The Wayfarer Vol. 3 Issue 2

THE
A Journal of Contemplative Literature

Vol.3 Issue. 2
I S S N 2 1 6 9 - 3 1 4 5
WAYFARER
Featuring the poetry of Monika John, Gary Pierluigi, Nicolo Santilli, Hope Hearken, D.L. Collins, Barry
Yeoman, and Heloise Jones. Plus 6 questions with author Nora Caron and Te Sinners Prayer by Dan Leach.
In the Book Spotlight
To Live in Paradise by Cindi McVey
Cosmos, Mythos & Spirit
by Theodore Richards
The Men Died First
by Sharlene Cochrane
A Compassionate Cynics Guide To Survival
by karuna das
Saving the World
by Jamie K. Reaser
Creativity
by J.K. McDowell
Feature Poet
C.M. Rivers
THE
A Journal of Cont empl at i ve Li t erat ure
WAYFARER
VOL. 3 ISSUE. 2
THE ENVIRONMENTAL COLUMN
Saving the World by Jamie K. Reaser 2
THE CONTEMPLATIVE COLUMN
Cosmos, Mythos, & Spirit
by Theodore Richards 8
The Poetry of Monika John 12
The Poetry of Gary Pierluigi 14
The Poetry of Nicolo Santilli 15
Rag and Bone Man by Stephen Poleskie 16
The Poetry of Heloise Jones 18
The Poetry of Hope Hearken 20
The Poetry of D.L. Collins 21
The Poetry of Barry Yeoman 22
The Men Died First by Sharlene Cochrane 24
Feature: The Poetry of C.M. Rivers 32
A Compassionate Cynics Guide To Survival
by Karuna Das 35
6 Questions with Nora Caron 44
THE CREATIVE COLUMN
Creativity by J.K. McDowell 46
Bloodroot by Jamie K. Reaser 51
The Sinners Prayer by Dan Leach 54
Book Spotlight
To Live in Paradise 59
contents
A wayfarer is one who chooses to take up a long jour-
ney on foot. Te journey we chronicle within the jour-
nal is that of our path across the inner-landscape of
our own being, as we reach for answers to the central
questions of our existence. Spirituality is the culmina-
tion of the individuals desire to understand the deeper
meaning in life. Te works found within Te Wayfarer
are those small truths we gather while traversing the
breadth of our days; shared in a belief that through an
exchange of insights we help one another move for-
ward. Te Wayfarer is a quarterly journal distributed
by Homebound Publications that explores humanitys
ongoing introspective journey.
About Homebound Publications
It is the intention of those at Homebound to revive
contemplative storytelling. Te stories humanity lives
by give both context and perspective to our lives. Some
old stories, while well-known to the generations, no
longer resonate with the heart of the modern man or
address the dilemmas we currently face as individu-
als and as a global village. Homebound chooses titles
that balance a reverence for the old wisdom; while at
the same time presenting new perspectives by which
to live.
2014 Homebound Publications All Rights Reserved.
All rights to all original artwork, photography and writ-
ten works belongs to the respective owners as stated in
the attributions. All Rights Reserved. Without limiting
the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this
publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced
into a retrieval system or transmitted in any means (elec-
tronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or other-
wise) without the prior written permission of both the
copyright owner and publisher. Except for brief quota-
tions embodied in critical articles and reviews.
Cover Photo: Midnight Sun by Josef Stuefer Slickr
Founder and Executive Editor
L.M. Browning
Associate Editor & Staff Writer
Jamie K. Reaser
Staff Writer
Teodore Richards
Staff Writer
J.K. McDowell
2 | The Wayfarer: A Journal of Contemplative Literature
Saving the
World
THE ENVIRONMENTAL COLUMN
By Staff Writer Jamie K. Reaser
I HAVE DECIDED TO STOP TRYING
TO SAVE THE WORLD.
I

COULDNT SAVE MY MOTHER. SHE WAS DIAGNOSED
WITH BREAST CANCER IN JANUARY 1990, A YEAR
AFTER SHE HAD FOUND A LUMP AND WAS TOLD THAT
IT WAS NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT. WHEN THE
DOCTORS CHANGED THEIR MINDS, THEY GAVE HER
SIX MONTHS. SHE MADE IT NEARLY SIX YEARS BE-
CAUSE SHE WAS A SINGLE PARENT DETERMINED TO
GET HER THREE DAUGHTERS THROUGH COLLEGE.
She fought the cancer as if embattled in a war with
her own bodyenduring numerous rounds of the self-
inflicted attacks known of chemotherapy and radia-
tion, as well as a bone marrow transplant. And then,
one day, she decided to surrender, to make her peace
with mortality.
A mystic once told me, Everything bound by form
must die.
By the time I was in my mid-twenties, Death was a
familiar. He had briefly held my hand when I was six.
He wiped away my tears when pets were buried and
flushed. And, he stood next to me at graveside when
the remains of my grandparents and my mother where
placed deep in the soilsoil which is the dark, dense,
gritty remains of other things that existed some time
ago.
* * * * *
For as long as I can remember, my primary relation-
ship has been with Mother Earth. In some form or
another, Nature has always offered me companion-
ship, instruction, and inspiration. Slugs, ladybugs, and
toads were among my first playmates, and my first
teachers. They continue to crawl around in the cham-
bers of my heart, finding their way into poetry, art,
and particularly good days.
I was still very young when I was told that Earth is
sick and, quite possibly, dying. I remember someone
saying that we humans are like a cancer that is slowly
killing her. Perhaps, they said, she is terminally ill.
This was before I had befriended Death, and my
response was of deeply-rooted fear and inconsol-
able guilt. I put my metaphoric fists up and became
a fighteran activiston behalf of Mother Earth. I un-
derstood the prevailing threat to be people. Waging
battles against my own species became the hallmark
of my adolescence. In 1986, I had spent enough time
on the front lines to be named the Youth Conserva-
tionist of the Year by the Virginia Wildlife Federation.
Death is an ecological process from which the human
animal is not exempt. In the moment that I accepted
this truth, I also awoke to the humbling realization
that I wasnt put on this planet to be its savior.
A mystic once told me, Everything bound by form
must die.
Mother Earth is destined to pass away. I cant say
how she will die or when, but I do know that she is
subject to the same processes of decay and destruc-
tion as anything else that has taken shape in this
universe. Maybe shell be hit by a big comet. Maybe
some chemical reaction will cause the atmosphere to
change adversely, or perhaps the sun will burn out
and shell become too frigid for life. Maybe human in-
security will foster such poor choices that we blow
her to bits. Everything we cherish about this planet
will change and, in time, cease to exit. Maybe it will
happen tomorrow. Maybe it will happen hundreds of
generations from now.
I have made the conscious decision to stop try-
ing to save the world. To some, this might seem a de-
featist act. After all, it is not uncommon for people
ENVIRONMENTAL COLUMN
The Wayfarer: A Journal of Contemplative Literature | 3
to get depressed and tune out (mentally escape)
when enduring seemingly insurmountable struggle,
to shut down in the face of peril, to become paralytic
as doom approaches.
When threatened:
Fight
Flee
Freeze
We can choose anoth-
er way.
To paraphrase Albert Ein-
stein, You cant solve a
problem at the level at
which it was created. In
other words:
Selfishness does not re-
sol ve selfishness.
Philosopher Arne Naess
is quoted as saying, Un-
happily, the extensive
moralizing within the
ecological movement has
given the public a false
impression that they are
being asked to make a
sacrificeto show more
responsibility, more con-
cern, and a nicer moral
standard. But all of that
would flow naturally and
easily if the self were wid-
ened and deepened so
that protection of nature
was felt and perceived
as protection of our very
selves.
It sounds glorious to try to save the planetnoble,
coolbut the motivation to protect Mother EarthPa-
chamamaGaiaTurtle Island is often motivated by
the same force that is making her sick, namely the
desire of humans to benefit humans. Actions aimed
at saving the planet are largely a quest for human
security, for certainty in a comfortable future. What
is currently regarded as Western Culture sets the
standards for comfortable; high standards that leave
little room for negotiation. Terms like protect, con-
serve and sustain generally mean to prevent loss
and maintain the status quo.
Separation doesnt resol ve separation.
The ideologies prominent in western culture largely
perceive humans as separate from the animal king-
dom, and thus not subject
to ecological constraints
- resource limitation, for
example. Many environ-
mentalists further the per-
spective that humans are
a part from, rather than a
part of, the natural world
by regarding what people
do and manifest as some-
thing innately obscene.
Beaver dams, bird nests,
and fox dens may have
a mystique about them,
but something human-
fabricated is considered
unnatural, artificial, and
often an assault upon the
Earth simply because it is
of human origin.
My adolescent sen-
timents toward people
are so common among
environmentalists that
they function as a green
membership card. Many
people committed to sav-
ing the planet have a
distinct distain for their
own species. People are
considered the problem
- a cancer attacking its
Mother. The Earth would
be better off without us.
But to see Homo sapiens as a part of the Earth-
system is to see the anti-human sentiment in the en-
vironmental movement as something akin to an au-
toimmune disorder: self-inflicted dis-ease. In general,
autoimmune disorders dont promote healing, they
debilitate and kill.
Control does not resolve control.
My decision
to stop trying
to save the world
was not defeatist,
it emerged out of
something activated
deep in the chambers
of my heart
something generative.
The quest for security drives people to try to con-
trol their circumstancestheir environment. A sense
of separation from the environment enables the hu-
man ego to foster the belief that is possible to domi-
nate the world.
The health problems that Mother Earth is now fac-
ing are primarily derived from the human enterprises
efforts to manipulate the environment beyond the en-
vironments ability to adversely impact peoplebuild-
ing permanent structures, managing temperature,
controlling water and food supplies, and redistributing
natural resources through trade and transportation
all on a large scale. Beliefs in permanency and the
ability to command ecological systems are illusional,
yet they serve as the foundations of human progress.
Many of the solutions being proposed to address
the environmental crises also arise out of a cosmology
of human-domination of Earth systemsgenetic en-
gineering, determining weather patterns, and turning
the atmosphere into a chemistry laboratory. One of
the side effects of our philosophical separation from
the natural world is our ignorance of natural systems
and their functionality. Enacting these proposals for
the treatment of Mother Earth is akin to throwing a
wide range of pharmaceuticals at an ailment without
understanding the consequences the drugs will have
on the human body.
I didnt stop loving my mother when I learned that she
was dying. To the contrary, I took actions to express my
love for her. I was her eldest daughter. When she was
diagnosed with cancer, I was four months away from
finishing college. I gave up my plans to go straight to
graduate school and, instead, moved home to help
her through her treatments. I chose to love her despite
a sense of impending loss, despite the pain that was
sure to come. l chose to honor our relationship and be
in service of something greater than my-self.
Environmental activist and Buddhist scholar, Joanna
Macy, writes, Were not going to save our world by
sermonizing and preaching to each other. Nor will we
save our world out of duty and grim determination, or
by winning an argument and persuading other people
that theyre wrong. We probably can only save our
world through loving it enough.
We are a species that has the capacity to make
choices regarding the evolutionary trajectory of our
consciousness. What if we didnt use love as a path-
way to security? What if we chose to love this world
while acknowledging that the world as we know it will
end? What if people chose to love this worldinclud-
ing the animal known as Homo sapienswithout feel-
ing entitled to something in return?
My decision to stop trying to save the world was not
defeatist, it emerged out of something activated deep
in the chambers of my heartsomething generative. I
asked myself how I wanted to honor my relationship to
Mother Earth despite her mortality. I questioned who I
wanted to be in relationship to her. I began to explore
what I wanted it to mean to be human. I asked, What
is the most potent essence of humanity?
In Reason for Hope, primatologist Jane Goodall
writes, It is these undeniable qualities of human love
and compassion and self-sacrifice that give me hope
for the future. We are, indeed, often cruel and evil. No-
body can deny this. We gang up on each one another,
we torture each other, with words as well as deeds,
we fight, we kill. But we are also capable of the most
noble, generous, and heroic behavior.
I havent stopped loving Mother Earth because I re-
alize that she will die someday. To the contrary, my life
has become an expression of my love for her. I have
come home to her by accepting myself and Homo sa-
piens as animal, as natural, as an aspect of her and
hard as it may be at timesto try to love every part
of her.
Real generosity toward the future lies in giving
all to the present, writes philosopher Albert Camus. I
honor the individuals and organizations who actively
participate in the environmental movement, who dili-
gently work to analyze human impacts and develop
options to reduce to size of the human footprint. They
offer us something vital: strategies. Strategy is im-
portant, but it is not enough. In order to be effective,
strategies need to be implemented. Implementation is
facilitated by the motivation to implement. Fear has
proven to be a poor motivatora destructive rather
than a generative force. I believe that what we most
need to give to the present are two outgrowths of love:
grief and gratitude.
To grieve is human
It is natural to feel grief when we lose something that
we love. Those who have tended the terminally ill un-
derstand that there is also a pre-grieving process that
can take place when we anticipate loss. Grief cracks
the heart open, making space for compassion, for un-
derstanding, for kinship, for us to claim our humanity.
We, as a species, have not been grieving enough. One
of the characteristics of Western Culture is emotional
adolescence. Or, as Jungian psychologist Bill Plotkin
would say, pathoadolescencepathologic immatu-
rity. Much of todays society has been culturally pro-
grammed not to feelto escape (flee) from feeling
through food, drugs, television, and various electronic
media and gadgetry. Embracing our emotions, espe-
cially grief for our Mothers ills, provides an opportu-
nity to be fully human, and to initiate society into an
adulthood that has the capacity to nurture self and
other. Through our grief, we can discover our humanity.
Gratitude grows our humanity
Gratitude is defined as the quality of being thankful;
readiness to show appreciation for and to return kind-
ness. Gratitude is powerful medicine. Gratitude enliv-
ens. Gratitude holds space for the generative forces
of wonderment and connection. We can be grateful
for the opportunity to be alive. We can be grateful
for every living creature and life-sustaining process.
From this place of gratitude, we can choose to en-
gage in strategic acts of reciprocityto actively love
life in all its forms and create opportunities for Na-
tures regenerative capacities to thrive.
At this point, it is not hard to hear critical voices
saying, Well that all sounds nice, but lets get real.
The hippies had their love fest and then went on to
become self-serving corporate executives.
The love that I am referring to is not an unground-
ed, new age notion rooted in a desire to blissfully
escape from the challenges inherent in the tangible
world. To the contrarythe love that I speak of re-
quires humans to stand firmly and consciously in the
messy thick of it, and to be courageously vulnerable.
We need to learn to let go of our sense of entitlement
to tomorrow, and accept uncertainty and insecurity as
the natural rhythms of life. We need to be brave and
humble enough to let ourselves be cracked open, over
and over again, from the inside-out.
The ideal of warriorship is that the warrior should be
sad and tender, and because of that, the warrior can be
very brave as well, writes Chgyam Trungpa, author of
Shambal a: The Sacred Path of the Warrior. What might
become possible if fear-and-guilt motivated activists
transformed themselves into heart-warriors?
In her poem, The Journey, Mary Oliver speaks to the
process of realizing that that there is only one life that
you can save:
One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do-
determined to save
the only life you could save.
I have decided to stop trying to save the world. Instead, I
have decided to actively love this world while being fully
aware of its temporal limitations, its mortality. Loving
this world has not guaranteed my life, but it has given
me inspiration to live. Loving this world enables me to
more fully express my human soulmy humanity. This
is what I can save, and this is how I can best serve our
Mother in her time of need.
To quote 13th century Persian poet, Jalal al-Din Muham-
mad Rumi, Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change
the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.
JAMIE K. REASERs writing explores themes at the interface of Nature and
human nature. In addition to more than 100 professional publications in the
fields of biology and environmental policy, she is the author of four collec-
tions of poetry and the editor of two anthologies. Jamie currently serves as
an Associate Editor for The Wayfarer journal and is a member of the Interna-
tional League of Conservation Writers.

