An Apertif to Insomnia

The Moon,
crisp and cool
in the Winter-clear sky,
is bright enough
to read my soul by.

Siren-like,
She sings seductively
through my veins.

Shining her light on my weariness,
she is the harbinger
of over-active thought.

She comes bearing a riot of the spirit
this January night
without the option to politely decline.

Ready or not,
She has Something to say.

I am ill-prepared
to honor the hidden words
hemmed into the lining
of Psyche's silken skirts tonight.

I am not ready to claim the truths,
woven into her delicate white petticoats;
embroidered there with the thread
of blood and consequence.

But she is alive in me.

Coy and coquettish,
She offers harsh queries on moonsilver trays
as an aperitif to insomnia.

Deep and devilish,
She delivers my discontent gift-wrapped;
neatly tied up with well-honed beams of truth to top it off.

She will not be dispelled.
There can be no peace.

All I want tonight
is sanity and slumber,
but Sleep,
my old illusive friend,
will not come this moon-full night
to comfort me.

She has hidden him,
once again,
in the ever-shifting pattern
of the stars.

And Sanity?
Well...
Sanity left me long ago
in a lovers' tiff
along the shores
of my oft-broken heart.

And I?
I am left alone
at the witching hour
to find peace with my unrest.

The Moon,
crisp and cool
in the Winter-clear sky,
is bright enough
to read my soul by...

© Tanya Anguita

Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate the Positive #58 -- 12/29/10

Until last week, it had been so long since I'd written anything that I'd begun to worry that I'd forgotten how.

Everything has been about "busy" these past couple of months.

Busy trying to find a place to live.
Busy packing.
Busy moving.
Busy dealing with health concerns.
Busy rehearsing.
Busy working.
Busy with Dickens Fair.
Busy, busy, busy, busy, busy...

And somewhere in there, I began to be frightened that I'd misplaced my Muse, and I was really missing her. I was scared that I'd lost my writer's voice and I was pining for it. I think I'm finding it again and thank goodness for that. Without it I feel lost and lonely...disoriented and directionless.

It soothes me to write. It lets the howling demons out and releases them to the wilderness outside of my soul. It gives me solace and relief. It quiets the internal landscape, leaving it greener, and more luscious with a chorus of simple birdsong and trickling creeks as the soundtrack instead of the tempest that sometimes brews in my mind, threatening to consume me.

Writing allows me to process ancient hurts and fresh thankfulness. To work through the scar tissue and to heal fresh wounds. It gives me leave to put my joys and sorrows somewhere outside of me so that I can more clearly think. It is the channel to my most honest self and it stills the noise that can become so deafening when I'm struggling.

I wrote a piece a few days ago that was fraught with hurt and anger. Old hurts from the summer of 2009 had come to the forefront rather suddenly and were banging on the walls of my psyche. I had to write the piece. I had little choice. It came out of nowhere and sideswiped me as I sat down at my computer. It was brutal and pain filled and it wanted out...NOW...urgently and with a force that was overwhelming. I had little choice but to write it or be eaten by it. I chose the former.

It is interesting, isn't it, to find out that hurts we think we've dealt with, healed from, passed through, are still lurking in strange corners of our emotional memory...waiting there in the dark with sharpened teeth to bite us when we least expect it?

I am not fond of these surprise attacks, but I would rather have those feelings pour out of me and onto paper, than in me...gnawing on my spirit.

I have a lot to be thankful for tonight, but I'm tired so will keep it short. To that end, I sing my gratitudes as follows:

1) I am deeply thankful for the ability to pour my thoughts and emotions out onto paper. For the gift of written release. For the still place that I go to when I write, and for the clarity and relief the written word gift me with.

2) I'm thankful for the light and the dark that live inside of me. Both help me to be the person I am, and to write the way that I do.

3) On some odd level, I realized tonight that I'm thankful for the insight my depression affords me. It makes me more patient and more compassionate. I've seen and lived in the basement of my soul and can therefor understand, on some level, the struggles of others in my life. Without it, I'm not sure that I would be able to understand with an open heart the sorrows of others.

4) Cups of tea and true conversation with dear friends. Makes my soul sing. Thank you, Laura. :)

5) Photographic learning curves. Spent the day trying to photograph jewelry for my dear friend, Joshua. I learned a lot, and hope that I got some shots that will be usable for him. His Etsy site is here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/lioncraftstudio

6) A warm place to sleep on a cold winter night. I do not take this for granted and I am So thankful. So very thankful.

