I used to make magic. Well, magical symbols. Headological symbols. Usually filled with feathers and beads and runic rhymes. But not always. Sometimes they were virtual cut and paste. Hey, whatever works. (Some links on that 2003 post no longer work.)
It has been said that the difference between headology and psychiatry is that, were you to approach either with a belief that you were being chased by a monster, a psychiatrist will convince you that there are no monsters coming after you, whereas a headologist will hand you a bat and a chair to stand on.
It’s been a long time between synchronistic symbolisms. And now it’s spring. And now it’s time, says my Granny Weatherwax self.
This for b!X: to bring good fortune, help dreams come true. As real as headology. It will be mailed tomorrow.
A circle fashioned of the flexible willow in our front yard and the ornamental tree planted in the back yard in memory of his father, covered in the colors of Scopio (black) and Luck (red). Two feathers from his nephew’s collection. A ring threaded with amber and coral brought back from Poland by his grandmother. And in the center, a jade carving that belonged to his dad connected to an “old woman” milagro.
Because, you never know.
My son-in-law says it’s his lucky number, so he and my daughter were married on May 24th, fourteen years ago. I hope that they had a Happy Anniversary today. I made dinner — spicy glazed shrimp over pasta with a double chocolate mouse pie for dessert. I even did the dishes (that’s usually my son-in-law’s job). And my grandson dressed like a waiter in a fancy restaurant and poured the champagne, served the dinner and dessert, and cleaned the table after.
It was a nice day all-around, even though it was muggy and the mosquitoes were out having a great time.
I’ve always wanted to grow calla lilies, and today my daughter planted the pot of them I bought last weekend. I couldn’t resist buying them because it was the first time I had ever come across a whole blooming pot of them for sale. I might have liked a different color, but those were the only ones available. They won’t last through the winter in our planting zone, but I’m going to try to remember to dig up the bulbs and bring them inside during the fall. I really do like calla lilies. (duh)
All the rain we’ve been having has really stirred up the growing green.
When they bought this house, I sent them an odd tree I had seen somewhere called a “Harry Lauder’s Walking Stick.” From here: This shrub reaches a height of 8′-10′, with a similar spread. The flowers of Harry Lauder’s walking stick are yellowish-brown “catkins,” as on pussy willows. The blooms appear in early to middle spring. However, this shrub is not grown primarily for its blooms but for its unusual branching pattern, which is indicated by its other common names: corkscrew filbert and contorted hazelnut. For as you can see from the picture, its branches contort themselves in every which way, resembing corkscrews.
Right now, ours is only a couple of feet tall and is covered with spring leaves. But in the fall you can see the screwy branches. In a few years, it’s going to be a real eye-catcher around here.
Our gardens around the house are fun and funky, evolving as the spirit moves one or the other of us. I’m rather partial to the little troll house that sits in the middle of a section of flourishing green at the end of a little path. 
No one seems to be living there yet, but, certainly, any on of our resident chipmunks would be welcome to move in.
Meanwhile, over where I put a bird feeder so my cat can sit on her perch and watch the activity out her window, a male grackle visits several times a day. I’ve never had a grackle feed at a feeder; they usually just eat what falls on the ground.
Although the grackle is often considered part of the blackbird family, along with crows and starlings, it actually is not. It is part of the meadowlark and oriole family of birds. It is a large black bird with an extra-long tail. About its head and shoulders are iridescent feathers that change from blue to green to purple or bronze, depending on the light.
This coloring often reflects a need for those to whom the grackle comes to look at what is going on in their life differently. It says that situations are not what they appear to be and you may not be looking at them correctly–particularly anything dealing with the emotions.
Keep in mind that black is the color of the inner and the feminine. The purple and bronze coloring about the head especially usually indicates that emotions are coloring our thinking process. The grackle can help us to correct this.
Spring. Newness. Hope. Magic.
(for lack of anything else to say, I’m posting here a poem a day….)
That first winter
(our strange shrimp-shaped child),
locked into the old railroad apartment
(our brassy new marriage keys) —
with the snow seeping through
the chipped bathroom bricks,
I nursed that child
before the open oven,
and we each took showers
with bathroom door hopefully open
to the kitchen’s meager warmth.