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THE CONTEMPLATIVE COLUMN
by Staff Writer Theodore Richards
WHERES YOUR MOTHER? MY FATHER ASKED,
FUMBLING WITH HIS KEYS AND, MORE SIGNIFI-
CANTLY, HIS EMOTIONS. HE COULDNT BEAR TO
GO INSIDE TO LOOK FOR HER. SO I DID. SHE
STOOD IN THE KITCHEN, WEEPING, CLUTCHING
THE BOOK.
Cosmos,
Mythos,
& Spirit
Reflections on Spirituality
in a Changing World
CONTEMPLATIVE COLUMN
Are you having a hard time, mom? I asked.
It was his favorite book, she sobbed, showing me
Sylvester and the Magic Pebble. I remembered the
book well. It is the story of a donkey, Sylvester, who ac-
cidentally, magically turns himself into a rock, and the
year his parents spend looking for and mourning him
before he finally, miraculously returns. The book had
always made her cry.
I held her for a while,
sharing the unspoken
knowledge that my
brother would not return
like Sylvester. Come on,
I said. Lets go.
I wanted to bury the
book with him, she said.
We can do that, I
said. Its OK.
And we got in the car
for the first time since my
brother was born thirty-
seven years before, a
family of threeto bury
my brother and his favor-
ite book.
* * * * *
Books had always been
important for us. Not
only for my mother (a
reading teacher) and me
(a writer) but for my fa-
ther and brother as well. I
can see now, as a parent,
how stories become the
stuff that brings a world
into being, the stuff that
brings the individual into
community. There was a
little bit of Sylvester with
my brother alwaysit
made sense to bury the
book with him. Books allow for the emerging interior
self to connect to the broader world through spacein
broadening ones sense of possibility and interrelated-
nessand time, in connecting us to the stories of the
past.
Even before there were books, human beings told
stories. Before we spent our evenings around the light
of the television, we sat around the fire. And wenot
a box with a screentold the stories. Storytelling was
among the earliest art forms and, like all art forms, was
participatory. The story comes into being not when the
writer puts it on paper, but in the space in between
reader and writer, between the teller and the listener.
The participatory imagination of the audience co-
creates it. And together,
worlds are created. The
oldest stories are stories
of creation, stories that
always end with the lis-
tener; for a creation sto-
ry tells us not only about
the cosmos beyond, but
the cosmos within us, not
only tells us the history of
our world, but how we fit
in it.
Telling stories, as
much as anything else,
makes us human. It is our
especially human way of
making a world.
* * * * *
There are no spiritual
traditions I know of that
do not revolve around
stories. Students of re-
ligion and converts so
often start in the wrong
place, with philosophies
and theologies, or worse,
lists of rules. If you want
to understand a spiritual
tradition, the place to
go is the story. For in the
story, the hardest ques-
tions are asked: Who am
I? Why am I here? Where
are we going?
And stories, like faith traditions, are alive. We like to
think of them as being one thing, written down at some
point and never changing. But the truth is that what it
means to be a Christian or a Jew or a Buddhist or a
Hindu has been changing throughout history, and is al-
Left: photo by Chinni Wong (Flickr Creative Commons)
Cosmos,
Mythos,
& Spirit
Reflections on Spirituality
in a Changing World
These special stories
are called myths.
Sadly, weve turned
that word into an insult.
It has become something
like a synonym for a lie.
But myths are simply stories
that tell us something
more important,
more essential
than mere facts.
They give us a sense
of who we are
and our place in the cosmos.
ways contextual. The apparent solidity of the written
word belies the fact that the story evolves, too, even
when the words on the page do not change. For con-
texts change, and with them interpretations.
If we want to understand the Hebrew Bible, for in-
stance, we are better off looking at the Exodus story
than merely the Ten Commandments. In either case,
there is a complex set of contexts the help bring the
texts to life. Scholars can help us come to understand
the historical context, of course. But it is the participa-
tion by the reader in the text that truly brings it to life:
The captivity in Babylon has more meaning, and even
new meaning, through the eyes of those in captivity,
the migrants and the incarcerated; American Chris-
tianity only truly could understand the Exodus story
through the eyes of Black America, a people who be-
came a people in their yearning to be free.
These special stories are called myths. Sadly,
weve turned that word into an insult. It has become
something like a synonym for a lie. But myths are sim-
ply stories that tell us something more important, more
essential than mere facts. They give us a sense of who
we are and our place in the cosmos. They allow us to
grapple with truths that are paradoxical and that arent
necessarily a matter of knowing information. Another
way of putting it is to say that the myth is the primary
way that a culture conveys a cosmology. And a cos-
mology is not merely about the universe out there; it is
about the universe within. It links individual and whole.
The question we all have, I suspect, is not so much
about what happens to us after we die but whether or
not we are alone in the Universe. Are we participat-
ing in a community or not? Are we essentially inter-
connected or isolated? If we are alone, no afterlife we
seek after would be worth much; for me, even a blink of
an eye with the possibility of true communion with oth-
ers would be preferable to such an eternity. And we are
brought together by the story, the fabric of our social,
cultural, and spiritual ecology.
* * * * *
We are in trouble just now, writes Thomas Berry, be-
cause we do not have a good story. Berry is writing
about industrial civilization and the story we havetold
through the mechanisms of consumer capitalismthat
teaches us that our world is a collection of objects to
be exploited. It is the story that tells us we are funda-
mentally alone, and in competition with one another, the
story that we become who we are based on what we
can buy. And the trouble he refers to is the imminent
ecological, planetary collapse due to our overconsump-
tion.
There is no more important work than re-imagining
this story. And it is work that requires not merely the
mind, but the whole self. It requires not merely an indi-
vidual, but an entire culture. The new story will be more
tapestry than a single cloth, more library than single
text.
To bring forth a new myth requires work that is deep
and hard. We must get outside and get our hands dirty
to re-embed in the earth; we must explore our interior
lives and do the soul-work that brings about the deep-
est insights; we must engage the old story with critical
consciousness to become, in the Gramscian sense, phi-
losophers for the people; we must sing and dance and
play and explore.
My suspicion is that the new story must come from
the margins, from those who havent been served by
the story we have now. This was an insight that Jesus
seems to have had. He didnt seek out the temple priests
or the Greek elites or Roman power; rather, he went to
To bring forth a new myth requires work that is deep and hard. We must get outside
and get our hands dirty to re-embed in the earth; we must explore our interior lives
and do the soul-work that brings about the deepest insights; we must engage the old
story with critical consciousness to become, in the Gramscian sense, philosophers for
the people; we must sing and dance and play and explore.
THEODORE RICHARDS is a poet, writer, and religious philosopher. He has received de-
grees from various institutions, including the University of Chicago and The California
Institute of Integral Studies, but has learned just as much from practicing the mar-
tial art of Bagua; from traveling, working or studying all over the world; and from the
youth he has worked with on the South Side of Chicago, Harlem, the South Bronx, and
Oakland. He is the author of Handprints on the Womb, a collection of poetry; Cosmoso-
phia: Cosmology, Mysticism, and the Birth of a New Myth, recipient of the Independent
Publisher Awards Gold Medal in religion and the Nautilus Book Awards Gold Medal; the
novel The Crucifixion, recipient of the Independent Publisher Awards bronze medal; and
Creativel y Mal adjusted: The Wisdom Education Movement Manifesto, which radically re-
imagines education. Theodore Richards is the founder of The Chicago Wisdom Project
and teaches world religions at The New Seminary. He lives in Chicago with his wife and
daughters. His next novel, The Conversions, will be released in October
those who were, as he was, at the margins of society.
There was a wisdom from those margins that could not
be found at the centers of power. Indeed, in todays world
this would mean turning away from the university and
looking to the streets, away from Wall Street and toward
the shanty towns outside the centers of capitalist power.
It means turning to what Martin Luther King, Jr called
the creatively maladjusted, those who do not adapt to
an insane world and instead attempt to re-imagine it. It
is the kind of wisdom that the Trickster Tales teach us:
that there is an insanity in the work of building human
civilization, and to appear mad in the face of it is a deep-
er wisdom than conforming to it.
But those at the margins, of course, are taught that
they are there because of their own deficiencies. Choic-
es is a word we will here over and over again in our
poor schools, the schools that send more of our youth to
prison than collegeas if life were so simple, as if mere
individual choices determine our fate and there is not
a whole universe of other choices conspiring to affect
us as well. This is the deficit narrative. The reclamation
of the narrative is the counter-narrative. This must be a
central aspect of any worthwhile educational program
for the marginalized. It was what Jesus and Chuang Tzu
and Baal Shem Tov, to name a few, offered: A narrative
that challenges the one we have been given.
It is easy to see, I think, how a counter-narrative might
be useful for the oppressed. But we must come to terms
with the fact that the condescending term at-risk, ap-
plied most to black and brown youth, applies to all of us.
We are an at-risk species on an at-risk planet. Our work,
our great work, is to tell a new story for us all. Anything
less is the rearrangement of deckchairs on this planetary
Titanic.
* * * * *
We made it to the cemetery, and I stammered through
the eulogy. My brother had little patience for intellec-
tual and spiritual laziness and preferred to face the
unknown with honest unknowing. Telling people what
they want to hear makes a lot of money in the pulpit,
but to honor my brother I had to tell another story: that
life is hard, and short; even the luckiest among us gets
a mere blink of an eye and cannot avoid suffering. It is
funny that the stories of so many of our great spiritual
iconsJesus and the Buddha, for exampleare stories
of this encounter with suffering, and yet our religions so
often seek to avoid its reality.
I held my mother as she placed the book in my
brothers grave. His sons stood uncomprehendingly
in the face of eternity. It was autumn. For a moment,
in the stillness of the cemetery, I could feel the move-
ment of seasons. Off in the distance there was a high
school. My brother had played football there once in
high school, my mother said.
Like the seasons, stories bring us into participation
with the cosmos. We will all die. My brothers ashes
were placed in the earth like the bodies of his ances-
tors.
And like the seasons, stories come back. The spirits
of our ancestors live on in story. They do not remain
static. We can participate with stories, change them.
They are there to serve us now and in the future. It mat-
ters less if Jesus said exactly the words written down
in the Bible than how those words come alive for us,
make our lives meaningful, and, of course, what we do
with those words. Words make worlds. And the mythol-
ogy of my brother can be the way he remains with his
sons in some small way.
Stardust and Peace
by Monika John

My mind is joined
to victim and violator,

to conquerors greed
and insights of Sufi saints.

My feet tread on dust
of blood drenched battle fields

and of the One
who walked in Palestine.

My lungs fill with air
expelled in Genghis Khans curses

and the sanctified breath
of Abraham.

I am no more than stardust,
a fleeting spark in space,

yet I abide eternally unchanging
in all embracing peace.
One People
by Monika John

Pilgrims always meet again,
oceans and mountains
mere trifles in their journey.

They are drawn together
by the finer stuff
that makes toy puzzles
out of continents.

Driven by an inner calling
they circle the globe
weaving common threads
of one people, one planet.
Until then I practice....
by Monika John

Since I am still learning
that all beings are my Self
I practice tolerance.
Till I know for certain
that there is nothing to attain
I practice patience.
As long as I cannot love
without conditions
I practice loyalty.
While I yet wonder
if all actions are just and fair
I practice forgiveness.
Until ultimate Truth
dawns on me wholly
I need to practice virtues. .
But the day I hold in my hand
the One perfect rose
I need not count its petals.
Poems by MONIKA JOHN, writer, attorney
and world traveler living in Washington
State. Her writings have appeared in vari-
ous journals and magazines in the USA and
UK: most recently Buddhist Poetry Review,
Light of Consciousness Magazine, Urthona
UK, Penwood Review, Presence International
Magazine, Anthology on Tagore, UK, Fun-
gi and Quiet Shorts Magazine, Sathya Sai
Magazine, Scheherazades Bequest. | Photo
Right: Prayer Wheel Michael Bay Flickr Cre-
ative Commons
To Kill a Mockingbird
by Gary Pierluigi

It was the world I lived in.

I thought people like Atticus Finch
existed, and of course there was that
homemade apple pie.

In the moonlight I crept from yard to
yard eating over ripe tomatoes.
I sometimes cracked pumpkins over
my knee.

I was in awe that Atticus read to his
little girl at night while she sat on his lap.

And answered questions.

In the darkness I urinated on an
assortment of vegetables, carving my
initials onto each and every one, and
would sometimes lay on my back looking
up at the stars, willing into existence
a father like Atticus Finch.
Since first being published in Quills, Gary has been
published in numerous poetry journals, including
CV2, Queens Quarterly, On Spec, Filling Station, The
Dalhousie Review, The Nashwaak Review, Grain, and
Misunderstandings Magazine. He was short listed for
the CBC 2006 Literary Awards in the poetry catego-
ry, a finalist in the Lit Pop Awards and received an
honorable mention in The Ontario Poetry Societys
Open Heart Contest. His first poetry book,* Over
the Edge, has been published by Serengeti Press.
His first novel, Abraham Man, is currently being re-
vised.
Dreams
by Nicolo Santilli
we long for the realms of luminous beauty
where beauty dances on the swaying grass
with immortal love and sorrow

and we would follow the spirit path
glimmering through ageless forests
surrounded by creatures
alight on the transparent wings
of dreamspells
and soft desires

so that each glimpse would be a prize
and if a spirit should follow us back
we should have to see the familiar world
to which we returned
through their startled eyes

as infinitely deep and dear
or dreary with empty dreaming
Sacrifices
by Nicolo Santilli
a saint sees the sacrifices
that lie under every paving stone
and in every mouthful of food

how a world of suffering
is condensed into every tear

and thousands died
that one may smile

and a million curses
had to be overcome
that we might love

and pledge our hearts
beyond the raging field
of desire
Nicolo Santilli is a philosopher and poet, residing
in Berkeley, CA. | Photo by LadyDragonflyCC on
Flickr
BY STEPHEN POLESKIE
W
E LIVED IN THE THIRD FLOOR APARTMENT.
MY FATHER HAD BEEN LEFT THE BUILD-
ING BY HIS
MOTHER, AND
WE COULD
RENT OUT THE ROOMS ON THE
SECOND FLOOR TO LODGERS
FOR MORE MONEY. THE SPACE
ON THE GROUND FLOOR, WHICH
HAD BEEN MY GRANDMOTHERS
SHOP UNTIL SHE DIED, AND HER
THIRD HUSBAND RAN OFF WITH
WHATEVER MONEY WAS LEFT
IN THE BANK, WAS RENTED TO
MICKEY THE BARBER.
From the window of the
bedroom I shared with my Un-
cle Edward, I could see Grove
Street. The two rear windows
in our kitchen had a view of
our small yard, in the center
of which stood the tiny spruce
tree my father had planted
the day I was born. I would
come back years later to find
it higher than the house; and
still later gone, cut down by
the new owners to make way
for a clothesline. A picket fence
separated one side of the yard
from the sidewalk and street.
The back border was formed
by a row of chicken coops and
a garage. A high wire fence ran down the other side, di-
I could see him now.
The old man had
stopped on the
corner and was just
sitting silently on
his wagon, waiting.
My heart was
pounding with fear.
I had never seen
the rag and bone
mans eyes look
so beady, so full of evil.
He took out a
red handkerchief
was this the signal?
viding us from the people next door. Their house was
as tall as ours, so I could see nothing out that way but
a wall. As work at the local coal mine was slow, most
of the bars on Grove Street had closed, the one un-
derneath the neighbors be-
ing one of the few remain-
ing. Its sign, which was lit
up at night, cast a red glow
on the walls my bedroom.
In the morning huge trucks
would come by and wake
me up with a great racket,
as they unloaded barrels of
beer that were rolled down
a ramp into the bars cold
cellar.
Mostly, I stayed in my
room all day and watched
the activity on Grove Street
out the window. I dont re-
member going down to
the street much until I was
at least three years old, al-
though I must have. I had
long hair, which my moth-
er set in curls. People who
didnt know me used to say:
Oh what a beautiful girl!
Then my sister was born,
and I was changed back
into a boy. I had my hair
cut downstairs at Mickeys.
I remember crying because
I was afraid it was going to
hurt. My mother said: If you
dont stop crying, I am going to give you to the rag and
bone man.
R a g a n d
I dont know why he was called the rag and bone
man, probably because he dressed in rags. I do re-
member he had a horse and wagon. My mother was
always threatening to give me to the rag and bone
man if I didnt do something or othergo to sleep, eat
my dinner, wash my hands. This made me feel espe-
cially worthless, as everything else she didnt want she
sold to the rag and bone man; rusty pots and pans,
broken sewing machines, anything that had outlived
its usefulness. Was I not even worth as much as my
mothers junk? I wondered. Now my father, who had
never been home much anyway, had gone off to fight
in the war, leaving me here with mother, and my baby
sister, who always cried to get everything she wanted
given to her.
Before my mother had begun her threats I had
waited in excitement for the rag and bone man to ap-
pear, listening to the bellow of his horn as he made his
way down Grove Street. Warm days found me hanging
out my window, hoping to catch a glimpse of the trea-
sures he had stowed in his cart. On those infrequent
days when mother, or the lady from downstairs, would
rush out with some small item to sell and the rag and
bone man would stop on our corner, my eyes would
enjoy a special treat as they inventoried the contents
of his rickety cart.
Now I no longer waited for the rag and bone man
with pleasure but with fear. Was today the day he
would come for me? Had my mother made some se-
cret pact with the gnarled old man to take me away as
a punishment for something she perceived I had done
wrong? At the first sound of his horn I interrupted my
play and took flight, diving under the spruce trees, and
then crawling behind the peonies.
Small bugs circled my blinking eyelids as I peered
through the picket fence. The rag and bone mans once
cheerful horn had become a mournful dirge, a sound I
STEPHEN POLESKIE is an artist and writer. His writing
has appeared in journals both here and abroad and in
the anthology The Book of Love, (W.W. Norton) and been
nominated for a Pushcart Prize. He has published seven
novels. His artworks are in the collections of numerous
museums, including the MoMA, and the Metropolitan Mu-
seum. He has taught at The School of Visual Arts, NYC,
the University of California, Berkeley, and Cornell Uni-
versity. Poleskie lives in Ithaca, NY. website: www.Ste-
phenPoleskie.com
remembered from my Aunt Beatrices funeral, the day I
learned what to be dead meant. The horse and wagon
was in front of our house now, but I wouldnt see the rag
and bone man until he passed the corner. I squatted low-
er in the flowers, making sure I had a clear path to the
chicken coop. I planned my escaperun across the open
yard, jump onto the water barrel, scramble on the coop,
then over the garage roof, and get away by the back al-
ley. My grandma lived at the end of the alley. She baked
me cookies when I went to visit her, and would never al-
low me to be taken away by a rag and bone man.
I could see him now. The old man had stopped on the
corner and was just sitting silently on his wagon, wait-
ing. My heart was pounding with fear. I had never seen
the rag and bone mans eyes look so beady, so full of evil.
He took out a red handkerchiefwas this the signal? I
prepared to flee. But my mother did not come down. The
old man blew his nose in the handkerchief, and then put
it back in his pocket.
Giddy up! he growled, giving his horse a crack with
the reins.
Still crouched in my hiding place, I felt a sense of re-
lief come over me. I listened to the bellow of his horn,
and the clip-clop of hoofs, as the rag and bone man
slowly disappeared down Grove Street.
B o n e Ma n