7) Not having to go to work tomorrow.

8) Having time to edit a couple of photos from my March trip to NYC. See below. :)

8) Wanting to keep writing these but knowing that I need to sleep and being smart enough to recognize that. Hee hee!

Good night! :)

Why yes, that is Anubis on a barge heading towards Manhattan. Why do you ask? *grin*


Yep. :)


The hand of Liberty.

Liberty's Backside

tattered

you have abandoned me
without a word

your silence is a scream of disdain--
disrespectful;
a cruel coldness
on a winter night

godspeed wherever you are.
i wish you comfort

my heart strains to hear yours
over the rift in my soul,
waiting like a deaf hound
for the command that will never come

godspeed wherever you are.
i wish you joy.

my comprehension of your actions,
like the coat of a newly-shot dead man,
is tattered,
full of holes.

my hurts coagulate around each
open wound where the
smoking pistol of your unkindness
dug into my tender heart
right before you pulled the trigger.

godspeed wherever you are.
i wish you contentment.

i used to think you kind and beautiful;
incapable of intentional meanness,
gentle in your entirety,
and good

now i see i was mistaken

you are, instead,
gifted in the art of passive heartlessness,
a bard well-versed in the song of the damning,
who has left me
haunted,
removed,
sorrowful,
alone,
damaged and done.

godspeed wherever you are.
i wish you love.

© Tanya Anguita

The Moon Wore Red

The Moon puts on a little red dress
and heads out to light up the night.

Slinky in scarlet and sensuous,
she's flirting with the midnight stars,
shaking her winter hips
as she dances circles
around the Storm Cloud's
ineffectual minions;
laughing merrily
at their pathetic attempts
to cover her shining beauty.

A sultry smile lights her
half-shadowed face
as she glides across the sparkling floor
of the Mid-Winter sky.

She hasn't felt this sexy since 1648
and no one is going to ruin it for her tonight.

Sauntering up to the bar,
she orders a round of Longest Nights
for everyone in the Northern Hemisphere,
gives a Red-Dress-on-a-Solstice-Night-shimmy
and welcomes in the New Year
by belting out the 12-bar-blues version
of "Welcome Yule"
to her waiting fans
as she toasts their tenacity
after a long, hard year.

The Devil may wear a blue dress, my friends,
but tonight the Moon wore red.

© Tanya Anguita

Arrows of Clarity

Arrows of clarity
are hurled across the bow of a ship
called Your Resistance;
shot there
to pierce your bound up heart.

Darts of openness
are flung across the hull
in an attempt to crack the hardened shell
that keeps Love out.

Broken by brokenness,
what you want most is healing.

Throw your anger overboard!
It no longer serves you.

Release the coiled anguish
that is tangled,
like so much matted twine,
around the coral reef of your heart!

Extricate the venom of all-consuming hurt
that encases your willingness
like a shroud,
and spit it out
like the vile poison that it is!

Untwist the distorted,
pain-filled knot
that binds you to your fears;
holding you down while you drown in them!

Unravel the restraints
that keep you tied
to the cracked and crumbling mast
of the role of observer
which distances you
from any real feelings;
keeps you separate
from your life.

Find your honesty.
It is the life jacket that will rescue you.

Own your truth.
It is the lighthouse that will guide you.

Allow yourself to climb,
exhausted,
into the waiting lifeboat
of hard earned happiness.

Kick against the crashing waves
of your self-destructive habits.

Decide that you are tired
of choking on the the roiling waters
of your deepest sorrows.

Make obeisance
to any god that will listen
and believe
in your ability to swim.

© Tanya Anguita

Oh! The Blessed Sunset!

Tonight no words...just images....

Because nature is more eloquent than I...


And who can express this in words....




Amen!

Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate the Positive #57 -- 11/03/10

I think this is a good daily message. :)

You know...my rant a couple of weeks ago? It really did me a world of good. I needed to let that out. I needed to be okay with not being okay all of the time. I needed to release my need to always project the happy. And I needed to just be however I was. It has been so freeing to be just as I am ever since. And today? I'm doing really well again...and that? is a cause for a big old YIPPEE! So um, YIPPEE!

