Posted on by judibwriting · 9 Comments

Freedom

How do I engage with inner freedom that is stable, independent of outer circumstances?

Outwardly, my life in the care center is shifting. Now we can rejoin the larger community and though we are all vaccinated, we from the care center must wear masks at all times, and stay distanced. To sit outside in the sun chatting with a friend, looking out on the pond in front of the main entry to Kendal, with no one to time me, or escort me, was like being on vacation. I relaxed in ways I hadn’t known I was missing. It has been very nourishing.

What is freedom? I wouldn’t recognize this gift if I didn’t already know it deep inside. Gratitude for the slow reintegration with other Kendal residents is blooming with the tulips.

Though still masked and distanced, I am reveling in new-found freedoms. leaving the care center to see the campus, friends, and community gathering areas once again.

Molting Goldfinch

I am shedding

my olive drab winter feathers

growing new ones of

aconite, forsythia, crocus, daffodil yellow

glinting in the spring sunshine

I dominate the bird feeder

propagate my species

crack open my sunflower seeds

while she delights in watching me

her seeds from a package

on top of her morning oatmeal

She is also molting

shedding gray prohibitions

of a pandemic

and growing new feathers

of golden hope

in trust for her species

I write from Ohio and am not sitting beside Lake Erie, but my body knows the waves.

Sitting on the Shore

4/7/21

Yesterday in the high wind

thoughts rose up

rising from the surf

of a thousand white stallions

crashing down on the shore

their flashing hooves

disappearing into sand

the foam sizzling away

only to arise and return

over and over again

Today my feelings are at low tide

the gentle slap and sigh

slap and sigh

lulled by waves

that come and go

to and fro

freely within

the greater body 

Sitting still

I gaze

beyond the horizon

from east to west

sitting still

what remains

beyond rocks that spawn each earthy grain of sand

beyond drops of all the rippling waters, salted and fresh

beyond photons of light radiating from our star’s fire

beyond molecules of oxygen blending into outer space

Sitting firm and utterly still

breathing in and out

freely like waves

within the greater body

Judi Bachrach

Posted on by judibwriting · 4 Comments

Flight

Diary 3/22/21

I have been a grouchy bear this week. I felt the spring call to emerge from my cave as usual but- the assisted living cave administrators are still bound to impose muzzling face masks, fenced in the enclosed garden, and no interactions with other any of the other bears in their independent living caves even though we have all been vaccinated. The rising sap has irritated me in ways I did not anticipate.

As I look towards July 4th weekend, which Biden bids us to hopefully celebrate as close to normal as possible, it reminds me that date will mark the start of my third year at Kendal. The continued restrictions confine my memories and my heart hurts. The arrival of spring used to mark lambing season for our flock of 23 Icelandic sheep, the transformation of fluffy peeping chicks into feathered hens, the yearly care for our horses, the careful transplanting of indoor seedlings and direct seeding of flowers and vegetables into the garden each according to their own temperature needs.

That connection to the seasons regarding working the earth and tending to animals under our care is gone. And truthfully, my own body was failing way before I moved preventing me from my attending to the active life of a homesteader. I was not aware of how much it all grounded and nourished me until this spring. My childhood and most of my adult life with Richard all happened in the Catskill Mountains and the Hudson River Valley. The Catskills are ancient rounded mountains. The energy there stood firm beneath my feet and was slow, measured, and weighted with a deep gravitas that rose up through the forests as they also embodied the seasonal changes of the northeast. Northeast Ohio has a very different feel altogether.

Kenda was built mostly on wetlands requiring the creation of seven different ponds. Settlers coming to what is now Cleveland, died by the droves of malaria. This is a wet claylike area south and west of Lake Erie with a lot of sandstone in various counties. The local wildlife no longer offers emerging black bears looking to raid our garbage deli for their spring hunger, nor are there wild turkeys scrabbling their scant nests to lay their eggs helter-skelter beneath some hemlock tree, or coyotes or foxes drooling for chickens- but there are a few deer, bunnies, muskrats, chipmunks, squirrels and a large variety of birds. Geese and ducks on the ponds, including a brief touchdown of trumpeter swans last week, complete the list and l have heard of the troublesome raccoons and skunks from those living in cottages around the far end of campus.

I have not yet had the opportunity to get around the campus (see grouchy bear above) and can only hope the new Covid19 mandates will loosen up our restrictions by the summer. Meanwhile the sun resurrects emerging growth everywhere as Eastertide approaches.

Hallelujah.

Diary 3/24/21

I am glad I waited to post the above. Today the amendments to our Ohio nursing home mandates arrived in full- in two weeks we will be allowed to leave the Care Center hallways- masked and distanced in the presence of our independent living residents- but we can go down to the central meeting area of Kendal to meet friends there. Best of all, we can be free of our own caves and venture out onto the entire campus to meet friends anywhere outdoors as well. My grouchy bear is rumbling with pleasure and anticipation. Visiting with my family will still be a timed, well sanitized, bureaucratic affair, with lots of paperwork for the staff to be able to track possible infectious problems and my daughter and grandson will be escorted to and from my room or even to outdoor assigned areas- but if the trend of less illness and hospitalizations continue all around us, eventually this, too, shall pass.

Sounds of Flight

The flight paths

are noisy again

birds returned to summer here

they weave a hammock of sound

that rocks me

before sunrise

air friction of larger manmade wings

have bested Covid withdrawal

to tear through the sky

ripping away away away

free to come and go

I prefer the bird sounds

but then again

nested on the ground

I am not yet

ready to fly