Crows & You

Crows & You

for Ginny

When you

conversed

with the crows

I loved you so;

now that you're gone

(where, I don't know)

they ask me about you.

(18 NOV 12, Santa Clara)v3

AGGIE OCTOBER

for Ann Wainwright


As a child, every October I was taken to the local (Essex*) county fair by my father who had gone to agricultural college a few miles away - the Essex Agricultural Institute, known as The Aggie. He would first always bring me to the pigpen where rotten potatoes were piled for visitors to throw at the pigs who happily ate them, rot notwithstanding. After throwing a few, I soon lost interest - because the pigs just couldn't be deterred from eating the potatoes to avoid being bopped by them. Potatoes bounced off the pigs & were soon eaten, because to the pigs, potatoes were eats, not bops.
 
Held in rural Topsfield Massachusetts,- it was called the Topsfield, rather than *Essex County Fair. People came to it from about a 25mi radius. We came from urban-industrial Lynn, about 25mi south, where my father worked in a large GE plant as a parts-inspector of large naval gears since WW2.

At the Fair, a series of real, red barns were filled with exhibits of farm equipment, prize-winning farmyard animals, crop vegetables, curiosa - massive insect models, - jams, jellies & honeys, flowers, herbs, and baked goods:  breads & pies.. My favorite was always a murky, tart apple cider that I thought I could only get at the fair.

Strangely, I don't recall the massive, distorted squashes & pumpkins that now attract even the international news-media (SKY TV reported on them in metrics). This year, the largest, winning squash (900 lbs) was dirty yellow, & looked distressingly like Jabba the Hutt in STAR WARS.

But by 13, I went to the R.C. Xaverian Bros-run prep-school nearby (fund. 1907) , a class step up that my father couldn't aspire to in his day (b. in 1911 in Glasgow, the Great Depression.). As you might expect, it changed my life, which my father never fully accepted because I didn't become the doctor he had aspired to be - he looked exactly like Robert Young as TV's MARCUS WELBY, M.D. - but instead became the writer you're reading.

- Bill Costley, Jr.

WE@THERING

Thunder claps. So do I.

Rain falls. I don't. Farewell to falls.*

Sit up. Stand uP. ST@ND UP!

(20 SEP 12, Santa Clara CA)

* A Stanford Hospital program.

 Alex (my son) asked me if this exercise poem is a haiku.

I suppose it is, as close as need be. Modern haikai no longer need conform to the 'classical' (16th cent.) 5-7-5 syllable model & can even be written in English in a single sinuous (no pun intended) line.

DISAPPEARED?

For Ginny Zeitman

Rumors

of my disappearance

are greatly exaggerated.

I know where I am.

So does my family.

So do people who see me,

sitting under a bo tree.

You may not recognize me,

but they do, embarassed

by what I'm doing.

I've done much worse;

I've starved myself.

Fortunately I stopped

before I died.

There's a lesson,

actually many lessons,

to be learned from this,

depending upon your

inclination to learn.

Learn this:

where you begin

may not be

where you finish.

It may look like it,

but then, it may not.

Simple enough?

I am beginning

to think so. You

may, too. Or not.

It's all up to you.

Are you listening?

I am. To you.

(19 SEP 12, Santa Clara CA)

snowy owl

from a recent reoccurring dream

A snowy owl glides down
to graze the snow-crust,

dropping its sinking,  

escaping

prey...

(01 AUG 12, Santa Clara CA)v14

Cancer anxiety

Thinking I have an enlarged prostate (at 70),  I began taking 5MG Finasteride daily on Fri. 27 JUL 12. My daughter Maya now tells me that my 1st-wife Joan Budyk (her mother; 70)  has 4th-stage colon cancer, & is now in chemo in Cambridge MA where she lives.

Psycho-embryonic

Am I beginning to realize

my soul melds with womens'

in their health & suffering?

Am I profoundly empathetic?

Am I psycho-embryonic?

(28 JUL 12, Santa Clara CA)v3

July Vacations

Does taking early July vacations
account for people's not answering
e- & voicemails wherever they are?

Where are you as you read this?
What are you reading it on?
Why are you reading it @ all?

(09 JUL 12, Santa Clara CA)

Smiling @ Smiling

Why am I smiling @ the word smiling?
I hardly know, but I am. Something's

changing within me in this silence.  I
even need to speak to Reggie, & so I do. 

