Tag: Margaret Atwood

Lightly Child, Lightly. (Part I)

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Three Advil every three hours wasn’t taking the edge off.  The pain was ripping thru my left shoulder and rolling down my arm.  And during sporadic moments, there was relief.  And, I would breathe. But the storm returned.

Resistance to professional evaluation had run its course. It was time.

A five minute wait in the waiting room.

X-Rays of shoulder prior to examination.

“Shirt off please.”

Doctor steps in.  “Resist here.”  “Push back there.”  “Is it tender here?” “Or here?”

“Sports injury?” As he looks at the bone protruding on the left shoulder.

He continues.

“I’d like to get x-rays of your neck. Your shoulder pain, it’s a red herring.” Continue reading “Lightly Child, Lightly. (Part I)” →

Lightly child, lightly

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Like breath or a balloon, I’m rising,
I hover six inches in the air
in my blazing swan-egg of light.
You think I’m not a goddess?
Try me.
This is a torch song.
Touch me and you’ll burn.

– Margaret Atwood, from “Helen of Troy Does Countertop Dancing”

 

Notes:

  • Poem Source: Anne Sexton Appreciation. Photo: Deviant Art
  • Post Title & Inspiration: Aldous Huxley: “It’s dark because you are trying too hard. Lightly child, lightly. Learn to do everything lightly. Yes, feel lightly even though you’re feeling deeply. Just lightly let things happen and lightly cope with them.”

Lightly Child, Lightly.

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You thought the happiness
would appear simply, without effort
or any kind of work,

like a bird call
or a pathside flower
or a school of silvery fish

– Margaret Atwood, from “Your Children Cut Their Hands…” in “The Door”

Notes:

  • Poem: via Adrasteiax; Photo: Noell Oszvald with The illumination (via see more)
  • Post Title & Inspiration: Aldous Huxley: “It’s dark because you are trying too hard. Lightly child, lightly. Learn to do everything lightly. Yes, feel lightly even though you’re feeling deeply. Just lightly let things happen and lightly cope with them.”

 

Lightly Child, Lightly.

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I’m getting somewhere now, I’m feeling lighter. I’m coming unstuck from scrapbooks, from albums, from diaries, and journals, from space, from time. Only a paragraph left, only a sentence or two, only a whisper.

I was born.

I was.

I.

– Margaret Atwood, from “Life Stories,” in The Tent

Notes:

  • Painting: The Blue Hour by Jon B. Paulsen
  • Prior “Lightly child, lightly” Posts? Connect here.
  • Post Title & Inspiration: Aldous Huxley: “It’s dark because you are trying too hard. Lightly child, lightly. Learn to do everything lightly. Yes, feel lightly even though you’re feeling deeply. Just lightly let things happen and lightly cope with them.”

It’s been a long day

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fingers-massage

Take me to your trees.
Take me to your breakfasts,
your sunsets,
your bad dreams,
your shoes,
your nouns.
Take me to your fingers.

— Margaret Atwood, from Good Bones

Notes: