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Hope Arising

It has been a slow evolution of experiencing fall weather here in northeast Ohio. We’ve had cold nights but a lot of warm and windy days. Halloween night was kind to children wearing only their costumes without the need to cover them up with jackets.

There has been no need of imagining things to scare adults as we now are in for 4 more years of destructive chaos post-election. Fortunately, for me, my body simply cannot handle fear and despair. I think of a Rumi poem that says something to the effect of, “If you are selling fear in the marketplace, I’m not buying.” I cannot handle it in this body which has an already overloaded nervous system from 55 years of living with MS.

I am not dwelling on what might or might not happen. I see humanity as swinging on a pendulum always moving between chaos and order, darkness and light, destruction and creation, and fear and love. I am intensely curious to see where the pendulum lands after the dust of rancor, lies, and told you so’s die down. I am aware that we are no longer able to easily reach a peaceful equilibrium at this point in our history. But order follows chaos just as creative chaos follows too much rigidity. We are not exempt from the laws of Universal Mind which arose from cosmic chaos to create our universe. All according to an order that scientists are still proving, uncovering more and more through new technology.

Meanwhile life goes on as it will in our individual lives. For those of you reading this, our immediate daily patterns may not be disrupted very much as we may not be the direct targets of the deconstruction touted by the new administration. The ripple effects will touch us all. We do not live in a vacuum of our own socio-economic status. We also know that our country and the world are deeply interwoven. Changes will continue apace.

More than ever, I am determined to continue to hold to the values that resonate with my integrity and support their implementation at any level in my own sphere- from my retirement community to the local town and college just across from our campus. We keep breathing, and loving, and giving our best. I wrote this RAP (rhythm and poetry) song during Covid and updated it to present for Kendal at Oberlin’s Winter Solstice program. These are the lyrics and am currently working with an inventive percussionist to accompany me. I’ll post that finished version when available. (I dressed up as Gaia for Halloween)

Hope Arising

by Judi Bachrach

Gaia, She hangs in some cosmic infinity.

Mother of us all She acquires some divinity.

Her salt tears are rising, She storms and She burns

With immutable laws that Her children must learn.

Chorus: (sung)

I’ve got to-

uplift, my heavy heart

Whenever I feel my world is falling apart.

Uplift my troubled mind

Give voice to all the love and all the light I can find.

The whole world is in chaos it has happened before

Poverty, tyranny, deadly plagues, and war-

Everything is shifting before our own eyes.

We’ve got to keep uplifting so that Hope can arise.

Chorus:

People used to taking need to learn they must give back.

We’ve got the wisdom and the will it is connection that we lack.

Lead by giving, lead by loving, lead by changing how you think.

Believe that change can happen even standing at the brink.

Chorus:

Gaia, She hangs in some cosmic infinity

Mother of us all she acquires some divinity

Her salt tears are rising, She storms and She burns

With immutable laws that Her children must learn.

I’ve got to-

uplift, my heavy heart

Whenever I feel my world is falling apart.

Uplift my troubled mind

Give voice to all the love and all the light I can find.

Posted on by judibwriting · 2 Comments

October: Leaving the Garden

Northeast Ohio had a mid-level drought all summer. By the middle of September the trees had already started turning due to stress and acorns covered the ground under small oak tree near to a quiet spot where I like sit. The vernal pond has been a lush green field visited only by deer who scoot across the road from the woods.

This deer is only passing through just as we now only pass through the lovely, cultivated Courtyard Garden. In the garden the bench below is overhung with wisteria from a special cutting of the vine that survived the bomb in Hiroshima. Behind the bench is a wind chime with long tubes that keep ring-ing-ing in the fall breezes that are also passing through.

I am busily involved in another project with my creative photography partner, Rebecca. This time our focus is on water. She not only has photos of creatures living in and nourished by water from around the planet, but also exquisite pictures of water in patterns, frozen and misty, roaring African waterfalls, and captured in the white landscape of a single polar bear looking in her direction.

I have written about water in poems and songs for many years. My contributions to our program include offerings from my past albums as well as new songs I have written since coming to Kendal. Instead of water falling down mountains to the Hudson River where I grew up, I now live in the wetlands of drainage from Lake Erie. An indigenous speaker last year pointed out on a map what his people called The Great Black Swamp- which included northern land across the midwestern states below where the Great Lakes lie. He grinned at us as he said, “You know what I’m talking about.” As we have seven ponds created for drainage to create our campus, we laughed and assured him that we did.

Between coordinating slides with my poems and song lyrics on them, I am also tapping into the local talent to create song arrangements with a resident clarinet/sax player and a pianist player/arranger from the town of Oberlin. It is fun and challenging as my stamina is limited. I will also do a sitting-in my-wheelchair-dance to one of my pre-recorded songs. I treasure the opportunity as I cannot know how much longer I might be able to attempt this in the future.

I am fulfilled, ever grateful that I live in a place where I am cared for on every level. Shana Tova for those who celebrate Rosh Hashana. May we all find sweetness to hold alongside the political turmoil and our yearly tilt away from the sun as this year unfolds.

The Sea Walks (Kendal 1/4/2021)

The ocean

crawled out onto a sunny shore

over millennia

breathtaking

walking within warm skin.

Hold a body up

to an empty seashell.

Listen.











The brine of cerebral spinal fluid





washes your brain





2,000 gallons of blood gushes





daily through your heart.





Lymph river systems hitch rides,





surf your every move.















Billions of neurons flash





through chemical currents





molecular mermaids and mermen





partner the waves, choreographing





internal body ballets.










We return to those first waters





as tourists on beaches





beside rivers, ponds





diving into pools, gazing down into





sinkholes, sloshing through swamps-





pay homage.










All holding the sea of emergence





the flux of our beginning,





the ebb of our end.





We never forget





our eternal tides





still listening





to every drop.



	



	



		
			



	
		

			

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Septemeber
					


	

	

	

		






Morning Mist on Rock Pond by author





Yesterday’s sun was released through the early morning mist on every pond I passed. The chilly overnight autumn temperatures caused ghostly shapes and patterns to rise and swirl as the sun began to rise. Made visible by evaporation, subtle swoops and vortexes breezed above the waters. Sitting by one pond, my Polartec jacket zipped up to the neck, hands tucked into the ends of my sleeves, I drifted and dissipated along with the soft wet air we breathed- the fish, birds, the trees, the fields, and I. It is September.





In NY state where I grew up and raised my daughters, school always began the Wednesday after Labor Day. In Ohio, kids have already returned to school. My older daughter is on Sabbatical from this year’s teaching at her college, so the usual school related nostalgia of fall feels cut loose for me. I ate the last bite of summer with a fresh picked peach my friends gave me, and the perfectly ripe sweet corn from the holiday menu.





It is my birthday month. As a child, given that my birthday is around the fall solstice, I never knew if I would celebrate the occasion with a warm outside party or a chilly one based on indoor games. This year, I hope to celebrate with my daughter’s family and share my cake with my grandsons. I requested my son-in-law’s carob/apple/apricot/chocolate cake from a recipe he brought with him from Bosnia. It is fruity and dense without being too rich and drips with a dark chocolate coating. Being an excellent cook who loves international cuisine, I asked also for a Japanese dinner and was offered instead a Peruvian/Japanese meal. I did not know that was a possibility and eagerly agreed.





I asked for no physical presents as experiences are what I treasure these days. May your September bring you into fall with your own sweet desires to be fulfilled.





The following is a prose poem I read recently for a Poetry Potluck we hold at Kendal.

Lunch Lessons from a Finch





We both sat down for lunch. He flew directly to a middle perch on the birdfeeder with no competitors in sight.





He ducked his head inside for a seed, expertly cracked the shell, and swallowed the naked sunflower meat. Repeat. Repeat. Now and then he kindly dropped a whole seed for the ground feeders, mammals and birds alike. He paused.





He paused. Lifting his rosy head, he sang his own house finch song. Over and over, he trilled with abandon, before he returned to feed.





I paused with him. I set my fork down on my plate, already loaded for the next bite. His syrinx is located right next to his heart. If my larynx nestled up to my heart, what would I sing for my supper?