The Altar Of Birds
by Heloise Jones
I.
I looked to the dawn sky over the bay,
saw the coral sheets I knew colored
the sand, the water, the homefronts.
When I finally stood at the pink tinted shore,
trails of fire-edged clouds above,
I stood at the Altar of Birds.
Hundreds in flight, set for flats and shallows,
gathering by tribe. Heron, ibis, pelican,
seagull, darter, duck. A roseate spoonbill,
a rose on stilts. An osprey, a tiny fish
in its talons. Far from shore,
black shadows of longnecked bodies
sprinkled like crooked flowers. Then, water
lightens to the color of sky. The slap of
big wings, throaty murmurs, aaahhs,
soft clicks and loud squawks.
Of all, the gulls scream for the sun. Rip the air.
Only quiet when the glowing orb frees
the horizon, sprays a rippled copper path
across the bay, assures of another day.
Later, theyll forget mornings promise.
Their voices will rise, wail as the fireball drops,
the sky flares, warning of a sun
nearly gone, lost below the tree line.
Marvel the mullet, I say. How they throw
themselves where gills dont work. Leap
where air means death. And yet, they fly.
Airborne, again and again and again.
Im reminded of a time we
walked a great distance into the Gulf.
The tide at our hips. A sea warm as bathwater.
People shrunk to mere dots, specks on shore.
At our knees, fish as long as my thigh
chased fish as big as my hand. Then, fish
large as a lifeboat cruised a prairie of
seaweed, stalking, maybe me.
I live where birds cover marsh trees like blossoms.
Palms rustle like mountain streams.
The stillness of egrets and herons hold space.
Where pelicans glide in formation, wingtips on water,
baby dolphins flip, and spindly legs
reach shyly from a shell in my hand.
Where rainbowed butterflies of miniature mussels
join conch, all peachy and buttery cream,
buried in crude on the ocean floor, in waters
Corexit swirls with blood
like plastics taint the Pacific.
II.
I hold a tiny, dried corpse of a horseshoe crab.
The shell paper-thin, the legs perfectly curled,
its blue blood long gone. I think
of the time 22 miles out to sea,
at the Gulf Stream in the Atlantic.
The singular, giant dolphin. The singular bird
as I stood at the stern of a boat, tipped
my dads ashes into deepest water,
watched tiny pieces of bones & ash
bloom as tall and big as he was
when I was a little girl.
I celebrate the horseshoes slip
past human dominion, its march through
the rise and demise of epochs and species,
carrying copper-laced blood as expensive
as gold. I know Ill search for them in
lifetimes hence when I return, walk the shores
once more, pray at the Altar of Birds.
HELOISE JONES lives in St. Petersburg, Florida after
decades in the mountains of New Mexico and North
Carolina. Though she's a town dweller, she finds the
sacred in the wonder and rhythms of nature. She's
always loved birds. A Thomas Wolfe Fiction Prize fi-
nalist, her publications include a contributing essay
in the bestselling book, 'What I Wish for You' by Patti
Digh. www.heloisejones.com
P
h
o
t
o

J
a
m
i
e

K
.

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a
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r
89+
by Hope Hearken
red eyes in leaves
statues of dead trees
and azazel stood up
mountains blackened
my son was still gone
had never been home
earth jumped it's axis
and i didn't know exodus

demons sank islands
erupted volcanoes
exploded the sun
paused bible time
and my growth line

i knew i was alone
knew i was burning
but i couldn't wake
till god spoke

i remember everything
even the dragon's sting
monsters at my window
voices in the shadows
crucifix held to my chest
running in the street
this was my test
till god spoke
HOPE HEARKEN has previously published po-
etry under the name Hope Houghton. However,
a shift in ideals has caused her to take up the
name Hope Hearken. Hope includes now her
Christian beliefs and her love of God in her po-
etry. Follow her on Facebook. | Photo by: Foto-
Katolik Flickr Creative Commons
Waiting
by D.L. Collins

Sometimes wading looks like waiting
as we sense the approach of storm
long before dark clouds appear.

When waves churn deeper water
our waiting looks like wading,
or a cry of alarm, or a search for a foothold,

or a feeling of foolishness, or a sink
into drunkenness, or a call to war,
or jealousy, or self-righteousness, or pain.

Rarely, like a song, our wading
becomes a miraculous, light step
over dangerous sea.
She Was Not a Bird
by D.L. Collins

She was not a bird
who would stay still for no reason.
It was hard to tell if she was aware of you
while she sat on a twig, chirping
or made the nest tight for her babies.

Always grateful for the morning,
she could spend hours upon
hours telling a story about the sky;
she would forget to eat and drink
so lost she became in the glory of it.

Now she sits and quietly
ignores the clouds that gather.
No longer looking out,
she does not attempt to recite the colors
that are there for the taking.

Even as she recedes,
there is something
in the shadow of her glances,
a look like she has heard a fair weather report
from some far-off place.
D.L. COLLINS lives and works in the Detroit area. After a record-breaking winter freeze in the Midwest,
she gazes at greening plants and trees as if they were a new invention. She anticipates basking in the
glowing light that appears in Michigan in June and watching fire flies rise from the lawn when the sun is
only just sinking at ten oclock in the evening.
THE HIGHWAY
by Barry Yeoman

the constant
groaning
of diesel
from
route 70
below
the underpass
down the road

we
desperately
hope for
something
anything
beyond this
gasoline and rust

we have
barricaded
our hearts
with ashes
one can spend
a lifetime
dreaming
of eternity

we sit
and wait
but
cannot sleep
till
our pockets
of thought
are emptied

the
highway
continues always
like
an endless
evacuation
BARRY YEOMAN was educated at Bowling Green
State University, the University of Cincinnati,
and The McGregor School of Antioch University,
in creative writing, world classics and the hu-
manities. He is originally from Springfield, Ohio
and lives currently in London, Ohio. His work has
appeared in Red Booth Review, and is forthcom-
ing in Futures Trading, Danse Macabre, and Har-
bingers Asylum.