There is a lot to be thankful for in my life. Yes, I'm stressed about moving. No, things aren't miraculously grand, but there is a lot of good and I'm deeply thankful for that fact.

I've been really blessed these past few weeks. I'm no longer in limbo with my housing situation and that is a relief. I'm sad to be moving out of my beloved home but movement forward is so much easier than limbo is.

I've had some amazing conversations with some wonderful people in the past few days that have made me realize, once again, how lucky I am in the choices I've made in friends...and also how lucky I am that people choose me as a friend.

I've gotten to go on a last minute whirlwind trip to Disneyland and have it cost me very little to do so thanks to cheap hotels, smart dining options and a friend who made the park possible. I was also gifted with the opportunity to see West Side Story last night and it was a joy to see and the company was great. :)

I'm feeling a little bit nuts because it is Dickens season and I'm packing my home and prepping for fair once again. There are a lot of arenas where this feels like a big unfortunate deja vu, but I'm calmer about it somehow. And because I'm not insane enough, I seem to have decided to try NaNoWriMo for the first time. We'll see how far I get, but so far it is a great exercise if a slightly insane one.

So at the risk of repeating myself, tonight I sing my gratitudes for:

1) Forward movement.

2) Having a housing safety net. :)

3) The trip to Disneyland...for so many reasons. I NEEDED to do something purely for me and for fun before the move and before Dickens started. I'm so thankful to Cybele and J.B. for nudging me to make it happen. And I'm so glad that it was so simple and stress free. Thanks to Marc, Alejandra, Anni and Laura too. Just because I can say thank you. :) And hooray for silly t-shirts that made the park staff laugh. :)

4) Barbara Pond's amazing birthday present to me of Ghost Ship. Dancing without impact (I figured out if I'm careful I can shake my thang without hurting my neck/arm! YAY!) to amazing djs, and crazy shuttle foo, and seeing Michael and Aaron and Corinne and Tuffy and Karryn and Zak there. Hooray! Did I mention that I got to dance? For the first time in MONTHS? I needed that for my spirit. Thank you, Barbara, for a fantastic, soul-healing, dance-possible, amazing time in your wonderful company night. :) And um...hedgehogs. Yeah. ;)

5) A couple of really good and comforting and helpful conversations with Monique in the past couple of weeks. 21 years of friendship. Wow. We need to take our friendship out and get it drunk sometime this year. :)

6) Katie for being Katie.

7) Laura Gregory for being Laura Gregory. :)

8) Once again, an amazing and enlightening tarot reading from Jolie Stevens.

9) A wonderful conversation with Laura Brueckner last night. Thank you, Princess Stalkerina. I'd forgotten how much fun I have with the geeking part of this project...and hadn't realized how much I missed it. It was really good to catch up. :)

10) Knowing that the universe will make this move a good thing for me. Even if I can't see how just now, I'm choosing to trust that there is something good in store.

11) The fact that I'm managing to pack about 3 boxes a night. Which means it is conceivable that I may not drive myself too crazy with this. We'll see. So far it feels like I'm on track.

12) Bill Batty for the boxes. OMG...SUCH a lifesaver with this. THANK YOU!

13) Having done all of my laundry tonight. What a relief. I'm always so happy when it is done. Hooray!

14) Walks on the pier. I've rediscovered my pier these past couple of weeks and it is really remarkable how good that place is for my spirit and my psyche. Yum.

15) Trader Joe's Berry Applesauce cold from the fridge. Yum.

16) That Anni's family are ok post house-fire. I'm so thankful for that fact. Phew. I love you Anni. And I love you Shannon. :)

17) That this weekend is going to be filled with people that I'm happy to be getting to see. Eeeeee!

18) Starting NaNoWriMo. I haven't tried to write fiction really ever as an adult. I'm finding it kind of fun and extremely meditative. I like that most everything else falls away but the story when I'm writing. I will need to write almost double the words tomorrow though because I'm having a hard time keeping my eyes open tonight.

19) Getting my hair cut for the first time since March this weekend was made of happy goodness. I felt weird not going to Annamae, but it was a Groupon thing and it was in Berkeley so I couldn't resist. I'm relieved.

I'm sure there is more, but now I think I'm going to write a little and go to sleep. Hooray!

10/28/10 -- The clouds were a miracle that night!