If my larynx nestled up to my heart, what would I sing for my supper?





The first response was tuneless gratitude. I was grateful for nature’s bounty and all the human hands that brought this meal to my table. Deeper still, awareness arose out loud to know that I have everything I need to be grateful.





I have everything I need to be grateful while millions have every reason in this world to be starving, desperate, and terrified. I sang my compassion for their suffering and the knowledge that to me, they are not alone, not even in the cruel death their bodies may endure.





They are not alone.





I picked up my fork up again, and slowly chewed the rice and vegetables with care. The finch flew away, and the rest of my meal tasted like heart honey.










Cosmos and Marigolds by author

	



	



		
			



	
		

			

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August
					


	

	

	

		






8/7/24





8/7/24
The downdraft of last night’s storm
partnered a terrific tarantella with the trees.
The sky turned black, the wind 
howled in powerful gusts.
Then the slashing downpour 
we had hoped would happen
turning our brown lawns green again.
Others lost power but not where I live.






Had it been us years ago on the mountain
we would have been prepared to be off grid.
Five-gallon containers filled with fresh water, 
LED lanterns, a windup radio with a built-in phone charger,
a woodstove, a gas stove
that, lacking an electric spark, would light
with wooden matches, 
eating food from the fridge freezer first,
laying plenty of insulation over food in the chest freezer-
checking that all was well with the horses, sheep and chickens-
that was what you were born to manage.





As the days of the internet grew into necessity
we knew all the places in town that would be restored first.
Driving with our phones and computers we
connected to family, friends, and clients 
outside the library, at the edge of town
or behind certain homes on the side streets.






Today the morning broke partly sunny and calm. 
No damage that I could see when I got outside.
Tomorrow would have been our 54th wedding anniversary.
Today I dance a sedate waltz of memories
that sweetens my heart, and I imagine yours
to know that I am well and safe as are
our daughters and grandsons
in this violent stormy beautiful world 
we live in.

















	



	



		
			


		
			



	
		

			

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Red White and Blue
					


	

	

	

		











Red, White, and Blue





I am weaving flowers into my flag this year.





Flowers for beauty amidst the filthy pollution of violent words and deeds.





May they bring soft power to blunt the edges of our collective fears and rage.





Their blossoms need careful attention to avoid being overwhelmed by unlimited chaos.





Care-full balancing the elements of sun, rain, fertile earth, and clean air yields flower-full results over time we have been sadly wasting.





Rigid arsenals against their enemies never work. A good flower garden must adapt to changing circumstances, alert to all internal and external forces that thwart healthy growth.





The interconnectedness of any garden community cannot thrive if it is restricted to insistent monocultures that disregard the reality of seasons. It must celebrate the innate cycles of expansion and contraction for all beings in all circumstances that surround it.





No matter who our new head gardener will be, there is much work to be done in salvaging this garden flag gone wild.





I include yellow stars for every state of being, of living, of healing and the pursuit of happiness.










It is hard to believe that I arrived here the day after the fourth of July weekend six years ago. I remember being driven by my daughter and son-in-law through mountainous upstate New York, briefly through Pennsylvania and on into open flatlands of Ohio. My first glimpse of Lake Erie was through the haze of barbeque grilling smoke as we passed the park on its shore. I spent the night with my daughter at the Oberlin Hotel and the next day I walked onto Kendal’s campus for the first time.





Now Kendal is my home. I often use the term ‘widow shock’ to describe my own haze when I first arrived. Richard’s memorial was in March, and here I was in July, moving into a small but lovely ‘hospital room’ with my own bath. The Care Center rooms were indeed designed to be for residents during recovery post-surgery or from an illness before they returned to their own cottage or apartment on campus. To my surprise, by January 1st, I was chosen to live in an Assisted Living room down the hall. It is more like a studio apartment and larger and more spacious than the nun-like room I first thought of as mine.





My daughter and son-in-law (and now my young grandsons) have helped me over the years to make it my own bright yellow space. I am happy here. I grow geraniums that flower in the northwest light.