S
e
r
g
e

B
y
s
t
r
o

F
l
i
c
k
r

The Men Died First
by Sharlene Cochrane
I
n my family, the men died first; the women carried on. Women in
three consecutive generations faced the death of their husbands
from early, unexpected illness. Necessity shaped their response
as they became family matriarchs, resourceful, resilient, and alone.
I. Bina Rykena Voogd (1847-1924)
Abe O. Voogd (1847-1882)
Bina Rykena Voogd sat beside the bed where her hus-
band of eleven years lay, his weak form covered with
blankets and the multi-
colored quilt they re-
ceived at their wedding.
Holding his hand tightly,
she bowed her head, his
faint, uneven breathing
in her ear as she held
back tears. It all hap-
pened so suddenly; this
illness, the quick de-
cline, and now, sitting
in the bedroom, a cold
wind blowing outside,
her dear Abe, so close to
death. This was not their
plan, their vision for
their life together. She
kept up constant prayer,
repeating fearfully,
Please dont die; weve
struggled so much, and
have such happiness
now with our young and
growing family.
Abe and Bina each ex-
perienced the long jour-
ney to the United States
by ship. Abe traveled
from the Ostfriesland
region of northern Ger-
many, and at nineteen,
the oldest of five chil-
dren, he helped his fam-
ily make the overland
trip by train to Illinois.
There they lived for six
years within the grow-
ing Ostfriesen commu-
nity there, and journeyed by train to Cedar Falls and by
wagon twenty miles further west, finding rich, rolling
farm land near other German settlers in north central
Iowa.
Bina remembered the ship that brought her and her
parents from Hannover, Germany, and the train to Iowa
as well. She often said she never wanted to take such
a long, exhausting trip again. The Voogd and Rykena
families each farmed land near Highway 20, between
Parkersburg and Ap-
lington, two tiny towns
serving the growing
number of Iowa farms.
Bina often thought
about how much life
improved once they
settled in Iowa. The
farm was hard work
every day, but she
loved the green fields,
the wild prairies, and
the beautiful flow-
ers. They had many
friends, and families
helped each other
with harvesting corn,
building barns, and
preparing and storing
food. Through these
events and gather-
ings she came to know
Abe, a handsome man
and hard worker. Af-
ter a short courtship
he asked her to marry
him, and she eagerly
agreed.
They began mar-
ried life on a small
farm near their fami-
lies. They spent long
hours working their
farm, and Bina gave
birth to four sons: Olt-
man, now ten, Richard
eight, five year-old
Dick, and Abe, carry-
ing her husbands name, recently turned one. The boys
were a handful, especially the younger ones; still they
...Bina accepted that
her dream with Abe
of a family farm
where they would
support themselves
and raise their
children was not
possible. She made
a decision that
changed her life
and the trajectory
of her childrens
own dreams.
___________________________________________________________
Lef: Kate Mereand-Sinha Flickr Creative Commons
would learn to do their farm chores, and promised to
be a big help once they grew older.
Sitting at his bedside as she carefully watched her
husband, Bina tried not to imagine what she would
have to do to take care of her family without Abe. It
was more than she could bear. Their four little boys,
without a father. The family without Abe to farm the
land, protect them, and help these boys grow up. Abes
favorite brother John lived on the next farm, with a
growing family of his own, and constantly talked about
moving on to Minnesota. Abes other two living sib-
lings were on the farm with their aging parents. There
wasnt room, and the boys werent old enough to help.
She would have to stay and make their farm succeed;
if not, what else could she do?
Despite Binas tears and prayers, Abe Voogd died
March 10, 1882, at the age of 34. Bina, also 34, now
faced all the realities she had not wanted to consider.
Family members reached out to help, and neighbors
were sympathetic to Binas plight. Within a few months,
however, Bina accepted that her dream with Abe of a
family farm where they would support themselves and
raise their children was not possible. She made a de-
cision that changed her life and the trajectory of her
childrens own dreams.
Having expected to be a farm wife in a role she
knew well, she sold their farm, left her familiar world,
and settled in the nearby town of Aplington. She pur-
chased a modest house, and rented rooms to boarders
to make ends meet.
Bina, the sole support of her growing family, focused
her time and energy on the lives of her four sons. She
stayed connected to her Ostfriesen roots, continuing
to speak German, and even listing the boys in the Iowa
State census of 1885 with their Ostfriesen names: Olt-
man, Rike (Richard), Dirk (Dick), and Ebe (Abe). She
also made sure the boys attended the small public
school in Aplington. Each of the brothers took advan-
tage of the opportunities for education and leadership
in their small town, and developed a profession or a
business, while maintaining a close relationship with
their mother. As the brothers became productive town
members, Bina left the demanding boarding house
role, supported by her sons.
Oltman, the old est of the four Voogd brothers,
managed The Aplington News, the weekly newspaper,
while his brother Dick attended the University of Iowa
Law School. When Dick graduated and began his law
practice, Oltman stayed at the newspaper, eventually
purchasing it. He married, and with his wife and four
children lived next door to Bina.
Dick served as one of the two lawyers in Apling-
ton, and also served as mayor for ten years. Both Dick
and Abe, the youngest brother, continued to live with
their mother at various times during these years. Abe
managed the local grain elevator, and worked in other
sales positions in the town.
At the age of 15, seven years after his father died,
Richard started a merchandise business, a small store
on Aplingtons block-long main street. Richards store
expanded to a larger storefront, advertising general
merchandise and millenary. He also bought and sold
property, establishing with a colleague the Tiedens
and Voogd Real Estate office. He married Bena Weiss
when he was twenty, and they had three children. The
family lived in a substantial home in town, near his
mother.
In her later years, Bina lived with her son Abe and
his wife. Called Grandma Voogd by all, she remained
the head of the family, overseeing the activities and
enterprises of her sons. She never married again and
lived more than forty years without her husband Abe,
before she died in 1924.
II. Bena Weiss Voogd (1874-1942)
Richard A. Voogd (1874-1921)
Bena Weiss Voogd, Binas daughter-in-law, sat with her
desk full of papers, and tried to take in their message.
The family real estate business lost money again.
The lands that seemed so lucrative a few years ago
produced less now, and the situation worsened each
year. Somehow the death of her husband Richard had
opened up a hornets nest of bad financial news. We
were doing so well! What are we going to do now? she
kept repeating to herself in disbelief.
Bena married Richard Voogd at a time of great
promise for both of their families.
Like the Voogds, Benas parents came from Ger-
many in the 1860s, settled for a while in Illinois, where
Bena was born, and then moved on to Iowa. After de-
veloping a successful farm, the family moved to town
in 1889, where her father Fred Weiss ran a grain, coal
and implement business. He also served on the city
council and the township board of trustees and had
a small real estate business. It was a happy time for
Bena, including a wonderful trip with her father to the
1893 Worlds Fair in Chicago. She treasured the two
beautiful glass goblets they bought there, with dark
red borders and their names painted on the glass.
Bena and Richards marriage the year after that trip
celebrated the coming together of two of the towns
leading families.
Not all was happy, however; difficult times ar-
rived more than once. Their beautiful baby girl Beulah
passed away when she was only two. With their son
Fred only six, Benas parents living next door offered
the young family support. Bena especially valued her
fathers energetic and positive attitude. Then, seven
years later, her father died of a heart attack, while on
a real estate business trip in Minnesota. He seemed
so vibrant, even at 62, and traveled regularly. Now
a grieving Bena waited, while Richard and her uncle
made the railroad trip north to retrieve the body. Those
were the hardest years.
Benas attention wandered from the piles of finan-
cial documents on the desk to other memories of her
married life. Their two-story, beautiful home provided
space for their family and they often welcomed visi-
tors. Sometimes Richard drank a little too much, like
the time he was driving their new car and ran it right
into their garage door. One Christmas, he caused a bit
of a scene, and wrote a letter of apology to son Fred,
away at business school, for ruining the holiday. But
that didnt happen very often, and he carefully moni-
tored his financial affairs, so they continued to live
comfortably.
Richard sold his general store in 1913, and concen-
trated on real estate, which continued to support them
well; in fact, he was able to buy a farm in the name of
each of their children, for future security. She laughed
when he wrote to Fred at business school urging him
to be careful with his spending, so typical of Richards
attitude: I hope you willget the habit of taking care
of your money as I told you before, every successful
man absolutely has to learn this lesson. The sooner the
better. Money is a mans best friend. (Richard to Fred,
February 17, 1917)
Their three children, Fred, Beulah (named after little
Beulah who died) and Edward, grew up strong, bright,
and healthy. Fred succeeded at business school, and
Richards connections with the owner of the bank in
Austinville led to Freds job there as a bank clerk. That
same summer Fred married Neva Stockdale, and they
began life together, living with Nevas brother on a
farm at the southern edge of town. Beulah excelled
in school, and eagerly planned on attending college,
while Ed cared less for school, spending time with
friends as a gregarious, busy young man.
Then, without warning, Richard became seriously ill
and lay bedridden for a month. The doctor called his
condition, Embulis, (likely pulmonary embolism, or a
blood clot that lodged in his lung), and despite con-
tinuous medical care, Richard died on July 24, 1921, a
steamy, hot, terrifying day. He was 47 years old.
Bena knew their son Fred, married and working,
could be a great help. But Beulah was 16 and Edward
only 13so many financial needs, college expectations,
and pressures to keep up the house and business. Like
her mother-in-law before her, Bena looked for the way
to support her children while facing new and unset-
tling challenges. Fortunately, Richards brother Dick
became the legal counsel for the business, and her son
Fred, as she had expected, took over many daily re-
sponsibilities. She hoped they could count on Richards
business to continue to support her family. If so, they
would manage.
The year after Richard died, however, the familys
fortunes began to change. Benas tax returns from 1922
and 1923 showed yearly losses of $2000. 1924 returns
improved, yet still showed a loss, and again in 1925, the
losses amounted to $2000. In addition, Richards es-
tate remained unsettled, leaving questions about what
taxes to pay. The lands managed by the business of-
fered little security.
After many long discussions, Bena, Dick and Fred
decided that a trip was necessary to see these lands in
person and determine what recourse to follow-to sell,
rent, or continue to own the farms. This would be a
major undertaking, as the lands included farms in Min-
nesota, South and North Dakota, and even a farm in
Saskatchewan. Fred arranged for his brother Edward
to go along, and Uncle Dick went, bringing his legal
experience. Freds best friend and brother-in-law, Bob
Stockdale, who had his own farm, joined the travelers.
They set out in August 1925, Fred driving his 1922 Buick,
going all the way to Canada, in an effort to resolve
several of the unsettled land transactions.
Bena faced this loss of income and status amidst the
increasingly depressed national farm economy. The real
estate business gradually closed. The only farmland still
in the family were the local holdings Richard had pur-
chased earlier for the children, which offered some finan-
cial security. Bena continued to live in the family home,
in a modest fashion, staying active in church and main-
taining a strong hold on her children as they became
adults. Cared
for by daughter
Beulah, Moth-
er Voogd re-
mained in her
home until she
died in 1942,
t we n t y - o n e
years after Rich-
ards death.
III. Neva
S t o c k d a l e
Voogd (1893-
1984)
Fred R.
Voogd (1896-
1936)
Neva Stockdale
and Fred Voogd
became high
school sweet-
hearts. Neva,
three years old-
er, grew up on a
large farm four
miles west of
Aplington, while
Fred lived in town. They attended the same Presbyterian
Church and new two-story high school. They socialized
with a shared group of friends, attending occasional
movies in near-by Parkersburg and band concerts in Ap-
lington every Saturday night, when the farmers came to
town. After she graduated in 1912, a member of the first
high school graduating class in Aplington, Neva helped
on her familys farm, and remained a part of this social
scene. During those years the two began to court.
Neva hoped that once some of her five younger sib-
lings got old enough to work the farm, she could go to
college. Fred enrolled at Iowa State Teachers College
immediately following his graduation and quickly de-
cided this school was not for him. In 1916, he enrolled
at the Business School in Cedar Rapids; the same year
Neva was finally able to start college. Fred advocated
for her to attend Cornell College in Mt. Vernon, only
twelve miles from his school, and Neva agreed. Their
informal dat-
ing in Apling-
ton became
a more estab-
lished court-
ship while
they were at
school, with
Fred traveling
by streetcar
most Fridays
to visit Neva.
Fred com-
pleted his
schooling the
next year and
began his job
at the Austin-
ville Bank, two
miles from
the Stockdale
farm. He saw
no reason for
Neva to con-
tinue with
college, al-
though Neva
held back.
Even though
she admitted her grades needed improvement, she
was having a great time at Cornell, making many
friends, and she preferred to continue.
Late that same spring, however, Nevas parents
called her home. Gladys, her oldest brothers wife,
was bedridden with illness following the birth of their
first child. Following weeks of suffering and uncertain-
ty, Gladys died, and the family needed Neva to stay
with brother Ray and the new baby. Once she was
home, it was clear to Neva that she would not be re-
Women became matriarchs
in the Voogd family
in three consecutive
generations.
While the details
of their lives varied,
critical factors led
to this identity....
turning to school, and on a brilliantly sunny, hot July 24,
1917 Fred and Neva married.
The couple spent their first two years of married life
with Ray. Neva wrote in response to her sister-in-laws
death, It certainly is a blessed thing that one doesnt
know whats before themIt seems hard to think its
for the best but we know it must beI always think of
Someday Well Understand. (Neva to Fred, 3/31/17)
This was a reference to the Bible verse from John 13:7:
Jesus answered and said unto him, what I do Thou
knowest not now; But Thou shalt know hereafter. This
deep religious belief gave her reassurance in the midst
of such losses.
After living at Rays for two years, Fred and Neva
moved to their own home, a block from Freds moth-
er, Bena. Neva focused on raising their sons Kenneth,
born in 1921, and Richard, born three years later. Fred
stopped each afternoon at his mothers house on the
way home from the bank. The family continued to at-
tend Saturday night band concerts, family activities,
and the Presbyterian Church. On alternate Sundays
they would visit Nevas mother on the farm and Freds
mother a block away.
After 1921, when his father Richard died, Fred took
on responsibility for the real estate business and its de-
clining income. Probate issues continued, as well as dis-
couraging financial losses each year. He took the road
trip to Canada in 1925, assessing the land potential
of various farms, time away from his young sons and
Neva, who he addressed in his letters as Dearie. In
1934, while these probate and income issues continued,
his Uncle Dick, legal counsel for his mothers estate,
died. Fred faced further financial and legal burdens.
Neva knew that Fred sometimes suffered from stom-
ach pains or bowel problems. She remembered his re-
assurances, after the travelers left for Canada, that he
bought some magnesia and take a dose, my bowels
are in better shape than before, so dont worry. (Fred
to Neva, August 9, 1925) However, early in the summer
of 1936, at the age of 40, Fred became suddenly and
seriously ill, with painful abdominal cramps. Alarmed
and fearful, Neva drove him to the hospital in Waverly,
thirty miles away. The doctor insisted Fred stay for ob-
servation, and told Neva to go home, get some rest,
and return the next day. She assumed that meant Fred
would improve, and reluctantly left the hospital. Instead,
she learned the next morning that Fred had died dur-
ing the night: June 21, 1936. The death certificate read
perforated gastric ulcer, peritonitis and neutropenia
a massive infection in his abdominal cavity.
Neva, with 15 and 12 year old sons, faced a broken
heart and an unsure future. She built her life around
Fred and the family they created together. Financial
support for Neva came in part from her mothers farm
income, and from her mother-in-laws help in erasing
the mortgage she and Fred owed on their home. She
and her sons could stay where they were and maintain
much of their daily life among family and friends.
At the same time, the loss continued to take an emo-
tional toll. Neva tried to hold on to her faith that there
is a reason for each death, even if we dont know what
it is. As a poem she wrote at Christmas time that very
hard year suggested, Xmas 1936 reinforced her belief
that there are reasons for the deaths that come and
that Fred would want them to be happy:
But God Knows what is Best for All
And its not for us to say
Just who should be the ones to go
Or who the ones to stay!
So now een tho were lonely
We Know that Daddy dear
Would want us to be Happy
And wish others Christmas Cheer!!
Two years later, near the anniversary of Freds death,
Neva reflected with more subdued sadness. She ques-
tioned the belief that God determines who dies and al-
ways for some good reason. Spring 1936, described a
yucca plant growing near the house, which the family
watched throughout the spring for its first blooms. But
as the flowers opened:
how could we know
What their message was to be?
When the first white bell unfolded -
Daddy wasnt there - to see!
But how could we have known
What their message was to be?
That tall stem pointing, up to Heaven
Was all that we could see!
April 29, 1938
Neva never fully said goodbye to Fred. She kept his
coats and straw hats in the closet upstairs, and saved his
bureau contents as they were when he died. She began
to save other kinds of items, stacking church programs,
magazines, and newspapers in piles in the living room
and bedroom. Her sons married, served in the Army, and
moved to new communities, while her saving practices
expanded.
By the time Neva died, almost 50 years after Fred,
each room overflowed with saved objects and papers.
She no longer allowed anyone to come into her house;
visitors could only join her on the screened-in front
porch. She still took flowers from her garden to church
every Sunday. She visited family living nearby, and vol-
unteered with her sister Hazel at the town library. But
no one went in the house, where Neva shuffled about
through the pathways in each room, holding on to her
Dearie, Fred.
IV.
Growing up, the only story I knew about these three
generations was that my grandfather Fred died when
my father was twelve. No details, no back story, and only
a few hints about how strong Grandma Voogd was,
raising four boys, and a photo of Mother Voogd at a
holiday dinner in her home, surrounded by family mem-
bers.
Whenever we visited Grandma Neva, we stayed with
her younger sister, Hazel, who lived in a two-story frame
house on Main Street. Hazel never married and was ac-
tive in the library, and her home was the gathering place
for the various family members. We always stopped in
Des Moines on our family visits, where Freds sister Beu-
lah lived. She was a teacher for many years, and having
waited until her mother passed on to marry, became a
widow a few short years later.
These women shaped my ideas about gender. They
lived independently in their own houses. They traveled
to visit us and took trips to several western states. Their
lives included friends, work or volunteer activities, and
few interactions with men, other than their brothers. I
loved these women, admired them, and wanted to be like
them. To find out that my great grandmother Bena and
Great-great Grandmother Bina also had this experience,
also lived independently and well, never remarrying and
living close to their children, made my lived experi-
ence part of a constant thread. That strong character
and commitment to carrying on came through gen-
erations, not only the generation I knew and loved.
I didnt see the possible shadow sides of their life.
Neva continued to function in the world after Fred
died, volunteering at the small local library her sister
Hazel and other members of the Womens Club began,
making floral arrangements from her garden for Sun-
day church services, and traveling to visit her sons
families. After she died we finally went into Nevas
house. We found the pathways through the house, the
piles of newspapers on every surface, Freds clothes
in the closet, 50 years later. Her outward expression
was independent, managing well. However her home
became a lonely place, overflowing with saved stuff
and she allowed no one to visit her. Her independence
and individual life had its compromises.
At the same time, I slowly learned of troubling
attitudes toward the earlier womens life choices; a
reminder of the way in which our choices may pro-
duce both strength and sorrow. Bina, Grandmother
Voogd, raised four boys who became successful
members of the community. The whispers criticized
how demanding she was, perhaps how her strength
to carry on meant pressure and expectations on her
children that led them to do what they did, whether
they wanted to or not. Her son Richard opened a store
when he was 15how did that come about? Perhaps
he found satisfaction in that step; or did he want to go
to school like his brother Dick, or farm nearby, rather
than buy and sell farms? Was his occasional drinking
connected to the pressure he experienced, his own
unfulfilled dreams, or his loss of a father when he was
only eight? Did his drinking contribute to a thread of
alcohol abuse in future generations?
Bena, Mother Voogd, also required much from
her children. Her son Fred stopped at her home every
day after work, before returning home to his wife and
children. Neva hinted more than once that she was
unhappy about that. Beulah lived with and took care
of her mother, delaying her own marriage until after
she was forty. She never had children, and her hus-
band (like her brother and father) died young, within
a short time after their delayed marriage. Perhaps
Beulah chose that delay, accepting the expectation
that she should not marry while her mother needed
her.
SHARLENE VOOGD COCHRANE grew up in Nebraska,
but always felt I was from Iowa. She teaches in the
self-designed masters degree at Lesley University,
and is currently writing a series of stories based on a
collection of her Iowa grandmothers letters. She also
facilitates Courage and Renewal retreats for educators
and recently published Courage in the Academy: Sus-
taining the Heart of College and University Faculty in
the Journal of Faculty Development.
The place where these women lived, the land and
farms of north central Iowa, played a role in their abil-
ity to survive. Bina had the resources to change her
life because she and husband Abe had a farm that
provided her with funds to move to town and estab-
lish a boarding house. Bena and her husband Richard
started with a small store in town that served primarily
farmers, and then a real estate business that provided
well for them for many years, mostly by buying and
selling farmland. Nevas mother and the resources of
her familys farm supported her after Fred died. Each
was in some way dependent on the land to provide
their financial stability.
The network of families, especially women, that
existed in each generation offered critical additional
support. The Voogds came from Ostfreisland as an ex-
tended family, and interacted and traveled with others
from their home country. They farmed in an area where
many of their fellow immigrants settled. While they
lived far from everything they had known, they were
also part of a stream of immigrants from that area,
and experienced a shared culture. While Bina moved
to town and left the farm life she knew, she moved to
Aplington, four miles away, and stayed in contact with
those around her. She lived alone, yet had siblings and
other women she knew and could depend on for sup-
port, advice, and understanding.
Bena also had friends and links to immigrant fami-
lies of her mother and father, and was part of the Voogd
extended family. Though her financial status declined
in the years following Richards death, her links within
the community and the church continued. Her children
were older, too, so her needs for support differed from
her mother-in-law with her young boys. Benas chil-
dren, especially her daughter Beulah, became part of
her support network.
Neva, the most fragile of these women, depended
heavily on the women around her. Her sister Hazel
was an important support, living two blocks away, and
serving as the center of family gatherings and interac-
tions. With five brothers, all married and with children
of their own, the family connections and interconnec-
tions within the town and nearby farms provided child-
care, travel companions, and help with typical auto
and house problems. While her quirky ways tended
toward isolation, the family as a whole served to keep
her connected.
I tended to romanticize my grandmother Neva
and grand-aunts Hazel, and Beulah, imagining them
as happy, independent, and capable. While they were
all of that, at some level, each of them, and I have no
doubt Bena and Bina as well, had their share of lone-
liness, heartbreak, fear of the future, and challenges
around children, finances, and managing in difficult
circumstances.
Women became matriarchs in the Voogd family
in three consecutive generations. While the details of
their lives varied, critical factors led to this identity;
most importantly, each faced the death of her hus-
band from early, unexpected illness. Unlike many wid-
owed women of their times, they each chose not to
marry again. Their situations offered limited options,
often disrupting the lives the family had known. They
exhibited independence, resourcefulness, and, espe-
cially with Grandma Voogd and Mother Voogd, an un-
bending will. They also counted upon their children as
they aged, and created expectations that shaped the
childrens experiences as well. And sometimes grief
and loneliness continued, as each woman carried on
for her children, while holding on to what she could of
an earlier time.
Feature Poet
C.M. Rivers
Compass
by C.M. Rivers

How do we become so fenced in,
afraid, mean-spirited?
Why not instead leave a trail
of breadcrumbs along the hedgerow.
Some acts of heroism are so quiet
no one sees. Let them go.
Someone doesnt always need to know.
You are the keeper of the knowing,
and that can be enough.

Before you stow fragments of your life
in a shoebox in the closet,
you may want to reconsider
the heart compass,
study the topography of spirit
and the surrounding earthworks,
look where lines are drawn
between what others claim as truth
and what you, yourself, have chosen.

Watch how I behave.
See how I welcome silence?
There were days when I, too,
fled from it,
days like smoldering cellos,
days that came down along the coast.
I would put myself in the silence,
as a trial, then run away pleading.
Prophecies might be foretold
in mirrors and temples.
So be a little less organized,
let things clutter up.
Dust and muck are a part of it.
See the mountains?
Fling yourself out the window,
swing yourself across
the peaks and valleys,
back to where your journey began.
Knapsack
by C.M. Rivers

Its a shame
I dont have the patience to garden,
my mother being who she was,
doing what she did with sunflowers
and lemon balm.
And with me being who I am-
a fine cook responsible
for so many glowing embers,
so many bubbling broths.
The memory of her is light enough
to take with me wherever I go,
propelled by the sea breeze,
pushed along by intimate hands,
drawn down muddy roads
slashed with the watercolors
of coming summer,
medicine wheels whirling
in my stumbling eyes.
Feature Poet
C.M. Rivers

J
o
h
n

F
o
w
l
e
r

F
l
i
c
k
r

C
r
e
a
t
i
v
e

C
o
m
m
o
n
s
Ephemeral
by C.M. Rivers

There are transitory moments
between seasons
when the world
comes out of its dressing room,
so stunning we lose our balance.
This moment of spiritual frenzy
does not wait to be discovered.
It comes and goes like a fire
of dry kindling,
and can be easy to miss
depending on ones latitude.

Light spills through antique bottles
on a sunken windowsill,
stones and tree-roots
are less discreet than usual.
We feel our fingertips more closely,
an unnamable itch turns over inside us
and we want to know everything.

It is my job to point this out,
as I pointed out the copper-plated bar top
while you slurped mussels from their sleek shells,
floating in cream and brown roux.
Planets may rotate and stars explode,
but earthbound as we are,
we listen for warblers.