I even notice it now & even write about it.,
realizing I'm doing it in aching desperation.

(09 JUL 12, Santa Clara CA) v1

IN HUMAN SILENCE

As a teen, I imagined myself as a poet & proseur, but now, @ 70, being both on the web has become increasingly stark ...because I write here in human silence, unexpectedly shocked that it's not at all what I thought it would be. Readers may imagine writers as self-stimulating, self-satisfying solipsists, but I need to hear live human voices. Call me at (408) 247-1943  I may be here when you call; if not, leave me a voicemail & I'll call you back.   ~ Bill

HAPPY APRICOTS

HAPPY APRICOTS

Q: What stops me from writing

happily about being happy?

A: Feeling I must write about

political crimes, lies, deceptions.

But I briefly find happiness

by picking up fallen apricots
during their very short season.

I’m smiling about them now.

(29 JUN 12, Santa Clara CA)v2

GINNY BRIGHTENS

GINNY BRIGHTENS

Ginny brightens

& rises, inviting

me to dance,

smiling happily.

I try my best to

follow her feet.

We swing,
we sway, 

we bounce.

She smiles

brightly.

as we dance

together.

I smile now
as I write this 

(29 JUN 12, Santa Clara CA)v3

BACK ON MY BIKE

w/thanks to Susan

Back on my black Shogun
again after almost a year,

I gradually work up a sweat

huffing & puffing from

Goodyear Tire whose mgr

cordially pumps its tires up,

then I ride to the nearby

Alvarez kiddie Park I'd
only walked to before,

after showing it to Ginny

& Susan, who’d urged me

to exercise every 3 days;

today counts as the 1st.

(27 JUN 12, Santa Clara CA)v3

July rides: to&from Grocery Outlet (=5mi.); to&from dentist =(2mi), to&from Safeway (1mi.)

.

Praying Deeply

When Canon Rev. Linda Taylor concludes a service, she says:
"those you love, & those who you have difficulty loving."

I've never heard that said in place of those you hate. It has me
thinking of the power of prayer as not being limited to oneself.,
but to those who you would never have thought of praying for,
like - one's enemies. Doing this may be long understood by
those who have prayed deeply all their lives. I've only begun
to pray deeply recently - for Ginny Zeitman & myself - but
today I began to pray for her son Dan who is behaving like her
irrational adversary. If my deep prayer is sincere I hope it may
affect him. My experience with him has been deeply negative -
he suspects &  hates me. If my deep prayer can transform that,
something new might come of it directly to Ginny's benefit .
This I hope & deeply pray.

INexact-itude

This year (2012), a few weeks after I’d turned 70 (21 MAY), my daughter Maya (52) sent me a book for Father’s Day (17 JUN): AGELESS MEMORY by Harry Lorayne. Why? I dare not ask.  Memory matters abound nowadays, lack of mastery of which constitute proof of dementia, Alzheimers’, etc. It's as though everyone’s under the microscope for proofs of debility. Why? To select-out the excess population? Probably. Has perfectibility ceded to rabid perfectionism? We now have to know so much more than we used to just to do our daily dozen. Now not fully mastering our increasingly complex living systems automatically chucks you into the trash can (see the computer file-dumping dynamic-image.) 

Today I spoke to a local telephone advice-nurse who didn’t know the difference between a terrorist & someone who terrorizes (terrifies) another. (Homonyms aren't synonyms.)That distinction must surely distort her advice & reports!  She may ‘process’ many advice calls per hour, but how many of them are seriously flawed with such inexactitude & unintended inexactness, which I think of as characteristic of California.

After my 1st few months here in northern California, I wryly reported back to Massachusetts Bay: “Californians seem to have invented inexactitude” (my variant) As a result, I value the minds of fellow NNEastern emigrants over native-born Californians. My advice to fellow NNEasterners:  ”When asking for directions, if you must ask a native-born Californian, try to also ask a non-Californian as well.” Try it. You'll often find it works. 

POSSIBLE

POSSIBLE

At 18, after signing up

at my local draft board, 

I said I wouldn’t serve

    after being inducted,

& began practicing Zen;

by 24, I beat the draft:

at my induction physical

by declaring myself a

‘covert homosexual.’

At 70, again in crisis,
I pray for help for Ginny
in protecting her from her son
Dan, determined to put her
in assisted living against her will.

