Kevin's Watch

I have wanted to see the journals since she started writing them. But I know the illness that is in there and truthfully I am scared. I am scared of the tenuous line I walk. I am very much my mother. I am afraid of being triggered into something way worse. A real pandora's box.

There are four cases of handwritten journals in my father's garage in Florida. They are taped and bound since one of my brothers boxed them two days after she died. Also are all her paintings, which my father will not let me have either. I only have the photos of her pictures that he sends me.

There are a lot of stories hidden in that garage.

First of all, I need to say thank you to all of you for allowing me to work through this here. I find it a safe place and really appreciate the trust and safety of you allowing me to share here.

this is one of my favorite pictures I took of my mother in her later years. She was happiest lost in her work.

lorin wrote:I have wanted to see the journals since she started writing them. But I know the illness that is in there and truthfully I am scared.

As I said, you haven't read them because you don't want to. And I don't say that with any judgement. You and I started out different genders, then were raised as different as can be. Your reasons for choosing as you have are far beyond my understanding or judgement. I'm just saying that you have the right to read those journals. With every kind of pain there is, you've paid for any good that might come from them, or from your mother's art.

lorin, when I saw the first picture of your mother, the thing that struck me was, "Wow, she's so pretty!"

But in the second, she seems more "real," looks more like someone who I can talk to, sit and have a cup of coffee with... rather than some mysterious and distant starlet.

Thanks for linking to this, Linna; and lorin, thank you for sharing so much of yourself with a bunch of cyberfriends who may or may not be as out-there as your Mom... she was an amazing woman and her art is ..."amazing" seems so lame a word. I loved the first, luminous Jerusalem-like picture, the impressionist street scene (empty-eyed children and all), and the collage work was mesmerizing. I hope you can rescue more of her works, including the Kennedy bust, and share them with the world, which is the poorer for losing her.

and thanks deer for posting in this thread and bumping up to my attention.

mygod lorin...i don't know how i missed this post and this incredible story and your mother's extraordinary art!!!

thank you for sharing this with us and for sharing your mother's work.
in response i'd like to explain that i relate to your feelings regarding
your mother in the best way i know how, by giving you these two pieces i wrote when i was dealing with my own feelings about my family, my mother
in particular:


About My Mother's Business

I have never been about my mothers’ business.
She sat starving while my father fed me.
It was he who painted on my lips, one Halloween,
and told me I looked like Bette Davis,
and I went around the house screaming “WHAT A DUMP!”
What a dump.

I learned to curse like my father
and bit the hand that fed me.
I flipped my silver Zippo
for anyone who needed fire
and changed the spelling of my name
because she said I was just like him.
No one called me hers.
Sometimes, I see my fathers’ belly
swollen, with me inside.

And now I reach for my mothers’ part in me.
I ask her to hold me but her arms are indifferent.
The defection was completed long ago, hers and mine.
I have never been about my mothers’ business,
and now I am the hungry one.



Crows Go


Crows go
black on blue
over the apple and cherry trees
over the backyard fences
behind the curtain
but that is out of memory,
out of mind.

Once my questions were about crows
about their leavings, their loud,
diagonal comments,
tirades, screamed down
from their comings and goings.

Once I loved my father
because he talked like
a southern Marlon Brando,
confident and confused
and fatherless himself.
But he was too much a crow
and I was only a reflection in a black wing.

Once I loved my mother
because she was still in her absence
a martyred saint with no cause, no voice,
and no obvious distinction.
But she was too much a crow
and I was only a black feather pulled from her breast.

Now I have loved too many and I am the crow.
I sit in the tree and count my comrades


i know i am probably a day late and a dollar short, lorin, but you are in my thoughts today, you, and your mother...and mine.
i love you for your extraordinary bravery.

lucimay wrote: mygod lorin...i don't know how i missed this post and this incredible story and your mother's extraordinary art!!!

--A

lucimay wrote: mygod lorin...i don't know how i missed this post and this incredible story and your mother's extraordinary art!!!

Luci, I just saw this and am so sorry I missed it for so long. I was wandering past this post for my usual mothers day blues and just found it. Your poetry is wonderful. All your work is pretty amazing. Thanks so much for posting it and again, I am really sorry I missed it.

Why
lyrics
Songwriters: Mathes, Robert; Shamblin, Allen;

It must've been in a place so dark you couldn't feel the light
Reachin' for you through that stormy cloud
Now here we are gathered in our little hometown
This can't be the way you meant to draw a crowd

Oh, why? That's what I keep askin'
Was there anything I could have said or done?
Oh, I had no clue you were masking
A troubled soul, God only knows what went wrong
And why you'd leave the stage in the middle of a song

Now in my mind I keep you frozen as a seventeen year old
Roundin' third to score the winning run
You always played with passion no matter what the game
When you took the stage, you shined just like the sun

Oh, why? That's what I keep askin'
And was there anything I could have said or done?
Oh, I had no clue you were masking
A troubled soul, oh, God only knows what went wrong
And why you'd leave the stage in the middle of a song

Now the oak trees are swayin' in the early autumn breeze
The golden sun is shining on my face
The tangled thoughts I hear a mockingbird sing
This old world really ain't that bad a place

Oh, why? There's no comprehending
And who am I to try to judge or explain?
Oh, but I do have one burning question
Who told you life wasn't worth the fight?
They were wrong, they lied, and now you're gone, and we cried

'Cause it's not like you to walk away in the middle of a song
Your beautiful song, your absolutely beautiful song




















Happy Mother's Day, mom.

Beautiful...

She just looks like quite the starlet in her youth... would draw the attention of all around her, hold up the hopes and dreams of her family.. oh dear.

That's you holding the leaf? Precious girl.

Love the fun, zany pictures you threw in... like her getting "threatened with a weapon" while apparently reading obliviously.
Love the zany tongue-sticking-out at the end, with the sparkles in her eyes.

lorin wrote:Songwriters: Mathes, Robert; Shamblin, Allen;

...Oh, why? That's what I keep askin'
Was there anything I could have said or done?
Oh, I had no clue you were masking
A troubled soul, God only knows what went wrong
And why you'd leave the stage in the middle of a song

...This old world really ain't that bad a place

Oh, why? There's no comprehending
And who am I to try to judge or explain?
Oh, but I do have one burning question
Who told you life wasn't worth the fight?
They were wrong, they lied, and now you're gone, and we cried

'Cause it's not like you to walk away in the middle of a song
Your beautiful song, your absolutely beautiful song