Our imaginative landlord
(poet-pretender,
great making of Christmas plum pudding)
attached an infra-red lamp
to the toilet,
mistakenly assuming
that plumbing, like flesh,
would succumb to its magic.
We could afford to laugh,
then, shivering
behind the radiant lie
that lined the loose edges
of the closed bathroom door.
I still feel the cold
of that first winter,
the cold of that closed door.
Cold as hell.
c elf 1960s
(for lack of anything else to say, I’m posting here a poem a day)
I asked my mother to give me roots.
She smiled and left the cord uncut,
its far end snaking through
a lineage of cords untouched.
I clawed against its tether,
searching desperately for swords.
I asked my father to give me wings.
He stood away,
arms pressed heavy to his sides.
“Fly, fly!” his strained voice cried.
I raised my naked arms
and walked into the wind.
I asked my husband to share
with me the things he knew
of roots and wings.
He showed me scars
where his own still pressed
from deep below old broken skin.
I stumbled away,
a stolen blade tucked in my boot.
I asked my lover to show me
what he thought of roots and wings.
He climbed upon a fence
and sat away the days.
So I called the stones
to coil at my feet,
sharpened my blade to womansword,
and carved a path that spiraled
through a horizontal rain.
And the roots became wings.
And the wings became roots.
And now I flow among the sands,
cold and knowing;
I rise, unbridled,
light among the dust.
c elf 1980s
(for lack of anything else to say, I’m posting here a poem a day)
I wake
tight
wound in the sheet
–night winding sheet —
wounded
in the tight lined
yellow-sheet logic
of your wound mind
winding
sheet-tight
around my night.
c elf 1970s
(for lack of anything else to say, I’m posting here a poem a day)
Resting on a quiet ledge
on the beach at Manchester,
the sun warming all of my ends
and endings,
I am drawn to these granite reaches
of the gray North Shore —
the icy sea
an eternal challenge
to the persistent sun
that beats
and strokes
and licks summer heat
into the abiding stones
that wait, still and silent
against the stark abuse
of a relentless surf.
c elf 1980s
I missed posting a poem today because I was setting up my new computer. So, instead, here’s a link to one of my favorites that I wrote in 1991 and posted in 2005.
((For lack of anything else to say, I’m posting here a poem a day….)
Her Daughter’s Destiny
If she mirrored me
she refused to know it,
choosing, instead,
the finer lines
of her father’s reflection.
There were times
I wished her gone,
her and her herd
of fragile unicorns –
or cornered where
I couldn’t watch
their golden dances
filling the space in my mirror.
When she left that spring,
the corners grew shadows.
She set free the unicorns
and took all of my mirrors
with her.
……….
Her Son Leaving Home
Young Dionysus,
a faded blue bandana
circling his head like a halo,
layers himself with choices
forgotten by the gods.
He smells of earth, of dreams,
of rain that flows with ease
along acres of hilly woodland,
filing some final need
in the deep hollows of stones.
He releases himself to the magic of motley,
to the wind, alive in his unbound hair,
to sweet pickings, scattered
like ripening berries
along miles of roadside vines.
As he leaves, the hearthfire
crackles softly.
Blackbirds loose feathers
from the heights of sky-borne oaks,
and honey bees sing to the sun.
c elf (1970s and 1980s)
(For lack of anything else to say, I’m posting here a poem a day….)
Ode to Opal
The opal, they say,
scatters the heat of the wearer,
turns her fickle, they say
(if she is not centered)
– like light in moving water,
like water on warm stone.
(Let her who wears it
beware.)
The opal, they say,
is partly water,
softer than crystal
(though not as clear),
smoother than pearl
(though not as soft),
as fragile as a heart
nearly mended.
Break it and it bleeds —
water scattering light
like dreams at dawn.
(Let him who holds it
beware.)
The opal, the say,
attracts joy, love,
creative spirits
that fire the heart,
sends from its center
the magic of all other stones,
– an irresistible call
to iridescence.
1992 c elf