I pray that once again what seems 

mpossible can be possible.

(09 JUN 12, Santa Clara CA)v3

tinnitis

tinnitis

Hour-by-hour, minute-by-minute,

daylight’s brightening crack
grows in intensity around

    [{my light-blocking drapes}]

distracting me from tinnitis’ buzzing,

my newest tribulation @ 70. Will it

never end? What can cure it?

(05 JUN 12, Santa Clara CA)v2

Apricot Tree

There’s a single apricot tree standing

at the end of my apartment building

that I watch as its fruit go from flowers,

to green, to orange, then ripen & drop 

onto the Lillies of the Nile below;

Happily, I pick them up, 

& eat them out of hand.

(31 MAY 12, Valley Village 4-4D

390 N. Winchester Blvd. Santa Clara CA 95050)v3

A Total Eclipse of the Sun

Around 6pm PST, Dr.Ginny & I tried to watch the full-eclipse of the Sun
visible here in the Western states; each time, we were blinded by it. It
proved better seen on [{TV}] every few minutes during the news-hours
as a darkly-fliltered image. If you saw it: when, where, how?

(20 MAY 12, Santa Clara CA)

W@KING UP

{crash-note:} I've just accidentally deleted the headnote & 4 days of entries
(beginning on my 70th birthday, 21 MAY 2012.), so I'll just begin again.

[HeadNote:] Would you like to read & comment on a daily blog that includes
what I see & think soon after waking up? If so, this is it. - Bill Costley

(24 MAY 2012, 7:05 PST) I put my morning glass of cold water aside to shave
& then write this, glancing briefly to the N. at a pure blue sky. I'll be taking the
V V van to Kaiser Hospital @ 8:45am.for a 10am audiology appt., back by noon.

(25 MAY 2012) Anita forwards me a poem about her garden; I call her back &
listen to her talk about what gardening is for her & can be; it is for me, too, now,&
like a succulent, need a cool drink as Reggie waits beside me patiently, so I take him
out for a while as it slowly  gets colder outside. Ginny appears & walks Reggie; we
sit on the green bench until we're too cold & Reggie heads back to my apt; I make hot
cocoa for us, butter&mayo on a 1/2-slice of sourdough bread for myself..

(27 MAY 2012) I wake at 6:15am with Reggie on my chest, purring, stroke him,
get up & pour myself a tall glass of cold water. All night I'd been thinking of the
French surname Chouinard (cabbager), why, I really don't know.

(03 MAY 2012, 5:20am) I had the strangest dream last night of auditions for Hamlet
that bore no resemblance to the actual play; so I left w/out doing mine, which would have
failed miserably; I was simply not up to it. Now I'm going back to bed.

 ....2 mos gap

(07 JULY 2012, 08:11am) A few fingerfuls of thick oats microwaved 1 min have just made a satisfying start to my currently diatetic day. Next: cold sour fermented juice. Wt. 279

(10 JUL 2012) After a day of painful constipation, I now realize I'd better drink that tall glass of water every morning & take some psyllium. Wt. 279.5  BP 127/672

...5 days gap

(16 JUL 2012)  [Yest.] I weighed-in at 277 BP 119/6~  I'm thoughtfully drinking a cupful of cool water every time I'm at the sink because I've had no bowel movement in the last few days. FINALLY! a soft green substantial dump!

(17 JUL 2012) Took my fallen crown to dentist for reseating; no chewing on that side today, so I put my sloppy salad into the blender & will eat it at room temp.all day.

 ...3 days gap...

(20 JUL 2012)  rode black Shogun to Safweway for 4 delicious qts. yogurt@$1.99, gave 1 to Ginny

(21 JUL 2012) woke to spoon 1/2 cup of vanilla yogurt, drink small cuppa water w/acidophilus wafer, fish oil, vitamins: B complex, Centrum, etc.

Reggie's Ears

Reggie’s ears

are soft seashells,

capturing sound

from all around

as he turns alertly

swiveling both of

his delicate ears.

(05 MAY 12, Santa Clara CA) v4

Touching

We all need gentle touching,

stroking, from birth onwards;

Reggie taps me @ daybreak,

asking me to touch him, so

I twiddle his ears, stroke his ribs

& back, until he’s fully satisfied.

(05 MAY 12, Santa Clara CA)v3