We look ahead to coffee,
meals, holidays, weather.
C.M. Rivers is a native of the Pacific Northwest, cur-
rently living in Ithaca, New York. Once-nominated
for a Pushcart Prize, his poetry has appeared in
Rosebud Magazine, Orbis International Journal, and
several online literary journals. He is at work on a
book of poetry and a young adult fantasy series. You
can read more of his writing at www.cmrivers.com
I
M WRITING THIS IN A DARK PLACE. PHYSICALLY
AND EMOTIONALLY. MY LIVING ROOM SHADES ARE
DOWN WELL INTO THE AFTERNOON. ITS GLOOMY
OUT THERE ANYWAY. PHYSICALLY AND EMOTION-
ALLY.
Jack Johnson Radio plays on Pandora.
Matisyahus One Day at the moment. I lis-
ten to this station because the music on itwith the ex-
ception of all the John Mayer songs (I fucking hate John
Mayer)makes me feel good. Most of the time anyway.
Occasionallylike todayit reminds me of ways the
world fails to live up to my ideals. Ways I fail to live up to
my ideals.
Im writing this because, here in the dark, Im hope-
ful. Im hopeful that by writing this I can save my life. Or
maybe someone elses.
Today is the third Monday in January. The day desig-
nated to honor the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. Youd
think thatd be a good day for me. But its not. Youd think
Id be out attending community celebrations. But Im not.
And that gets to the crux of my problem. My dilemma.
Paradox even.
I care so much about the world that I cant see the
point of well, most everything.
I fucking hate John Mayer. But I dont tell Pandora to
skip his songs.
I admire the folks out there trying to follow Dr. Kings
teachings and bring about a more just worldincluding
those who do it only this one day a year. But I dont join
them.
Its not laziness. Its learned behavior. Or belief. And
what is behavior but manifested belief? (Even if those be-
liefs are often unconscious.)
Im not some alienated teenager going through my
rebel without a cause phase. Im not some sad sack
A COMPASSIONATE CYNICS
GUIDE TO SURVIVAL
who never had a chance or some square peg who
cant fit in or some former eager beaver who was
treated unfairly by the system. (But I can identify
with all those types.)
Im a well-educated white male from a middle-
class, progressive family whos excelled atand
been rewarded formost of my endeavors over the
course of my forty-six years.
Im aware of my privilege. Or at least some of it.
The parts Ive learned to see.
Compared to many people in the world, my life is
very good. I never doubt that my basic needs will be
met. I have fulfilling relationships with others. I feel a
lot of joy. And gratitude.
But, man, when I slip into the pit of despair its
an abyss.
My beliefthe belief that often stops me from
taking actions that might improve my existence or
the existence of others and that periodically propels
me into the abyssis that, in the grand scheme of
things, in the overwhelmingly unjust and seeming-
ly cruel world we live in, the impact of any action
I might take would be so negligible that itd be a
waste of energy.
Im well acquainted with the celebrate small vic-
tories maxim. I think its bullshit. One more way the
structures of power in our civilization channel poten-
tially revolutionary impulses into activity that pres-
ents no real threat to the status quo. Impotence you
can feel good about.
But I dont believe in bloody revolution. Im a pac-
ifist. I wont even kill insects.
Sometimes I think I need help. I dont mean
psycho-analysis. Im perfectly capable of conduct-
by Karuna Das
ing my own analysis, of myself included. Too capable
perhaps. (Also, I cant believe that shedding whatever
baggage I carry from my upbringing would alleviate
the weight I feel over the state of the world.) The help
I mean is the help offered by Big Pharma. Better living
through chemistry. But I cant stand the thought of be-
ing comfortably numbed on a permanent basis.
Instead I medicate myselfusually through alco-
holon a need-to-numb basis. I know it doesnt really
help. In the long run, it worsens my depression. But I do
it anyway.
I know the answer. Not just to my problem. To the
worlds. Its quite straightforward. Im by no means the
first person to articulate it. Humanity must evolve
spirituallyto the point where our collective values
shift. To where everyone truly appreciates the intercon-
nection between all forms of life. Thatand only that
will end hunger, violence, and our other ills.
The catch is that collective spiritual evolution seems
highly improbable in a world where so many people
struggle to survivein terms of material existenceon
a daily basis. When your very survival is at stake, youre
most likely not too concerned with the big picture of
earthly life. And rightly so.
So we need a spiritual evolution to develop values
that will alleviate human suffering. Andwe need to al-
leviate human suffering in order to be in a position to
evolve spiritually.
Another fucking paradox.
Maybe they have to happen together. Maybe small
steps forward really are all we can hope for. Maybe we
do each have to heal ourselves in order to heal the
world.
Or maybe those are comforting lies that allow us to
carry on in the face of hopelessness.
Or maybe thats a self-defeating mindset that keeps
me from acting in a way that might make a real dif-
ference in the world and actually helps maintain the
status quo.
Or maybe
Or maybe
You get the idea.
Welcome to the vicious circle of my compassionate
cynicism.
Its Tuesday afternoon.
I just ate lunch. Veggie potstickers with a Sriracha
sour cream sauce, followed by a mint-crme-filled
chocolate. Sensations of cool and sweet and salt and
heat linger in my mouth.
Ive been a vegetarian for a while now. I stopped
eating mammals nearly ten years ago and phased out
birds and fish (and shellfish) over time. When people
ask why, I tell them its for a combination of the stan-
dard reasons: health, ethics, environmentalism, and
spirituality.
Its not because I believe my choice makes any real
difference in the world. Its a purely personal matter.
And Im not rigid about it. Im not a vegan. I sometimes
eat things made with gelatin. But I cant imagine con-
suming actual animal flesh. Ive completely lost my
taste for it.
Its snowing here today. The shades are up, and I can
see tiny flakes falling straight down or on a diagonal, or
swirling, or blowing sideways, depending how the wind
gusts.
I even went outside for a while, right after breakfast,
to shovel the sidewalk in front of our house and in front
of the attached houses of our neighbors on each side.
It was my turn. I sprinkled expensive eco-friendly ice
melt on the sidewalk afterward. It didnt do much good.
Id planned to go grocery shopping this morning. But
right as I was getting ready to leave, the snow really
started coming down, and I figured there was no reason
to subject myself to the cold and wet. We have plenty
of food in the house. Ill go tomorrow. Or Thursday.
Im considering going to yoga later. I could really
use it. Physically and emotionally. But Ill probably find
an excuse not to go. Its supposed to snow hard again
around then.
I did exercise a bit yesterday, after I finished my
journal entry. I walked a while on the treadmill, then
did some stretching, a little core work, a few push
ups. Several years ago I finished a marathon in under
four hours. But Ive been hampered by recurring ham-
string and lower back problems the last couple years. I
havent run for months.
As I age, I relate more and more to the characters
in Samuel Becketts plays. Especially when it comes to
trimming my nails. Seriously. Its absurd how much of
our lives we spend on basic grooming. Existence can be
so fucking mundane.
But what Im really talking about is the slow deterio-
ration of our bodies. And our minds. Although thatby
its very natureis, fortunately, less noticeable.
I suppose the only alternative is death.
Helping other people
is never a wrong choice.
Even if in some abstract
and convoluted way
it ultimately hinders
the kind of total transformation
I want so desperately
to see in the world.
I know that. When Im not mired
in the abyss, I even believe it.
I just skipped a John Mayer song on Pandora. Third
one I skipped in the last hour. I wonder how many times
I have to do that before the program starts to weed
them out for me.
As expected, I
didnt make it
to yoga yester-
day. It wasnt
snowing much
when I wouldve
had to leave
the house, but I
was in the mid-
dle of watching
a movie.
You might
be thinking I
have too much
time on my
hands. You
might be right.
It wasnt al-
ways this way.
I spent many
years with my
nose to the pro-
verbial grind-
stone. In my
case that often
meant with my
nose buried in
books. Plays,
mostly. But his-
tory and criti-
cism as well.
And cultural
theory and phi-
losophy. Nine
years earning
two graduate
degrees (MFA
and PhD) in the-
atre. I learned a
lot about dra-
ma and about
art in general.
About the world. About people, and the systems we
construct and enforce.
My first year as a tenure-track college professor, I
worked eighty hours a week. After eight more years of
full-time teaching (and creating art on the side or dur-
ing summers), I finally walked away from academia.
Even though Id managed, through repetition, to make
the workload
more sustain-
able, I didnt
see any point
in continuing
to labor in that
envi ronment.
(Also, repetition
becomes bor-
ing.)
I could rant
for quite a while
about the nu-
merous failings
of our higher
education sys-
tem. I could
make a strong
case justify-
ing the perks
of academic
life as well. Ill
spare you both.
I definitely had
it pretty good
in some ways
especially com-
pared to all the
adjunct instruc-
tors struggling
to survive on
what frequent-
ly comes out to
less than mini-
mum wage.
Te a c h e r s
want to believe
theyre making
a difference. I
no longer be-
lieved that. So
I quit.
It didnt matter that I had (some) students who
clearly appreciated my efforts and even a few who
told me Id changed the way they look at the world and
their art. That did help. At least in terms of my tolerat-
ing aspects of the job I hated. Like grading. Or, as I call
it, de-grading.
For a while I accepted less palatable aspects of
the job as necessary evils in an overall worthy cause.
But at some point Id come to the realization that my
changing a few livesor even dozens and dozens of
themwould never have a tangible impact on the
world. I know, I know: Ripple effect blah blah blah. I wish
I could believe that.
I dont believe it. Nor do I accept the view that
change takes a long time, so we have to be patient and
trust that justice will eventually triumph. That strikes
me as a convenient outlook.
Its convenient for those working for change. It gives
them the impressionan appealing onethat their
lives matter.
Its also convenient for those who prefer that things
remain as they are. They can rest easy knowing that
none of the work being done actually jeopardizes their
power.
My evidence is the world around us. Do I really need
to list everything thats wrong and seems to be getting
worse? I wouldnt know where to start.
Actually I do know where to start. A hot share on
Facebook this week has been a report that the richest
eighty-five people own as much wealth as the poorest
half of the world.
Come on! I wont argue that wealth shouldor
couldbe distributed equally across the entire popu-
lation. But how extreme will we let it get? Fewer than
one hundred souls possess the equivalent assets of 3.5
billionthirty-five million hundredhuman beings. Its
obscene.
Everything else I might point outcorporate control
of our dysfunctional and divisive political system, en-
vironmental degradation for the sake of shareholder
profits, abuses of power by police and other authorities,
widespread lack of basic civility and at times horrifying
disregard for human lifeflows from that basic reality.
From the values inextricably linked to that reality.
I do understand why so many people put up with
such injustice, even though they themselves struggle to
survive. Theyve been trained to think that they dont
have a choice or that they dont deserve better or that
its them against (most) everyone else or that fortune
might suddenly smile on them and catapult them into
the ranks of the affluent.
I get it. It drives me absolutely bonkers, but I get it.
Heres an inconvenient truth. Whatever effort you or
I might make to level the economic playing field, or to
help those less fortunate or more oppressed than us, at
best temporarily alleviates a tiny bit of suffering.
I simply couldnt go on wasting my energy. I was, in fact,
training students to become cogs in the machine, even
though I also tried to teach them how to examine the ma-
chinery with a critical mind. It all seemedand seemsso
futile.
Im not saying you shouldnt do it. But lets be clear:
You do it because it makes you feel good. Not because
in the big picture, in the grand scheme of thingsit
makes a real difference. Even if millions of others did
the same, the impact would be superficial. A band-aid
on a deep wound.
Heres the worst part. What you actually do when
you give your hard-earned money to a political group
or charitable organizationor to a panhandleris al-
low people who truly can afford to give up some of
their wealth to not be forced to do so. In doing your
perceived duty, in demonstrating your humanity, you
let them off the hook from doing and demonstrating
theirs.
By the way, I do that sort of thing anyway. Give to
charitable organizations. Sometimes. Andmore rare-
lyeven to panhandlers. But I dont feel good about it.
Heres why I cant feel good about it. Whenever were
permittedand especially if were encouragedby
the structures and institutions of our civilization to do
something, thats a sure sign that doing it only perpetu-
ates the status quo. All efforts to work within or slightly
aroundor even to reformany of our broken systems
ultimately support the overall set-up and waste energy
that might be used to re-imagine, more meaningfully,
how we live.
This perspective is why I quit my job. I simply couldnt
go on wasting my energy. I was, in fact, training stu-
dents to become cogs in the machine, even though I
also tried to teach them how to examine the machinery
with a critical mind. It all seemedand seemsso futile.
Anything you might say to try to change my per-
spective, Ive most likely already heard. From the Se-
renity Prayer to Buddhist philosophy, Ive heard it. Ive
heard it, Ive considered it, Ive made a concerted effort
to embrace much of it, and Ive rejected all of it. Ive re-
jected it as propaganda for the big picture status quo.
Thats the best we can hope for doesnt cut it with
me. I hope for more. I demand more.
I consider anything short of a total transformation of
our collective existence an unacceptable compromise.
And I consider anything that encourages me to accept
such a compromise an attack on my integrity. An attack
on my humanity. Even when it disguises itself as the op-
posite, as an appeal to my humanity.
I stillsometimesdo political things. I attend se-
lect rallies and protests. I occasionally produce theatre
events with an activist thrust. When Im in the midst of
those things Im often able to lose myself in them. To
get caught up in a sense of communion. Of purpose. To
feel good about what Im doing.
But at some point, after the moment has passed, the
rush wears off. I come back to the feeling that none of
it matters. Nothing really changes. The world reminds
me of that every day.
Much of what we do is done simply to make our-
selves feel better in a world we cant control. Sometimes
we realize thats what were doing. Other times we en-
gage in willful ignorance. Signing petitions? Sending
letters to elected officials? Are you kidding me? Who
the fuck cares? (And, yes, I do those things, too. Not of-
ten, though. Only when I cant not do something.)
Anyway for the last two years Ive been voluntarily
unemployed. Thats been possible only because my life
partner continues to toil away within the system and
we reside in a place where we can get by on a single
(non-profit even!) salary.
So I do have a lot of time on my hands. Even more
than usual lately, as my partner has been putting in es-
pecially long days between her job-related responsibil-
ities and various volunteer commitments. (She doesnt
share my cynicism. But, thankfully, she understands it.)
I fill the hours in various ways. First and foremost,
I manage most of our domestic affairs. I do nearly all
the shopping, cooking, cleaning, and laundry. A blow for
household gender equity!
I also take freelance jobsas a theatre artist, teacher,
or editorfrom time to time. (I have two such projects
underway right now.) And even though Im no longer
a career educator, I read manuscripts for former stu-
dents and give them (literally: I do it for free) feedback.
I do the same for professional associates and some-
times even for strangers (if theyre friends of friends).
And I write. This week its a journal of sorts. Mostly
its drama. Screenplays in particular. Ive completed
four feature-length scripts since I left academia.
Last fall I started pitching the stories to Hollywood
managers and producers. Several have requested
scripts. But Im under no illusion Ill ever sell one, much
less see one filmed. Although my screenwriting compe-
tition results (finalist or semifinalist more than a dozen
times) might indicate that I have some recognizable
talent, the coverage Ive gotten from industry profes-
sionals has made it clear that my artistic visionmuch
like my political and spiritual visiondoesnt quite fit
into the mainstream (commercial) mold.
I again refuse to compromise.
It was important to me to give it a shot. Ill continue
marketing my finished works, but I dont see any point
in generating new material that will inevitably elicit
the same response.
All of which is to say I watch a fair number of mov-
ies. Partly for diversion, partly as researchto study
the craft.
The movie I was watching when I bailed on yoga
yesterday is called The Way. It was written, directed,
and produced by Emilio Estevez. It stars his father, Mar-
tin Sheen, as a man who goes to Europe to retrieve the
remains of his adult son (played in flashbacks and vi-
sions by Estevez) and spontaneously decides to make
an 800+ kilometer pilgrimage through northern Spain
to complete a journey his son had barely started be-
fore dying in a freak accident.
I found the story compelling because Ive experi-
enced the loss of several loved ones recently.
Last June, a dear friend and artistic collabora-
tor died of a brain tumor diagnosed about eighteen
months earlier, not long after we closed a run of her
solo show aboutin an eerie coincidencea young
mother dying of cancer. She was forty. She left be-
hind a husband and two small children. I went to their
house Sunday evening, with food Id made, to watch
football and play with the kids.
Last August, a friend from graduate school died,
also of cancer and also in her early forties. She left be-
hind a husbandwhom, prior to her diagnosis, shed
been in the process of divorcing due to his ongoing
substance abuseand two pre-teen children. They
dont live anywhere near here, and I have no idea how
theyre doing. My last (only) attempt to reach out to
him got no response.
Perhaps the hardest loss for me to deal with has
been the death of one of our cats last November. She
was ten and had suffered from chronic health issues
for several years, so we knew her days might be num-
bered. But shed been doing quite well for a while, and
she died suddenly from an unrelated condition (unde-
tected cancer). More accurately, she died from eutha-
nasia. In my arms.
The depth of my combined grief has been over-
whelming. Its brought tremendous pain, and consid-
erable perspective. My compassion for all who expe-
rience similar losses, whether of pets or people, has
expanded infinitely.
So I guess, in a way, by watching that movie I was
doing yoga after all.
My partner stayed home sick today. Shes working from
the house, though. It takes a lot to get her to agree to
even that. Shes been battling a cold-like illness since
early Decemberfor nearly seven weeks. Every time
she seems to have shaken it, she has a relapse, usually
after a string of her not-so-unusual twelve-hour days.
She hasnt seen a doctor and probably wont. Even
though her employment provides her with a decent
health planmuch better than my individual policy
shed still owe a copayment. Why spend thirty bucks
and waste an hour of her valuable time to be told what
she already knows? Its (most likely) a virus. Drink fluids,
eat right, andthis is the tricky partrest.
Im glad to have her here. It gives me a chance to
take care of herphysically and emotionallythe way
she does for me on a regular basis. I dont know what
Id do without her support and affection. I try to return
them but rarely feel like Ive given back enough.
I do keep her well fed. I make us a healthy and hearty
breakfast almost every morning. I cook us a nutritious
(and usually delicious) dinner most evenings, general-
ly with sufficient leftovers to send her off to work with
lunch the next day.
Feeding people is one of my true joys. I like to say
that the secret ingredient of everything I make is love.
And it really is. Im not at all sorry if that sounds cheesy.
(I told you Im not a vegan.)
Having her home also gives me a good excuse to put
off grocery shopping for another day. (Its snowing again
and quite cold out today.) I dont know why I dread go-
ing to the grocery store. Its most often a painlessand
sometimes even pleasantexperience and rarely ap-
proaches the frustrating scenario described by David
Foster Wallace in his This Is Water essay.
If youre not familiar with that piece, I highly recom-
mend checking it out. Originally delivered at a college
commencement ceremony in 2005, it was published
posthumouslyin 2009. You can find itin text, audio,
and probably video versionsonline.
I read it again this morning. I dont find his advice
about surviving the day-to-day routine of adulthood any
less incisive just because he ended up killing himself. On
the contrary, I find his death a tragic illustration of what
he identifies as the difficultyand the necessityof ad-
justing the way we think about our experiences in order
to reduce our own suffering. He saw the mental strug-
gle of human existence so clearly, and he still lost.
After reading the article today, I did a little research
on the author. It turns out he graduated from Amherst
College the year I graduated from Amherst Regional
High School. So we inhabited the same small town in
Western Massachusetts for much of the early 1980s. He
was about five and a half years older than me. He com-
mitted suicide almost five and a half years ago, at age
forty-six.
Studies around the world have found thatin the U-
shaped curve of happiness over a lifetimedepression
typically peaks at age forty-six. I will turn forty-seven in
September.
I finally made it to the grocery store this morning. In
hindsight, waiting until Friday may not have been the
best decision. At least I went early. It was crowded, but
my patience was never really tested.
It takes a lot to get me worked up these days. Since
quitting my job Ive been able to maintain a much more
even keel as I navigate the world and interact with peo-
ple operating on what David Foster Wallace calls our
defaultIts all about mesetting. With few excep-
tionslike the local tradition of using parking chairs
to reserve street space in front of a houseI just smile.
Even when my perfectly able-bodied but overly en-
titled neighbor down the block uses a parking chair, I
usually smile as I remove it from the street. Of course,
thats a mischievous smile and not the friendly one I
wear while running errands.
Before I left home, I shoveled the sidewalk again. I
stopped my next-door neighbor from doing it so I could
take another turn. We dont follow a formal rotation.
The chore falls to whichever resident of these three
houses feels motivatedor obligatedto step up and
do it. It seems to work out to everyones satisfaction.
Ours is frequently the first stretch on the block to be
cleared.
Its cold again today. But every now and then the sun
shines through the winter haze.
The shades are up. Im listening to Jack Johnson Ra-
dio. Its having the desired impact.
I noticed something on Pandora the other day. Right
below the option to skip a song are two icons: thumbs-
up and thumbs-down. Apparently thats actually how
you customize a station. It takes a little extra efforta
couple more button pressesbut its extremely enjoy-
able to give John Mayer a thumbs-down. (Its not like it
hurts his feelings.) Time will tell if its effective.
By the way I didnt mean everything I wrote the
Yet, if I werent such a dreamer, maybe I wouldnt be
so susceptible to disappointment....Ive labeled myself a
cynic. I wonder if thats the right word for someone with
the heart and soul of an idealist and the eyes and mind
of a realist.
other day about your efforts not making any real differ-
ence in the world. Well, no, I did mean it. When I wrote
it. But I dont mean it today. At least not fully.
Of course they make a difference. And even if its a
small one, its important.
We each have the ability to choose how we par-
ticipate in the system. As far as I can tell, theres no
right way. Butat the risk of moralizing (even more)
it should be a choice and not a default action. And
the choice should be an informed one. With as much
awareness of the implicationsshort-and long-term
as we can fathom. There may be no right way to par-
ticipate, but there are wrong ones. Its up to each of
us to determinebased on our individual values and
circumstancesthe ones that are wrong for us and to
do our best to avoid them.
Helping other people is never a wrong choice. Even
if in some abstract and convoluted way it ultimately
hinders the kind of total transformation I wantso des-
peratelyto see in the world. I know that. When Im not
mired in the abyss, I even believe it.
If I had the right computer skills, Id join Anonymous.
But I dont have those skills.
Im already starting to get the hang of this Pandora
customization thing, though. I just gave a thumbs-up
to a Red Hot Chili Peppers song. Parallel Universe
sounds good.
Lately Ive been on the lookout for opportunities to
more fully employ the skills I do have. When I left aca-
demia, I hoped to share my radical spiritual vision with
the world through screenwriting. Maybe that will still
come to pass someday.
In the meantime, my personal status quo is not sus-
tainable. When I have a writing project underway
such as this oneI do fairly well. But Im not the kind
of writer who can write a few hours every day. I work
intensely on something until its done and then need a
break before starting the next thing. And its in those
lulls that the gaping mouth of the abyss beckons.
(In case you were wondering, those lulls can occur
any time of year.)
Im open-minded but selective in considering possi-
bilities. Taking a job just to have one is not an option for
me. That is, unless it becomes absolutely necessary
phynancially (sic) or emotionally.
I applied for an academic gig (teaching theatre for
social change) with an early December review date. At
this point, its probably safe to assume I didnt make
the short list of candidates. I also applied for a full-time
position (educational outreach) at a local non-profit
with a social mission of special interest to me. I didnt
get an interview.
My partner and I are exploring less conventional
paths as well. One would reduce our participation in
the system significantly. In March were going to Belize
to investigate several small lodges for sale in the moun-
tain district. Apparently its possiblefor a much less
substantial investment than I expectedto live simply
and well there, almost totally off the grid.
Its a long shot well actually make the leap. Buy-
ing even the least expensive of the available proper-
ties would tie up pretty much all our assets. We might
decide its too big a risk. Either way, well have had an
adventure. And, for now, dreaming about it helps me
get through the day.
Yet, if I werent such a dreamer, maybe I wouldnt be
so susceptible to disappointment.
Ive labeled myself a cynic. I wonder if thats the
right word for someone with the heart and soul of an
idealist and the eyes and mind of a realist.
Truth be told, I feel a little ridiculous for having writ-
ten this, even though I needed to do it. My privileged
ennui seems laughable when people are out there in
the world struggling to survive.
Then again, in a wayperhaps lesser, perhaps just
differenthere in my living room, so am I.
Peace.
24 January 2014
Epilogue: A John Mayer tune just came on Pandora. I
quickly gave it a thumbs-downwithout even consid-
ering the particular song. I realized after the fact that I
actually do kind of like that one. Its called Waiting on
the World to Change. Maybe you know how it goes?
KARUNA DAS lives, with his partner and cat, in Pitts-
burgha city of bridges (which he crosses regularly
without jumping), where even hearts are forged of steel.
with Nora Caron,
author of The New Dimensions Trilogy
1. What books are on your nightstand?

