12:32 a.m. 091211
I wish I had been still, silent,
when you suddenly re-appeared
as a call in the night
of the full moon.
To hear your voice, it’s lush and sultry
lullaby, took me back to the time
long ago: when I was awakened.
Quietly, I sensed your presence, palpable, at midnight.
A distant sound of your heat coming closer.
Your call at 12:32 a.m.
was the cresting-
casting our breath,
the call and response of life,
as a pendulum
between us.
A quiet metronome calling in and out the tide of a calm and alert heart beat.
My fast delight in you astonished me.
Its rainbow colors had not paled.
The roses’ flush had not faded.
Eleven months ago was the last shore
our voices and breath
had swept upon.
I had sailed small ships to you,
rhythmically,
in the interim/the pause
carefully crafted ships that
could be held in your palm-
weightless amulets for you,
as I knew your burdens
were powerful and heavy
demanding
the strength of Atlas
and the
the faith of Job
and
the abiding care
of tenderness.
No sounds, breath nor words echoed back from you.
I knew you were a king,
a lion heart warrior,
and I know
you own multiple suits, hats, masks and masquerades.
I believe in you.
The measure of you as a man is:
a good man,
a genius man,
a grace man
You navigate a relentless,
unmerciful, turbulent sea
with
fortunate tastes of heaven
along the way.
I have faith
in your fortitude,
in your resilience,
in your laughter.
I wanted to hear the story of you.
I believe in real experience,
the dynamic storytelling,
not quotes of a life-
that is fiction.
I asked you about the beginnings,
the markers, the coordinates, the constellation, the compass
to enter your world gently,
to trace and create a new map,
since
the last sweet note of your voice
intertwined with mine.
I needed to know your True North.
I had found a reliquary of joy,
a captured memory of a beloved life
that left the earth
yet, forever
lives in you.
I found it in the week of your grief.
I now told you of its existence
for you.
Insensitive you spat and declared me.
I knew then you heard me as noise and as a rogue wavelength not listening and responding to you in kind.
Warmth turned to ice, frozen ice.
I was gliding and now I was paralyzed with your responses.
I wish I had asked for you
to take the lead.
My quiet inviting you
to move the world forward.
Your call at 12:32 a.m. on 091211 was the authentic capacity of your world.
No words.
No stories,
No information.
Simply breathing together was the music, the exchange, the reverence of a secret harbor.
I understand.
You told me:
Do not talk about the past.
I need to move ahead, move forward.
I listened.
I heard you.
You told me:
Do not talk about the past.
I need to move ahead, move forward.
I listened.
I heard you.
I too need motion, forward motion, real motion.
I needed to know the motion of your True North at this moment.
The past had closed and exist as still photographs of remembrance and points of departure.
I wish I had asked for you
to take the lead.
The quiet inviting you
to unfold in your rhythm.
I wish I had been a soundless presence
explicit and naked with milk and honey.
Hushed.
I wish I had been a reflecting pool
a meditation of resonating care
with flashes of silver on blue.
I wish I had been water reflecting
the haloed light
of the full moon’s splendor.
Slowly, I felt blindfolded
and placed in a maze, groping
for an exit.
Suddenly, I was on a high wire.
I was terrified.
The words I spoke shaped questions of your past year,
I sensed that you heard my questions as spears,
as barbed spikes to injure you.
You did not listen to their true caress,
and you chose to step away
and
watch me fall
and
fail
to comfort you.
I was losing my balance.
My delight became unmoored.
I felt trapped and unable to breathe.
And then you hung up.
Harsh.
I reeled,
staggered
in your choice of direction.
Your blow was shocking, severe and searing.
And yet I understood.
I called back.
I cannot live backwards and in fear.
No. No. No.
I need the scent, sound, sight, taste and touch of fresh and engaging lush and sultry lullabies.
I need love’s freedom in forgiveness
and love’s responsibility of forgiveness.
Forward motion not movement.
Alive.
I wish I had asked for you
to take the lead.
I wish I had followed only your breath.
Following your breath as the lead.
Reflecting back in silence.
Opening up in silence.
Giving you a nest in silence.
Giving me a nest in silence.
Swinging the breath between us,
opening, improvising, creating
a new rhythm, a pure music
of adventure and renewal.
The night became a cry for me.
I looked down at my scars as rips and tears.
I felt like I was positioned on a game board as a piece – not a person.
I am a woman of amplitude and honed sensibilities.
I am not a manufactured game piece sold over the phone.
I felt the cruel quicksand drown of humiliation.
I felt like an iron shovel was thrown into a delicate garden.
Awkwardness swallowed my happy elegance upon
hearing your voice once again.
My care for you was kept in a hurricane lamp.
Safe and sound.
The sun rises again, a new story
is in every breath,
in every motion forward-
thought and chosen action,
and, even in my indignant and bruised cry of that night.
I choose to welcome this crossing as a discovery.
I am supple-not servile.
I am responsive, dynamic.
Rigid rules, bitterness, unresolved wounds and unspoken agendas kill.
The past can hold the present hostage
by turning away, and
burrowing the wheels of past grief, hurt, rage and betrayals
into a deep hidden caverns
and gradually the rancid energy
wires the heart and the spirit shut.
It has the power to become an unconscious leit motif,
a conditioned involuntary reflex
and becomes a familiar home
seeking its mirror, its counterpart.
Stuck- a phonograph needle caught in a vinyl valley, an obsessive looping of the same.
Rolling the boulder up the mountain and then the boulder rolls down over and over.
Again.
Again.
Again.
Until one can imagine beauty, deliverance and liberation,
stare down the cannibal of fear and voracious demons,
and
venture into a new world and break open a new life
with
uncharted music and unknown choreography,
the boulder will continue to tumble down-
shackling one to punishing patterns of the past.
Yes.
I know this because of the winter of my winter’s winter-
my dark night of the soul
You did not know of this season.
Your stony heart will break open into flesh and blood once again.
Yes. Yes. Yes.
I know the joy of you.
I am here for the full extent of your humanity
as you echo
your care about the full extent of my humanity.
Be still and in motion.
My word
is the full moon
shining
flowing
every
night
into
dawn.
Luminous.
I need infinity
and
divine breath
to live
love
my
life
and
to invite and welcome
a beloved.
My beloved has wings and sound that are as wide, broad and deep as the universe’s sanctuary.
My beloved sustains the capacity,
and the courage
to acknowledge
that truth and freedom and love
co-exist and are simpatico-
syncopating
the beats, rhythms and notes
of
alternating, simultaneous melodies of:
breath and breathing;
joy and sorrow;
trust and respect;
silence and sound;
presence in presence and presence in absence;
endings and beginnings;
patience and forgiveness;
composing and creating;
design and improvising;
strength and vulnerability;
deepening and refining
intimacy.
Moving forward the rich, vast and textured sounds and exclamations of life
and
moving in the direction of greater authenticity and truth telling.
Living truth. Living freedom. Living love.
An honorable relationship is not a possession, it is sacred vehicle of extending the possibilities
of truth, freedom and love between beloveds.
The very life of life: falling and rising in forward motion.
One cannot create, search nor find one’s anam cara-
it finds you and unveils and opens
the sacred and joyous offerings of the Divine within-
slowly and/or suddenly.
Revelation.
The life force is pure music- an overwhelming, spontaneous mystery.
It is breath and breathing.
It is revolution.
It is is:
PRIVATE RHYTHM: BE MY LULLABY Catherine L. Johnson 2009
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1+2+3+2 =8
Infinity.
Prana: divine breath.
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FOR N.A. P.
CATHERINE L. JOHNSON 