often end a sentence with: " you know?".

Anyway, what I've been thinking about lately is family values, sort of. I got accepted into an art school when my first child was about one year old. It's very hard to get into an art school here to study fine art. There are only about 120 openings each year in all the schools put together and less in the schools that are in my vicinity. So I was extremely happy when I got my acceptance letter.

Here in Norway, it is the norm to put your child in day-care from around one year old because that's when your state-guaranteed paid leave of absence runs out. I've worked in day-care centers here for about 5 years. They are of a much higher quality than American day-care centers. It's actually considered to be kindergarten, even for the youngest. The ratio of adult to child for the youngest is 1:3. Still, the look of vacancy in the eyes of one year olds who only want to be sitting in their mommy's laps convinced me that I would never put my child in kindergarten at such a young age. Until I got my acceptance letter,- then I started thinking maybe it wasn't so bad after all. Everyone else does it. Women are encouraged to get back into the work force and put their kids in day-care. Husbands and wives should share duties and contribute equally to their own household and to society in general. I like to think of myself as an independant thinker, but even I began to feel the pressure. It wasn't until the very last moment that I decided to stay home with my son for one more year before starting on my Bachelors (which I want mostly for practical reasons...).

Now I'm awaiting my second in June, so I won't be starting this Fall either and if I'm fair to the coming child, the Fall after that will be spent with her as well.

The feminists who encourage women to get out of the house and look down upon those who don't, have a point though. My brain is getting rather blunt. Most of my days are spent with other mothers who I in any other circumstance, wouldn't have anything in common with. But now we get along just great and I enjoy their company.

I can't help but wonder what life would have been like if I'd started school and my son was cared for by someone else during the day. I'd definitly be more stimulated artistically and socially,- but would he be as stimulated? Would he be as happy? The more I write, the more I think I made and am making the right decision. Time spent alone with a child at home is time noone but those involved know about or can share. I get no feedback except his happiness or unhappiness. It's hard for someone like me, who enjoys feedback, it's a challenge. But I suppose life is a challenge, nothing is gained by avoiding it. Maybe, and I hope, both me and my children (and husband) will gain from these quiet days at home, wishing for a blast of freedom in between meals, naps, walks and playing. Wishing but being glad, actually. Glad inside to be so close to my child, - for being close.

2006-02-16T00:45:00.000-08:00

See Through Night (1999)

2006-02-13T06:21:00.000-08:00

2006-02-05T09:42:00.000-08:00

I grew up in the late 70's and 80's. From my perspective, it was a peaceful time, I mean, compared to living in WWII or the McCarthy era or Vietnam. We read about harder times in literature and history books. They seemed inconcievable and not repeatable.

One author who wrote alot about the Mc Carthy era in particular was Philip K. Dick. His worlds are often populated by secret agents who come knocking on peaceful pot-smoking bohemians doors asking them if they are or have any affiliation with communists. He wrote science fiction it has to be said and these agents and situations seemed a little weirder than one imagined they really were. But today I read something stranger. My friend who's an artist has recently opened his door to two different "agents" at two different times asking if he was either an animal rights activist or a terrorist. (see Hobowilson's blog at www.hobowilson.blogspot.com ) . As he explains, the first episode was the result of his taking a picture of his reflection in his car mirror which the person driving the car in front of him who worked in a perfume factory found threatening and called the "episode" in. The second is weirder if you ask me. My friend was photographing a bridge. Doesn't matter why or it shouldn't, but he explains that he uses pictures of bridges and industrial structures in his art. Sometime after returning home from taking these pictures a federal agent knocks on his door asking if he is a terrorist or knows any terrorists. He invites him in to further convince him of his innocence. Why did the agent visit him? It's unusual behavior to take a picture of a bridge.

This is weirder than the science fiction I grew up with and I don't know what's worse;the fact that my friends action resulted in a housecall from a federal agent and being suspected of terrorism, or the more subtle fact: taking a picture of a bridge is unusual. It wasn't unusual in the late 70's and 80's. What do people do now instead, I wonder?

2006-01-25T12:42:00.000-08:00

Shooting Stars

Giving birth is wild. I gave birth for the first time about a year and a half ago. I can already feel the cringes in the minds of those who read this and for good reason. People don't talk much about it. We're all used to the paradoxes of being human: Civilized, cultured, reflective and sometimes elegant, while still deficating, urinating and fornicating on a daily basis. But giving birth occurs much less often and only to half the population, therefore we just can't get used to it. Wild animals. Infant cries. Pain, pain, and more pain.

To all you ladies out there who have yet to birth a child, I'm gonna let you in on a secret: despite the fine drawings and diagrams you'll find in all the various books on birthing,- despite the wide array of birthing positions and techniques available- the fact is that giving birth is WILD. It is its own thing and it has control over your body. And the infant, the infant... giving birth is both holy and dreadful, in my humble opinion. I wish all the books wouldn't make it seem so ordinary, understandable, controllable. It's not, it's different and you will be too after you've gone through it. It's like the galaxy itself decides it wants something of you and begins to churn - you.

I'm expecting my second this summer. I don't dread giving birth again,- I look forward to it. It turned me inside out and left me feeling battered,- but it also did two other things: It brought me closer to nature and the cosmos, and it brought me closer to my child. Holding the child and feeling its flesh after nearly a year of living with it growing inside of you is all that the birth proccess isn't: It is light and loving.

2006-01-25T09:56:00.000-08:00

Shooting stars divide
black sky and night

Between folds of space
fruits of new design
appear

Everything is bursting
with the unknown
between folds of space
identities ripen

From black night and emptiness

New fruits grow the universe.

2006-01-19T11:29:00.000-08:00

Poetry is old-fashioned. Don't you think? I love Rainer Maria Rilke's poetry. Emily Dickinson is awe-inspiring. Sylvia Plath could also be. Kenneth Patchen.... But that was a long time ago. Poetry today isn't allowed such luxerious themes and subtle developments toward grandiose visions or experiences. Poetry today is about other things. Deconstruction, cold musings or observations. Poetry is un-cool, so poets have to write poetry that doesn't seem like poetry in order to gain accept. The deconstruction began beautifully, with Allen Ginsberg who still had a vision to deconstruct, so that in the end we were left with his view of a world living and strange which he grappled with but which didn't seem to grapple much with him. But, as time passed, it seems poets have forgotten that deconstruction involves an original construction- they need something to deconstruct- a vision or experience of the world that is overpowering, at least to the poets themselves.

Visions are out of fashion. Amazingness is also out of fashion. Things are fucked is in. Deconstructing the fucked up world which everyone can understand. Well, I miss poetry. Men and women who sulked and hid for many years behind personal obsessions and overwhelming experiences of being alive.

If anyone out there knows of present-day poetry that I might like or that has moved them, I'd love to hear about it!!!

2006-01-17T11:01:00.000-08:00

Eve and the snake. The image fascinates me, not because I'm interested in the Fall of Man or sin or temptaion, but because a woman being entranced by a snake into eating an apple from the Tree of Knowledge which her father bid her stay away from, for me is mesmerizing. It's so poetic. She can't help it, the snake made her do it...but how? With it's eyes, with it's mouth? Or with the unseen. That's what gets me, the unseen. She's captivated by what she sees, but she doesn't see a snake, or even an apple...she sees what can't be seen and yet what was shown to her, and the snake bid her to eat of the apple so that she could continue to see.

Did it work? Do we see? Well, we have come a long way from the Garden of Eden. My question to my readers: have you ever seen anything that can't be seen? Heard anything that can't be heard? Experienced something that doesn't fit into the world as we know it? I'd like to hear about it.