Nora: I am currently reading The Untethered Soul by
Michael A. Singer.
2. What book are you an evangelist forwhat book do
you feel that everyone needs to read?
Nora: One of my book bibles is Women Who Run with
the Wol ves. Every woman should read this book and be-
gin the journey inward.
3.If you could sit down with one author living or dead
who would it be and why?
Nora: I would sit down with William Shakespeare. I truly
believe he is the greatest writer that ever walked this
earth; his insights into human nature blow anyones
mind and his talent as a writer surpasses anyone else
I have ever read. There are hundreds of layers to each
play and dozens of spiritual awakenings hidden in ev-
ery sentence he pens. Whenever I read him, I travel to
distant worlds and forget who I am.
4. Tell us a little about your own creative process.
Nora: I am a morning bird. Even on weekends, I am up
at the crack of dawn. Perhaps its because my Chinese
sign is a rooster, but I have never been able to write at
night. I wake up, drink my black Chinese tea, and sit
down to write for two or three hours before the work
day begins. I find my mind sharper and clearer early
morning. I find inspiration in nature and in silence; cit-
ies are the worst place for me to write. If I find I lack in-
spiration, I just drive to the nearest mountain or beach
and walk for hours, soaking in the free medicine nature
has to offer us. If I can run into animals, all the better,
because they always bring me to a place of love and
gratitude.
5. At what point did you feel you crossed the line be-
tween hobbyist writer and author?
Nora: When I published Journey to the Heart seven
years ago, I knew there was no turning back. I took my
first publishing endeavor very seriously and made it my
priority to spread the word. I was 27 years old at the
time. To be honest, though, I knew I would be a serious
writer from the early age of eight years old. I used to
walk around and tell my family I would be a writer one
day, and everyone rolled their eyes at me, thinking I
was a very imaginative little blond-haired girl.
6. What are you working on now?
Nora: Currently I am working on my fourth book, which
will not be part of any trilogy. It will be a love story in the
realm of Romeo & Juliet but more magical and modern
with my usual twist of philosophy and history.
6
Questions
Jaguar Dreams is Now Availabl e!
Jaguar Dreams, the final book in The New Dimensions Trilogy, finds Lucina in Guatemala searching for her
lover who has run away. When she discovers the news that he is somewhere deep in the Petn jungle, Lucina
hires an intimidating mysterious older guide named Alejandro who forces her to face more fears than she ever
imagined she could handle. It is on dangerous and frightening jungle trails that Lucina at last surrenders to
the greater powers that are guiding her life. In a dramatic scene, she encounters a deadly predator and trans-
forms into a new woman, one who understands the world in a completely different light.
Once I started reading Jaguar Dreams I could not put it down! Nora Caron
brilliantly weaves together a beautifully written, engaging, and inspiring story
with powerful spiritual wisdom. Jaguar Dreams inspires us to fully engage in life,
be grateful, courageous, surrender, and live from our inner power and strength.
This is a great book!
Sandra Ingerman, author of Soul Retrieval
WWW.NORACARON.COM | WWW.HOMEBOUNDPUBLICATIONS.COM
Shamans believe that we are one with everything; the plants, the waters, the earth, and the animals.
Jaguar Dreams is the story of a search for that Oneness. So often when we begin a search we think
we are looking for a particular thing, and we end up finding something much more valuable: ourselves.
When you embark on this journey with Lucina as she explores the sacred, encountering spirit animals
and other teachers that help her answer her deepest queries and provide her with life-changing support
and healing, dont be surprised if you sense changes occurring within yourself as well
Colleen Deatsman, author of The Hollow Bone: A Field Guide to Shamanism
Jaguar Dreams is Now Availabl e!
By Staff Writer J. K. McDowell
W
ELCOME TO THE WAYFARERS COLUMN ON
CREATIVITY. AS WE EXPLORE THE VARIOUS AS-
PECTS OF CREATIVITY AND THE CREATIVE LIFE IN
THIS COLUMN I WANT TO START SOME INITIAL
NOTIONS TO GET US GOING ON THIS ADVEN-
TURE. I believe that these first notions will hold or at least
not hold us back.
Lets start with declarations. We all know the docu-
ment and those lines penned by Thomas Jefferson, John
Adams and Benjamin Franklin:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all
men are created equal, that they are endowed
by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,
that among these are Life, Liberty and the pur-
suit of Happiness.
While Jefferson, Adams and Franklin labored long hours
to succinctly define a document that would lead to the
birth of our nation, this is not an exhaustive, exclusive
treatment. I believe that Creativity is another inalien-
able right. Your creativity is your sovereign own. My
creativity is my sovereign own. No law of government
grants you your creative right nor can the same instru-
ment deny this right. The creative right itself cannot
be sold, bartered or given away, yet its works may be.
The creative right is essential in the same way that
Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness are. The
creative right is so important that no longer can we
accept phrases like I am not very creative. as self-
talk or He is not creative. as casual judgments. To
counter such clichs we must go deeper to the chains
that bind us and to the fears that block us. This cor-
rect recognition of the creative right is an important
starting point for me.
Next we move from inalienable to indispensible.
You might know this quote from Henry David Thoreau:
The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.
What is called resignation is confirmed desperation.
From the desperate city you go into the desperate
country, A stereotyped but unconscious despair is
Creat i vi t y
While Jefferson, Adams and Franklin labored long hours
to succinctly defne a document that would lead to the birth
of our nation, this is not an exhaustive, exclusive treatment.
I believe that Creativity is another inalienable right.
Your creativity is your sovereign own.
INALIENABLE, INDISPENSIBLE & PRAISE-WORTHY
CREATIVITY COLUMN
concealed even under what are called the games and
amusements of mankind. There is no play in them, for
this comes after work.
These often-misquoted words from Walden are 160
years old and the sicknesses they describe still have us
in their grip. Quiet desperation is the silenced creative
spirit. We need to awaken this spirit in ourselves and in
others to loosen the grip of hopelessness that plagues
this modern world. We are enrapt by distractions as
we are cheered on to answer the calls of consumer and
media culture. Is everything so wound around selling,
urging the sale of widget A to sell advertising to sell
widget B and on and on? There are more important
challenges in our lives and in the world and they will
not be solved in these amusements of mankind like
consumerism. We need the creative spirit in all of us
to move us forward into a new era. An unexercised
creative spirit leads to despair, leads to numbness and
leads to hopelessness.
The creative spirit is celebratory. The creative eye,
when opened, pays attention to the miraculous in the
so-called mundane.
We need to say that the creative spirit is a thousand
strong. No, a million strong. No, a billion strong. Yes,
a billion strong. The creative spirit is a billion strong.
You think this is impossible? That is only one in seven
of every one of us on this planet. The challenges are
great. The world is more complex and more precious
than previously imagined. We need the creative spirit
to move from quiet desperation to a sense of richness
in ourselves and the world around us.
Now moving from indispensible to praise-worthy.
Here is one of my favorite quotes from William Butler
Yeats, from his poem Vacillation:
My fiftieth year had come and gone,
I sat, a solitary man,
In a crowded London shop,
An open book and empty cup
On the marble table-top.
While on the shop and street I gazed
My body of a sudden blazed;
And twenty minutes more or less
It seemed, so great my happiness,
That I was blessed and could bless.
Yeats describes a singular precious event, unplanned
and unexpected. We need to do better than this.
There is no longer any time to wait till you are over
fifty and twenty minutes more or less, is not long
enough. The creative needs to be praised and en-
couraged and blessed. Now, often, in your life and in
other peoples lives. The praise needs to be genuine.
Spend some time in praise and gratitude.
Creativity is an inalienable right. Yours, mine, no
permission necessary, no one can take it away. Cre-
ativity is needed in these times, to address the chal-
lenges, the small and the big ones in life. Creativity
needs fed with praise. No time to hold the applause.
These three small notions will sustain us on this ad-
venture into creativity.
The autumn issue of The Wayfarer will celebrate
New England, its writers and themes. I have already
mentioned two men of New England, Adams and Tho-
reau. In the autumn issue of The Wayfarer I will ex-
plore Ralph Waldo Emersons ideas around and about
creativity. I know Emersons essay On Self-Reliance
shaped my thinking early on and revisiting his wis-
dom will be refreshing to this pursuit of the creative.
Enjoy the summer; make the season shine with cre-
ativity. See you in the autumn.
J. K. MCDOWELL is an artist, poet and mystic, an Ohioan expat living
in Cajun country. Always immersed in poetry, raised in Buckeye coun-
try by a mother who told of Sam I Am, Danny Deaver and Annabel Lee
and a father who quoted Shakespeare and Omar Khayyam. In the last
decade a deepened study of poetry and shamanism and nature has
inspired a regular practice of writing poetry that blossomed into the
works presented in this collection. Lately, mixing Lorca and Lovecraft,
McDowell lives twenty miles north of the Gulf Coast with his soul mate
who also happens to be his wife and their two beautiful companion
parrots. He is the author of Night, Mystery & Light.
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B LOODROOT
by Jamie K. Reaser
I
N THE BLUE RIDGE MOUNTAINS OF VIRGINIA, BLOODROOT
(SANGUINARIA CANADENSIS), A WHITE-PETALLED MEMBER
OF THE POPPY FAMILY,
IS ONE OF THE FIRST
PLANTS TO EMERGE DUR-
ING THE WAKING OF SPRING.
Hiking along the wood-
land trails, one finds it
suddenly there; clean,
pure, declarative clusters
breeze-dancing where
not even a hint of a flower
occupied the dusty leaf
litter the day before. The
feet must stop. The eyes
and mind must fix to sub-
strate. Mustnt they? Yes.
Change is witnessed.
Something new exists
flowers and season and
possibilities. If you listen
closely, you can hear the
tenor in the Hallelujah
choir.
Emergence (Noun):
(a) The process of be-
coming visible after be-
ing concealed.
(b) The process of com-
ing into existence or
prominence.
Birds emergethey pip
their way out of shells
perfectly designed for
the exchange of oxy-
gen and carbon dioxide.
Tadpoles emergethey
wriggle forth from egg
masses, pushing through
a gelatinous encasement
that breathes while simultaneously buffooning voracious
newts and other would-be predators. Snakes emerge
from skins too small. Butterflies and moths emerge from
capsules in which they become nameless between iden-
tities.
I have goats on my farm. In the middle of De-
cember in 2005, I found myself, quite unexpected-
ly, watching goat kids emerge from their mothers
wide-stretched vaginas. I had never before wit-
nessed birth. It was
messy. It was sys-
tematically chaotic.
It was a process.
There, in front
of my crouched
body, they landed,
slimy-wet and clo-
ven, among the
stiff spans of gold-
en straw that Id
spread, in haste, to
gentle their arrival.
I witnessed eight
first breaths, the
first crying out of
eight newly-defined
selves, the first rela-
tional nuzzle of four
mothers and four
pairs of siblings,
twelve beings know-
ingit seemed
precisely how to
be what they are
goats.
I was fascinated
by where they had
been before they
emerged, and what
it was like there.
We humans
emerge, tooover
and over again.
We emerge from
our own mothers
womb, from stages
of maturity, from
relationshipssome
of us more scarred
than othersfrom
sleep, out the front door, and from our lives into
something so untouched by our fright-constrained
Sacred silence is an offering.
In reciprocity, the soul may
sing to us the navigation song
meant to guide us across
the wide-reaches of
seemingly desolate terrain.
Such songs have enabled
the Aboriginal Australians
to cross the Outback deserts,
Pacific Islanders to precisely chart
vast expanses of ocean,
and curanderos to travel
from one realm to the next.
curiosities that we can describe it no better than,
death.
In his poem, What to Remember When Waking, Da-
vid Whyte writes:
To be human is to become visible
while carrying what is hidden as a gift to others.
We must emerge to become human and be in service
of the world into which we have emerged. But, what of
the hidden places? What of the dark, often nameless,
places from which we emerge?
What of the soil-world in which is nestled the await-
ing seed?
What of the interior of the egg, the cocoon, and the
chrysalis?
What of the occupied space in literal and meta-
phoric wombs?
Bardo is a Tibetan word for the in-between or
transitional state. What of the bardosall those pe-
riods in our lives in which something has ended and
something else has not yet begun, all those places in
our lives between where we have departed and where
we have not yet arrived, all the crises of identity in
which we feel like anonymous is the old valid signa-
ture?
Yes, what of them? Looking downward and back-
ward, I conclude that we living beings fundamentally
require the dark, the hidden, the nameless, the inde-
scribablelet me say the mysteriousplaces and
spans of time in order to manifest somethingour-
selvesthat can be seen, named, described, and has
the capacity to touch others in the light.
The known emerges from the unknowable.
If a Hallelujah! is appropriate for emergence,
whats the best way to celebrate the in-between? I
think, perhaps, it is silence. No. It is a sacred silence,
a silence infused with an inherent gratitude for these
places and these times that are the gestating, creative
spaces in which the blessed templates of what-to-
come are scribed.
Sacred silence is not passive. To be silent is a verb
phrase. Sacred silence requires intent and inner-ac-
tion. It requires receptivity and holdingactions that
we humans dont seem particularly well versed at; oth-
erwise we might not have such an aversion to silence,
and the times and spaces it demarcates.
Sacred silence is an offering. In reciprocity, the soul
may sing to us the navigation song meant to guide us
across the wide-reaches of seemingly desolate terrain.
Such songs have enabled the Aboriginal Australians
to cross the Outback deserts, Pacific Islanders to pre-
cisely chart vast expanses of ocean, and curanderos to
travel from one realm to the next.
Upon reflection, I realize how often I have filled
what I thought to be life-voids not with sacred silence,
but with words: words of frustration, of anger, of accu-
sation, of self-pity, of entitlement. I have been known
to scold the gods for the absence of things, including
the clarity of next stepswhere to place my mind, my
heart, and my feet.
In her book, When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice
for Difficult Times, Pema Chdrn observes:
To be fully alive, fully human, and completely awake
is to be continually thrown out of the nest. To live fully
is to be always in no-mans-land, to experience each
moment as completely new and fresh.
It would seem that we require lifes proverbial no-
mans land in just the same way that a fledging re-
quires thin air. And, like the fledgling who must take a
leap of faith, we must lift each foot and, in turn, replace
it in the detritus of an unmarked trail.
Bloodroot garners its common English name from the
dark red-orange color of its rhizomes and the juice
therein. The genus, Sanguinaria, means bleeding in
