by Li-Young Lee
Someone said my name in the garden,
while I grew smaller
in the spreading shadow of the peonies,
grew larger by my absence to another,
grew older among the ants, ancient
under the opening heads of the flowers,
new to myself, and stranger.
When I heard my name again, it sounded
far,
like the name of the child next door,
or a favorite cousin visiting for the summer,while the quiet seemed my true name,
a near and inaudible singing
born of hidden ground.
Quiet to quiet, I called back.
And the birds declared my whereabouts all morning.
I have read and re-read this Li-Young Lee poem so many times in the past month that the collection it is from, Book Of My Nights, falls open to this last poem automatically whenever I put it down. I've written it out twice in my crumpled, indecisive scrawl...once, in my word-sketch book, the other, in my journal. The opening line, "Someone said my name in the garden, while I grew smaller in the spreading shadow of the peonies" makes my heart beat a little bit faster. For quite some time now, I have been growing smaller in the spreading shadows while growing "larger by my absence to another." How this poet has rooted in place right in the center of my body and twined himself through my ribcage with these words is a wonder to me...but, with the magical alchemy of writing serendipity, I shouldn't ever be surprised to find a poet's words on my tongue whenever I open my mouth. Thinking in fragmented line, in metaphor and visual imagery is how I process through my day it seems now.
I am drifting...both online and off. Some days, I write so much I literally keep my notebook and pen tucked in my back pocket. I catch myself narrating my way through everything in third person and jotting it down: "She took an orange from the bowl on the table, peeling it carefully, the bruised and marred glow of fruit skin and flesh striking sparks against the stained tablecloth...tasting July with every bite." Endless narrative-thinking and the firm belief that oranges, tablecloths and my life comprise a story worth telling.
Other days, I am much harder on myself. I see the accomplishments of my peers and wonder why, for the life of me, I just cannot see anything all the way through to completion anymore. The well of ideas and inspirations is constantly full, but I have so withdrawn from the world of seeking a "public" self that it seems a distant memory that I once published material monthly, had almost a thousand regular readers for my old blog, attended conferences and gave readings for my governor and in museums. I had an agent ready to shop my book manuscript, belonged to several writers groups and still kept my co-editorial hat on for the magazine I love so much. Then, I just stopped.
"The quiet seemed my true name, a near and inaudible singing born of hidden ground," writes Lee...yes, somehow this quiet has become my own. Logically, I get it...two years of watching a marriage splinter and then a full year now of settling in to my independent self is enough of a mental and emotional challenge to keep anyone off-balance to some degree. But, it's more than that. There was this old impulse in me to plunge forward without thinking...taking on the whole world, proving that I *could* finish college even if I did get pregnant almost as soon as it began...proving that mothers with a house full of children *could* still create and engage in a writing life no matter what people say about the need for solitude...proving that I *could* be a damn fine professor though I was the youngest on staff and had a baby who didn't sleep all night before class and cried for hours whenever I was at work. I was going to publish my book, keep barrelling ahead in academia and raise three perfect children in a little white house with a perfect partner. Right?
Well...those of you who know me, either online or in-life, you know that this isn't what happened at all. Now my goals have been whittled down, bone thin. Are the wildies happy and laughing? That's enough. Did I manage to teach a few classes, write a few words, answer a few emails and visit with a few friends too? Then, I've accomplished something amazing. I've returned to a more-serious zazen/meditation routine where I find myself touching the Earth again. "New to myself and stranger..." though I pinwheel back and forth between my old longings and a new, deeper quiet, I do feel more myself than I ever have. There is some grace in accepting our days, months, or years of being lost. I don't have the answers anymore...I don't have the clearly charted out path of where I want to be in a year, or five, or ten. But I know where I am in this moment...and it is exactly where I want to be: slinging some words, watching a deep and heavy snowfall, gratefully listening as "the birds declare my whereabouts all morning."