	



	



		
			



	
		

			

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June
					


	

	

	

		






First berries in Courtyard Garden





Strawberries are here. A friend went picking them at a local farm and delivered me enough to bag and freeze for weeks to come and still more to cook down into a syrup that will enhance my morning oatmeal sundaes.





Spring is rapidly maturing into summer here in northeast Ohio. We had several days of 80+ degree (F) weather already, though the nights are still cool. Hot humid weather is difficult for me, as wet heat slows down neurological transmissions to muscles. MS already shuts down those connections, so I get out on my mobility scooter as early as I can before the sun has time to heat up my campus. I don’t complain- Emilia’s good friend is visiting the States with her son from Delhi, India. It is over 120 degrees (F) there.










Out for a family stroll





Many goslings are already gawky teenagers and smaller birds are on their second broods. Cedar waxwings have moved in around a nearby Juneberry tree defending the small red fruits from aggressive robins. Tiny rabbits, squirrels, and chipmunks are rapidly learning the ways of their kind.outside. 










Small squirrel silhouette on feeder seen between my blinds and plants





And of course, the diversity of flowering flora is an unending delight with daily discoveries. A former biology professor from Oberlin College (one of several) has taken over our most beautiful community Courtyard Garden. One of the most spectacular displays is the cactus garden (yes, a cactus garden in NE Ohio!) which also blooms in June. 










Hard to describe the intense contrast of thorns and luscious blossoms





He installed a small water feature that is home to painted turtles named  Brutus, Woody, (who may both be females, no one is sure), and a tiny new one as yet unnamed and hard to spot. Brutus comes up to investigate onlookers from time to time thinking he will be fed. I had no idea turtles could be conditioned that way.










Brutus, ever hopeful for a handout.





This month has an underlayment of nostalgia as it brings both Father’s Day and Richard’s birthday. Our family remembers him for his birth and death day by eating ice cream. ‘Tis the season for ‘frozen dairy delight’ as he used to call his favorite treat. May the sweetness of the season find smoother sailing with the bitter nature of our tumultuous world politics.










My neighbor getting his small craft ready for sailing.






	



	



		
			



	
		

			

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May
					


	

	

	

		






I was asked to write a poem for our latest Spring Fling community gathering.The theme this year was Pollinators. We had a scientific explanation from our well informed head of grounds here at Kendal as well as songs and dances and skits all celebrating spring and its pollinators. I added my piece which was used at the very end. It got chuckles and appreciation so now I pass it on to you, my family, friends and readers.





The Hummingbird, the Honeybee, and the Butterfly                      










One June morning, sitting on my front deck, eyelids closed against the strong sunshine, a buzzing sound annoyed my ear. As I opened my eyes to swat away an insect, a hummingbird had helicoptered over to check out my brightly colored blouse. I was all show and no sugar, so he zipped away to chase off the other guys vying for their drinks at the red and yellow feeder.





My cat came stalking back from adventures in the forest to show off the best way to sunbathe. As she languidly climbed the steps to join me, I noticed a honeybee in the grass. Not a big carpenter bee who drilled holes above my window frame, dusting my bureau with delicate sawdust, but a small earnest honeybee diligently visiting white clover after clover, imprinting his wiggle dance to map exact directions for the hive.





Over by the garage, a monarch butterfly landed on some few remaining milkweed plants. Their poisonous sap could harm our newborn lambs who delighted in escaping beneath the fence, though the mauve flowers the plants produced would seduce the nose of an angel. I watched the female fluttering upside down quickly depositing a single egg beneath one chosen leaf, and then another. Her larvae would ingest the toxins repulsing very hungry caterpillar eaters.





I called out,” Hola, Señora Mariposa!“ because she had just returned from Mexico to leave the next generation behind her.





These three pollinateers fly in and out of our landscapes every year. Seeking sweet nectar, they and their kin nurture beauty and carry the survival of our crops on their wings. In return, let’s pollinate the idea that we carry their survival in our grateful hands.
















	



	



		
			



	
		

			

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April
					


	

	

	

		

The Pipes of Pan: Before the Eclipse, 4/7/2024










The house finch dipped into powdered rouge





touching up his head and chest,





that sexy stripe between his folded wings.










The goldfinch leaves his nest





half-dressed, molting from olive to gold-





spring summons love for the ladies.










Geese zoom in for splash landings,





raucusing amongst themselves,





raising cane in joyful havoc.










The pipes of Pan haunt





in wild and mysterious keys.





Called out of darkness,





through all seasons,





ears attuned for Love,





we fly and make a joyful noise,





ascending from note to note,





to unlock the vault of the sun.















In 1968 Richard and I saw a partial eclipse of the sun when we were freshman at Emerson College in Boston. I no longer remember how we ‘saw’ the event but I do remember the awesome feeling of standing on the street with hundreds of strangers in a hushed moment. The city paused and held its breath as relative darkness washed over us in a primal revelation of how much we depend on the sun for light and warmth and life on Earth. How small we are in the cosmic alignment of star, moon, and planet.





Living where I do in Northeast Ohio, we are in the direct transit line of this current event. And, living in northeast Ohio as I do, it will likely be at least partly cloudy as the local forecast says. Nonetheless, our whole community has been issued viewing glasses and many families have reserved a local place to stay and to visit their loved ones at the same time. There is a real buzz of excitement that is catching and joyful in anticipation for the entire afternoon’s careful preparations for one and all.





Darkness and light, moon and sun, earth and all of its inhabitants, we breathe and live together invisibly connected through the stream of life. Spring erupts around us in myriad delightful ways. May we all be fortunate enough to be touched by the inevitability of growth and give thanks at least several times every day for the diverse gifts that abound.






	



	



		
			



	
		

			

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March
					


	

	

	

		






I am coining a new phrase- SDD or Seasonal Disorientation Disorder. Since February 1st it has felt like spring here in Northeast Ohio. If it had been March or April, you would expect the yo-yo extremes of warm sunny days coaxing out the early flowers and returning songbirds followed by freezing nights and a few inches of snow. But it seems we have added another whole month to springtime. Now that it is March, there are already robins, nest builders, returning geese couples, early booming plants and benches that beckon you to sit a while in the warm sun. It seems wrong to cut winter short (unlike in Alaska where they had record snowfalls) and yet delight in wearing only a light sweater or jacket to walk and jog along clear paths.





We are fortunate that lovely weather is the result of climatic disruptions. Others around the country and the world watch droughts and floods and violent storms destroy their way of life, with the looming certainty that the usual order has forever been changed. I know I do my best to limit my climate unsustainable consumerism as an individual living in my community in America. But as an individual I don’t have much of an impact on the sweeping reforms necessary to ensure that my grandsons will have a safe planet to live on. But I can vote!





My spiritual practice stabilizes me in a big picture of humanity’s sojourn on Earth. There is nothing in the universe that does not expand and contract, passing through stasis points on either end. What remains constant is the source of creation itself, called by many names, accessed, and sought after by science and diverse paths, all leading to acknowledge our impermanence. I can live with that. I do live with that intimately as my body ages and declines in its own unique way.





Today I am grateful for mobility scooters and sunshine, friends and neighbors, nurses and physical therapists, and the joy of being alive to witness being one of eight billion people on earth. Consider that we are a very small percentage of the billions of beings that we share the planet with. Even the few tiny  ants that have begun to traverse the desert of my bathroom floor are part of my world each spring. Taking every moment that I have, just to be alive, is the joyful thing that I, as an individual, can do my best to inhabit every day.










Outside





I will go outside where pond-gazing is magnetic,





to spy on turtles rising from the mud of





gold and copper leaves tossed





like wishes into the autumn murk










caught frozen mid-decay










in ice mandalas sliding across the ballroom floor





released into black waters shimmering in





warm spring sunlight





rippled by today’s breeze,





by old thoughts dropped





into the dark brew.










The bounded certainty





of my room, weighted by shoulds,





maybes, papers, internet messages





hold a lingering whiff of





a delicious morning meditation





urging me out, get out, let go,





hand myself over





to the unseasonably early spring embrace.










Spacious skies invoke breathing,





geese preening, songbirds nesting,





stillness dissolving into silence.