Latin. In the Algonquian languages it was known as
poughkonered dyea reference to one of its com-
mon uses. Native Americans also employed bloodroot
to treat fever, rheumatism, ulcers, and various skin ail-
ments. In recent years, the bloodroot has been com-
mercially applied as an anti-plaque agent in tooth-
pastes and mouthwashes. Currently, it is being studied
for anti-cancer properties.
Bloodroots most potent gifts to humanity are hid-
den in the darkness. And, it is darkness from which a
single stem emerges to support the pure, white de-
clarative clusters that dance in the breeze.
Just a few feet down the path, I spot the first Hepatica
blooms.
JAMIE K. REASERs see bio page 2.
Gunilla Norriss remarkable reflections on friendship inspire and guide us
to the deep place where we can see the stars in one another.
A marvelous book to gift the friends who sustain and enrich our lives.
Joyce Rupp, award-winning author
WWW.HOMEBOUNDPUBLICATIONS.COM
One of the Most Impacting Spiritual Titles of the Year!
2013 Foreword Review Book of the Year Award Finalist
Winner of a 2014 Nautilus Book Award Silver Medal
Winner of the 2014 Next Generation Indie Book Awards
F
ROM MY HOUSE TO HERS WAS PRETTY LONG FOR A SHORT
WALK. DUSK HAD SOAKED OUR STREET IN THAT CHALKY
BLUE LIGHT THAT SLOWS EVERYTHING DOWN, making
the neighbors sitting out on their porches look
like statues carved with a mason jar in one hand and a
Marlboro in the other, their lime-stone limbs coming to
life for the flick of a wave. Even the sun seemed stuck
in place and looked less like a star with someplace else
to be and more like an orange rubber ball that a boy
had tossed into the trees, sworn to knock loose, and
then forgot to come back for. Fireflies aside, the world
seemed all but frozen. So we walked together, her and
me, with nowhere to go and all of eternity to get there.
The Sinners Prayer
by Dan Leach
Okay, but if Hes real, then why dont He answer
prayers? she said, picking up the loose thread of a con-
versation we had a couple weeks earlier. Ever since we
were kids she had done this, making it impossible to
know, when she opened her mouth, if she was going to
say something related to what we were talking about
two minutes or two months earlier.
Look at your cousin, I said and tried to remember
if I had already used Kayla Jean as a proof of Gods
providence.
The one whose husband ran off to St. Augustine with
the cleaning lady? she said and removed another wax
bottle, a blue one this time, from her back pocket. She
bit the tip off first and chewed the wax while studying
[Lef] Sparklers by Derek Key (Flickr Creative Commons)
be fiery and defined, perfect little bones at work in
the cheeks and jaw, had taken on a softer, more de-
feated look, almost but not quite like the moms who
drive around in mini-vans wearing sweatpants and no
make-up.
What motivates someone to do that? she said
and let the neck of the bottle rest on her lower lip for
a moment before biting
into it.
Prayer isnt like
punching in a request
on a vending machine. If
you think about it, its ac-
tually a lot like
Im not talking about
prayer, she said. Im
talking about that.
I followed her finger
to Mr. Thoroughgoods
lawn, which was cov-
ered, as it had been ever
since he moved onto
our street seven years
ago, in a veritable army
of lawn gnomes. There
must have been at least
a hundred of them, some
peering out from behind
shrubs or rocks, most
brandishing their point-
ed hats and tiny tools
out in the open. One of
them, a portly fellow
standing guard over the
perennials, was proudly
hoisting up a Confeder-
ate Battle Flag like he ex-
pected it to come alive in
the summer air. I knew it
was that one that upset
her, but I also knew she
wouldnt admit it.
The one closest to the
curb was a mischievous little guy who was thrusting
its ceramic rear up in the air and casting a know-
ing wink over his shoulder. There was a smug sort of
twinkle painted into his eyes, a reckless little splash
Fireflies aside, the world
seemed all but frozen.
So we walked together,
her and me,
with nowhere to go
and all of eternity
to get there.
the syrup inside by holding it up against the sky. This is
another habit Ive observed since we were kidsher and
her endless supply of bottles stuffed somewhere down
in her pockets. Now that were grown I have to believe
that shes the last person on earth who still eats them.
The one whose cancer is in remission, I said.
You didnt hear? she said, kind of smiling, but also
kind of frowning as she brought
the tiny bottle to her lips.
Hear what?
Its back.
What is?
Kayla Jeans cancer, she
said, draining the bottle in one
decisive swig. Hows that for
an answer?
We had been through this
beforeGods ways being
higher than ours, the necessity
of mystery, what the Scrip-
tures say about sufferingso
I didnt feel like getting into it
again. We had been through
quite a bit of religious talk
since she came back from col-
lege for the summer. She had
been gone for almost two
years, in which time she had
found a major (Mass Commu-
nications), a boyfriend (Trevor
from Ohio), and a newfound
aversion for all things South-
ern, especially Christianity. I
didnt go to college. Just stuck
around and found Jesus. Natu-
rally, we didnt talk the way we
used to.
I wondered if I looked as
different to her eyes as she did
to mine. Her hair used to be a
shade of blonde that reminded
me of sunshine in the old car-
toons and it was so thin that it
was always swaying whether the wind was blowing or
not. Somehow it got thick. And darker too. She wore it
up, all tangled together in a tight little ball, but with a
couple of loose strands falling out. She had put on some
weight too, probably about ten or twelve pounds, which,
spread out on her swimmers frame, hardly made a dif-
ference except for in the face. Her face, which used to
of white calling out from inside the blackness of his irises
that reminded me, strangely enough, of her. He seemed,
poised as he was on the verge of whatever mischief his
maker had in mind, to be in possession of some great se-
cret that the rest of the world was dying to know about.
Man, the years I spent wondering what her secret was.
So he likes gnomes, I said. Everybodys got a thing,
right?
Fair enough, she said. Remember when yours was
Springsteen? You had all his albums lined up along the
baseboards of your room and you would freak when any-
one tried to touch one. I always liked the one with him
smiling and leaning up against that big black fella. Which
one was that?
Born to Run.
Right, she said. That one had the song about the guy
and the car, right?
They all have a guy and a car in them, I replied, try-
ing, and failing, to think of an exception.
Yeah, you were pretty obsessed.
I was, I admitted. But I also distinctly remember
someone who was fixated on horses. I think I recall a pret-
ty impressive collection of horse sweaters.
Touch, she said, spitting out the wax into a patch of
weeds on the side of the road. Everybodys got a thing
and mine was horses.
I had been watching the tips of my boots scrap against
the gravel, which is where I normally look when I walk,
but I looked up to make sure the sun was still stuck up in
the trees. It was and even though wed been walking for
a few minutes, her cul-de-sac was as far up ahead as it
was the last time I looked. I say her cul-de-sac, despite
knowing that, as far as that goes, it was really just a place
that she stays with her parents when she decides to come
home from school. To me, she was and always will be the
girl from up the street, but home is funny word and who
knows whereor, for that matter, who-- she associated
with it.
I had this World Religions professor, she started in.
Said Jesus was a teacher and probably even a doctor
too. But said that all that stuff about his miracles and res-
urrection was just something that got added in when the
apostles wrote down the Bible later on.
There was not, in all likelihood, a professor, or even a
World Religions class. Like most of what she says, its just
something she throws out in hopes that it will chip away
at the wall that went up between us since I got saved. She
hates that wordsaved. Hates its exclusivity. Hates what it
implies about everyone elses eternity. Calls it coun-
try-club thinking. Most of all, she hates the idea of a
God who needs to save people from Himself. Hate, I
learned, can build a pretty thick wall. When she first
got back from school, she tried to bring it down all at
once. We had intense late-night conversations in the
corner booth at the Waffle House where I would or-
der hash-browns and she would slam her fists down
so hard the spoons would rattle and coffee would
spill. After a few of those, I think she began to se-
cretly hope that a steady supply of small comments
would bring it down. Where blunt force failed, time
and steady pressure might do the trick, seemed to
be her way of thinking.
And, inexplicably, its her trick, not mine, to al-
ways be talking about Him. Like a single-minded
salesman, she can talk about something seemingly
unrelatedwildflowers, jazz piano, the weatherbut
still be somehow circling around the one much larg-
er, more significant thing.
If cicadas really only come out every 17 years,
why do I hear them every summer? she asked.
Arent some of them supposed to be dead at least
some of the time?
Cycles, I suppose, I said, taking a moment to lis-
ten to the scratchy hum that rattles on so incessant-
ly in the evenings that, like white noise or waves, it
almost ceases to be.
Can you imagine waking up after 17 years? she
said.
Itd be quite a nap.
You would know, she almost whispered out of
the side of her mouth.
Look, I said and pointed to a sparkler lying di-
rectly in the middle of the road.
Like a child discovering a penny, she rushed
forward and scooped it up. After examining its tip,
she skipped back to me and asked for my lighter. It
was an old Bic, almost dead, but she eventually got
a flame out of it and let out a high-pitched squeal
when the sparkler, without any prelude, sent a show-
er of white-hot flecks across our waiting faces.
For a moment, we just watched the thing burn.
Then, she started skipping again, flicking her wrist
in the air above her head, writing out incandescent
scribblings against the darkening sky. First it was
circles, then 8s, then, when the thing had almost
burned down completely, she turned back to me
and said, You ever wonder why He didnt just sign
His name across the sky?
This question was punctuated with the sulfuric let-
ters G-O-D written in her sloppy hand on the space in
front of me and then, beneath the name, a heart that
seemed to linger in the hazy blue air even after the
sparkler had fizzled out.
I mean, she said and chucked the handle into
someones lawn like she was a playing fetch with some
invisible dog. It would make sense if He really wanted
everyone to know that He was up there.
Wheres the choice in that? I said. Theres got to
be a choice.
Choice, she murmured. Because He doesnt
wanthow did you put it?a race of robots, right?
As she said that, she stiffened the joints in her arms
and legs and simulated a robot walking, then waving,
and then, after a series of spastic motions, dying. Her
eyes were closed and she had made her upper body
bend slightly forward at the waist and her arms were
still locked in ninety degree angles.
Come on, I said and nudged her.
When she did not move I decided to tickle her back
to life and ran my fingers across her rib-cage. When
we were kids, that used to drive her crazy, but she
didnt budge an inch even after I tried both sides and
then under her neck.
Come on, I repeated. The neighbors are going to
think youre crazy.
Her lips moved and something less than a whisper
came out.
What? I said and leaned in.
She said it again, but I still could not make it out.
What? I said, leaning in so close our cheeks were
touching.
Even robots need saving, she whispered and sud-
denly jerked herself upright and darted off leaving me
standing in the middle of the road.
We kept walking. The sun had tumbled down into
the lower branches of the tree-line and except for a
pinkish smudge surrounding it, the sky had turned a
darker shade of blue. Stars like spilled sugar spread out
across the sky. The cicadas were still singing, but softer
now, as if some mother had leaned out of a bedroom
window and warned them to keep it down. The pave-
ment beneath our feet took on that glittering quality
that comes with the moon, even though there was no
moon in sight. The rhythmic muffled phmphs of a Ro-
man Candle sounded behind us and we turned around
to see a series of orange orbs complete their tiny arch
and fall back to earth.
Remember Quick Draw? she said, replacing sev-
eral strands of hair that had worked their way loose.
I remember you thought you were John Wayne and
practically singed Jeff Averys eyebrow off his face.
Her face lit up with the first memory then soured
with a second one.
His mother was irate. She threatened to sue. And
that was back before everybody threatened to sue.
I imagine so, I said. Half an inch lower and
Well, it didnt, she said lazily, stretching her arms
to the sky so that the tanned strip of skin below her
navel and above her jeans flashed like a winning smile.
Or I guess youd say couldnt, right?
When it comes to mocking certain aspects of my
faith, destiny is, for her, the most irresistible. And I have
probably failed, I dont mind admitting, to give a sat-
isfactory explanation about how free will relates to a
sovereign God. Choosing from His choices was how
she put it in one of our more heated Waffle House de-
bates. And I conceded to this wording because I didnt
know a better way to put it.
I would say that there is a reason Jeff Averys has
two good eyes right now, I said.
But youd say the same thing if Id shot half an inch
lower and he was living with one, she said.
Everything happens for a reason, I said.
Everything? she said and stopped so suddenly
that I nearly tripped trying to stay beside her.
Not tonight, I whispered and embraced her, notic-
ing, as I looked over her shoulder, that we had arrived
at her house.
She pried herself free and wiped the one tear that
had escaped. Without us noticing it, an ice-cream truck
had turned on to the street and was parked outside of
a house. That damned melody, so soaked in nostalgia
that I could not help but think of Bomb Pops and Pix-
ies Sticks, was the worst possible sub-text for all the
words to come, but it played on anyways as kids burst
out of houses clutching quarters or sometimes a dollar
in their little balled up fists. It played on as she tried to
hide her trembling fingers.
You know, she said, ascending the stairs to her
porch. I really did used to believe. Before that, before
we lost Madison, I had something like faith. It wasnt
strong like yours is, but it was something.
Madison. Once spoken, the word seems to expand
until it is so large that everythingthe cicadas, the ice
cream truck, even her breathingare all drowned out
by the unbearable implications of these three syllables.
Madison. She was almost six months pregnant when she
miscarried. She switched schools for her senior year of
high-school, lived with an aunt three counties over. It
was not until later, her first semester of college to be
exact, when I learned that she had picked out a name,
had even ordered a tiny pair of monogrammed paja-
mas. Madison.
Faith, in any God or gods, required accepting that
something, or, even worse, Someone, had possessed
the power to save, but had chosen instead to kill. Rather
than believe in a God with such a terrible prerogative,
she believed in no God at all, believed only in a world
governed by time and matter and chance, none of which
could be blamed for what happened to Madison.
Pray for me, she said.
I always do.
No, she said, taking my hands in hers. Now.
What should I pray for?
Pray that sinners prayer. The one they used to pray
on the last night of camp before theyd ask you to stand
up and say that Jesus was your Savior and Lord. Pray
that one. Pray for my salvation.
Thats not how it works.
Seemed to work fine back then. Couple dozen kids
got saved every summer. Then came back the next sum-
mer and got saved again. So go ahead and pray it. Save
me tonight and then, next time I see you, you can pray
it again. Maybe thats the reason, I have you as a friend.
So you can keep on saving me. Go on, now. Save me.
I cant, I practically whispered. Only He can
What about her? she interrupted, a darkness creep-
ing into her tone.
Who?
You know who.
I believe shes with Him.
Will I see her again?
The Bible says that whosoever believes in the name
of
I know what the Bible says, she snapped, her fist
balled and nearly drawn back like she meant to break
my nose. I want to know what you think. Will I see her
again?
Outside of the Cross? I said, closing my eyes and
offering up my face, half-hoping to feel her fist come
crashing down again and again and again before I
could speak what I knew must be spoken.
No, I whispered, when no fist or hand or word
struck out against me. The answer is no.
When I opened my eyes she was gone. A tiny sliver
of a moon had taken the suns place above the trees
and bathed the street in a sad and holy glow. I started
walking home and had reached the edge of her lawn
when I turned around and saw a light go on in her room.
The rest of her house was dark and that one square of
soft yellow light seemed to signify something beautiful
and profound, though I dont know what. I only know
that I could not stop staring at it as I prayed the only
sinners prayer I knew.
May we know You well enough to love You, I prayed
and then walked home, hoping against hope that it
would be enough. Please, Father. Let that be enough.
Dan Leach earned his BA in English from Clemson Uni-
versity in 2008. Since then, he has taught English at
various high-schools across South Carolina. He cur-
rently works at a high-school on James Island, South
Carolina. On weekends and summers, he writes short-
fiction that explores connections between faith, mas-
culinity, and the South. His work has been published
in Deep South Magazine, 2 Bridges Review, Crack the
Spine, and Drafthorse Literary Journal.
Faith, in any God or gods, required accepting that something,
or, even worse, Someone, had possessed the power to save, but
had chosen instead to kill. Rather than believe in a God with such
a terrible prerogative, she believed in no God at all, believed
only in a world governed by time and matter and chance...
BOOK
SPOTLIGHT
Chapter One
W
ith bags packed, I made my way to the
airport for a midnight flight out of An-
chorage. I felt an eerie excitement as
I drove in pitch-black darkness along
deserted lanes. The streetlights stood muted behind
a veil of falling snow, giving a surreal quality to the
hushed night. I still carried my guilt and felt like a
thief sneaking away from the responsible path, slip-
ping off for adventure.
As I sat back in my plane seat and felt the jet
pulling away from Earth, my mind was calmer than
I could ever remember. I had done it. I had blasted
out of the orbit I was stuck in, and jetting off into a
boundless unknown. I looked out the window down
into the vast darkness, filled with satisfaction at fly-
ing over that chasm which had held me back.
* * * * *
Surely I must be crazy. Really I could say I had it
all, and here I wanted to leave. I was blessed with a
terrific job, the perfect apartment, my family near-
by and a close circle of friends. And for someone
whose passion was nature, how could anything be
more spectacular than a home in the Last Frontier.
As a private pilot, I took flight over Alaskas sprawl
of wilderness, soaring above rugged mountains, feel-
ing lighter than air as I cruised amongst the clouds.
In awe, I gazed down into the splintered depths of
ice-blue glaciers, feeding rivers like molten steel that
rolled out to shimmering inlets. With my mother or
a friend next to me, wed eagerly peer into the deep
green below for glimpses of wide-antlered moose, or
scan the inlets waters for the pearly humps of be-
luga whales. All the while, noble bald eagles glided
with easy freedom off the planes wingtips.
So why then exactly, did I have such an urge to
flee? Actually, I felt guilty about it. I should be more
appreciative, I told myself, for the good fortune of
being born in one of the most inspiring places on
Earth. After all, I had been raised by parents who cel-
ebrated Alaska as their Shangri La.
Certainly Id run out of patience with the never-
ending trial of being snowed under for six months of
the year. Now at thirty, I wryly calculated Id spent
half my life trudging through winters icy clutches.
2014 Green Festival Book Awards,
Winner Best Memoir category
and Honorable Mention
in the general non-fiction category!
www.cindimcvey.com
www.homeboundpublications.com
It seemed a cruelty of nature to have so few months
when a cushion of grass lay under foot, and windows
could be thrown open to fresh air.
And that was a big part of it. I hated spending so
much time closeted indoors. I envied other accoun-
tants who thrived in their desk jobs, wishing it could
be me. Meanwhile, sitting at my desk, I longed to feel
the brush of a warm breeze against my cheek, and to
hear the lilting echoes of songbirds. One consolation
was that my office had a large window, letting in a
sprinkle of sunlight, and through which I looked upon a
lushly leafed tree growing from a square in the pave-
ment. This tree had been brought from another place
where the climate was different, and when the more
Spartan native trees all turned yellow and lost their
leaves in autumn, it carried on being lush and green.
When winters flurries arrived, the snow clung heavily
to its leaves, while next to it the austere branches of
the native trees rested unburdened. Gazing out my of-
fice window, with the Arctic afternoon already drowsy
in winter twilight, I often thought how I, too, seemed
out of sync.
But more than just feeling as though planted in the
wrong spot, something in the back of my mind needled
me. I couldnt stop thinking Id tumbled into a rut that
wasnt my groove, and felt a growing panic that I need-
ed to find a way out. As time passed, with both excite-
ment and a little apprehension, I realized my only cure
would be to set sail for distant parts, and leave behind
the place where Id spent every year of my life.
* * * * *
Like an oilskin chart to a pirates treasure, sprawled
on the wall above my desk hung a colorful map of the
world. Glinting in a dapple of light, during stolen hours
at work my friend Mary and I would study it and amuse
ourselves by discussing the endless places for adven-
ture. Certainly the vastness of the United States itself
held intrigue, with its own grand fusion of pined moun-
tains, sunbaked deserts, whispered forests and beck-
oning plains. Yet something pulled me farther away.
The wandering blood that had spurred my ancestors
over the ocean to America also pulsed in my veins like
an urge that couldnt be subdued. Only in a foreign
land could I find my cure.
As the months went by, with Marys help I narrowed
the options. Having had my fill of wintry weather, I
flatly ruled out northern destinations. And not want-
ing to make things too difficult, I decided to set out
for somewhere that spoke English. Id once spent a
few weeks hiking the evergreen hills of New Zealand,
and found myself enchanted. Or instead, what about
the wide plains of sunny Australia? But no, I knew this
voyage must take me to a place with unusual possibili-
ties, even perhaps some measure of risk. It should be a
place where peoples lives were lived differently from
anything Id ever known.
One enticing option was southern Africa, which Id
already visited twice, the first time six years earlier.
On this trip Id been subtly captivated by the friendly
country of Zimbabwe, drawn to her rich landscape of
bold African bush, breezy woodlands, and fields of wild
grass where buck browsed untroubled. Although her
charm was blemished by the towns ramshackle colo-
nial buildings, their faded paint peeling and fronted by
littered sidewalks, she was still an alluring prospect and
I began to be swayed.
As a wildlife enthusiast, Mary also awarded Zimba-
bwe high marks on our list. She too had visited this
Eden-like country with its enviable climate, easygoing
folk and low crime, which made an appealing spot for
adventure. So after months of entertaining debates, we
reached the conclusion of our game and all that was
left was for me to put the plan into action.
* * * * *
Actually, Zimbabwe was an ironic choice. Because while
Id been thrilled by my first trek into southern Africa in
1992, during the few weeks Id spent in Zimbabwe she
didnt strike me as a place to call home. To begin with,
even though a decade had passed since the end of her
civil war, in this land of opportunity I found a country
still hobbled and suppressed. Catching my attention
the most were all the ready-for-the-junkyard cars and
old buses clattering about, unbelievably not a new one
to be seen. This circumstance was the natural outcome
of a bizarre law that banned the importation of vehi-
cles, plus a lack of assembly plants in the country. Also
puzzling to find were bare store shelves, kept empty in
part by extortionate customs duties and surely an un-
necessary deprivation. Zimbabweans struggled to buy
such basics as toothpaste and ink pens, not to mention
the unavailable luxuries of magazines, spices, and
anything other than rudimentary clothing.
On my first wanderings into this beautiful domain I
was also astonished, in a tourists amused way, by Zims
antiquated phones still used in 1992, which resembled
those in the U.S. during the 1930s. A caller had to shout
over crackling party lines, while his neighbors might be
listening in. Television and radio amounted to a couple
of mundane government stations. A washing machine
was a rare find, with most laundry being laboriously
scrubbed by hand. My Zimbabwean peers had their
own eccentric style of dress, with men wearing shorts
that barely covered their buttocks in 1970s style, along
with rough-cut locally made shoes of brushed animal
hide. Womens wear was meager, especially footwear,
the ladies battered heels looking like Depression Era
dustbowl fashion. And while Coca-Cola had reached
into this forgotten corner of the globe, it came only in
recyclable glass bottles, the same as an early 1900s
collectible.
It seemed Id stumbled back several decades in
time, landing in a place with a dose of dilapidation laid
upon it, its people deprived of much outside news so
their point of view could be skewed, then mixed with a
measure of simplicity from having only the very basics
in life. Topped off with some odd laws such as taxing
working wives at 90% in order to keep them at home,
I confidently commented at the time, Id never live
here!
Four years passed before I next ventured to south-
ern Africa in 1996, on this trip allotting The Country
That Time Forgot only a few days. Once again I was
astounded on my visit to Zimbabwe yet this time in a
completely opposite way. Wide-eyed and speechless,
I looked upon a bounty of shiny new vehicles whizzing
about. Next to the old masonry buildings peeling in
dirty pastels, soared modern highrises of glinting glass.
In my friends homes were now computers and fax ma-
chines, satellite dishes and VCRs, CD players and cell
phones, plus just-out-of-the-box washing machines
and microwaves. With amazement I looked upon mag-
azine racks full of foreign newspapers, store shelves full
of everything, photo shops, video stores, and even a
trendy clothing outlet or two. I discovered Zimbabwe-
ans could now buy contact lenses and sunglasses, and
they even had the Internet! Plus, as a mark of progres-
sive thinking, I was told wives were now taxed the same
as men. I could hardly believe that in only a few years,
and as an outcome of an economic plan put in motion
with encouragement from the International Monetary
Fund, the country could change so drastically.
With this momentum of a revved up economic en-
gine, one sector to benefit was wildlife. A now thriv-
ing tourism industry meant a breeding herd of game
had become a valuable asset, and particularly in arid
parts of the country, private ranch land was turned into
wildlife sanctuaries. Intrinsically, this also meant the
protection of birds, reptiles, amphibians, rabbits and
rodents, beetles and butterflies. Zimbabwe was exactly
my kind of paradise, this vigorous land abundant with
the worlds most intriguing fauna.
And when I scouted the map for a destination to
launch myself, above all it had to be a place where na-
ture dominated. There werent many spots on the globe
that could outdo Zimbabwe on this account, and now
combined with her economic renaissance, this flourish-
ing country became the obvious choice.
the next step of my plot took me into reality, and I suddenly found
myself intimidated. Although my scheming with Mary had sounded prac-
tical enough, it now dawned on me that a real life-changing journey
would mean quitting my comfortable job, giving up my hard-to-come-
by apartment, selling my Bronco, packing my things, and jetting off to
a land as far as I could go from home. A pesky whisper in the back of
my mind said might it not be better to keep to the safe path, buying
a nice little house and flling it with my favorite things..
* * * * *
Yet the next step of my plot took me into reality, and
I suddenly found myself intimidated. Although my
scheming with Mary had sounded practical enough,
it now dawned on me that a real life-changing jour-
ney would mean quitting my comfortable job, giving
up my hard-to-come-by apartment, selling my Bronco,
packing my things, and jetting off to a land as far as
I could go from home. A pesky whisper in the back of
my mind said might it not be better to keep to the safe
path, buying a nice little house and filling it with my fa-
vorite things. Certainly the idea of spending the years
ahead in my secure little circle also had its appeal.
Perhaps I wouldnt like it in another place, or couldnt
get a job. What if I ended up lonely, and found myself
unhappy on that far-off foreign soil.
Yet this intriguing thought of a faraway land was
exactly what kept me yearning, and when another
friend made an interestingif not entirely practical
suggestion of simply trying it out for a few months, I
was conspiring once more. Yes, thats right, I thought
to myself, if I could wrangle three months off from my
good-natured boss, then Id have my job and home
waiting for me, if things didnt work out on the oth-
er side of the world. While I wasnt convinced I could
make it happen, I still pressed myself to think of a way
to persuade him to grant me several months of leave.
Unexpectedly, an opportunity soon appeared while
he and I attended a Medicaid conference in Baltimore,
put on jointly by the National Healthcare Lawyers As-
sociation and the American Association of Healthcare
Attorneys. No surprise, the conference was as exciting
as the name suggests, a week of tedium spent in sterile
rooms of subdued lighting and grey decor. The atmo-
sphere could make adventurous pursuits appealing to
anyone, and my plea for three months to traipse off to
Africa seem downright reasonable.
As conference guests, one evening my boss and I
were invited to a reception at the aquarium, where our
hosts generously plied us with alcohol. After snagging
a couple of meatballs on toothpicks we went off on a
stroll, casually looking at tanks filled with creatures
from the deep, sipping our drinks all the while. At the
indoor pool we relaxed on bleachers and sipped plenty
more, watching the lively dolphins put on a show. Af-
ter a few hours we walked back to the hotel, making
our way along the waterfront in the mystic darkness
of late evening. A tantalizing smell of sea air whispered
round us, mixing with lapping waves that sparkled with
moonlight, and when mingled with the pleasantness of
the wine, drew us into talk of adventure and the free-
dom to pursue our dreams. Sensing my chance, I took
a deep breath and asked for a few months off to head
out to Africa. While I was prepared to beg, make con-
cessions, or at least give a long justification, instead to
my surprise he simply said yes.
Next week back in the reality of the office I fully
expected him to renege. But he didnt, so I wasted no
time in making my plans before either he, or I, could
change our minds. Mary helpfully gave me the name of
a friend, Georgie, with whom I could stay in Zimbabwe,
and I swiftly completed my plans. Id leave Alaskas win-
ter at its coldest and darkest, and fly off into the south-
ern hemispheres summer sunshine.

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