poem: Area of Refuge

Today, I am an emotional refugee,

carrying small comforts on my back

 

curling my body into armchairs

un-meeting gazes, rather, tucking

inside, quietly, retreating.

I stopped trembling at noon,

reassured by green grass expanses,

ice cream, a few kind words.

 

I am exaggerated calmness:

in every small action, deliberate

focus, a dancer tiptoeing an incline

of glass shards; a hollowed space

 

carved through the center of

something soft. The concrete

stairwell I found was marked

"Area of Refuge," I wanted to

believe it. I tried camoflauge

but living flesh gives up the lie.

 

Kinetic energy never could

stand still for so long. and maybe

I somewhat regret that, too.

 

Let me... have my scrap of cloth

a gift from the one who would ask me

to stay, if he could. Do not laugh

if I press my ear against trees,

to hear the heartbeat of sap, the

soothing murmuring of maple blood

in spring's warm green-gold glow.

 

I sleep only in protected spaces,

jolted into heart-pounding awareness

on every side. I am tired, this orphan

wants a home; this hunted spirit,

 

its place of refuge. I do not want to go

back to bunkers and fortresses, cold

silences and locked nights ticking on the

sound of my pulse gradually counting

 

down, down, down... into a sleep

that rests the body but never the soul.

There is something in the periphery

 

but I am too worn to believe, today;

an emotional immigrant, slipping

unnoticed into the safety of public

encounters, known earth.

 

Let me have my small comforts for now,

and let me continue believing,

tomorrow,there may be gentle rains,

and soft greens; hearts unclenched

from safe protected walls, unfurling

 

flags of truce-white paper, unfettered

movement; rushes of traced linen

land for refugees to pour foundations

 

and a space to slow dance with you.

even if yours is but an illusion of refuge,

a product of my own delusion-

far more than security of concrete-

I need it so very gladly, today.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Reviews

[Ken Simm.]

You have an uncanny knack of not only placing your own thoughts in the creative arena but also those of others. You can grasp a character and paint its feelings upon not only an understandable canvas but a very beautiful ,inspiring one at that.
It then matters not whether you are talking about yourself or someone you have observed. They are both your creations and they both ring with truths.

[Marie Anzalone]

It's funny, Ken... when I write, I do always try to think, somewhere; "how can I make this relateable to someone else?" To me that becomes the measure of whether not a work has any importance to anyone outside of myself. I did not write for a long time, thinking that I did not have anything of any interest to anyone else. Feedback like your helps me ery much, and is greatly appreciated. Thank you, again.

I plan to ge tback online reviewing abit this weekend, and will spend soem time on your own words. I wanted to let you know that I shared one of your works on my FB writers page yesterday, as an ongoing small effort to promote noteworthy underappreciated authors. If you have any other suggestions for promotion, please let me know. Figured I would do a week's worth.

[emmajoy]

'Let me have my small comforts for now, ~ and let me continue believing, ~ tomorrow,there may be gentle rains, ~ and soft greens; hearts unclenched ~ from safe protected walls, unfurling .. '

Tis easy enough to say there are always places of different colours for the mind and heart to hide a while. It's an escape from what is into a world of somewhere we make for ourselves, not necessarily solid, more a flow of space within. Strange that your reviewer below talks of placing your thoughts around others; it's as if you're embracing or taking them on a journey they might need to share. Perhaps people need refuge from exaggerated calmness, whether with or without influences far beyong self. The profundity and hidden emotions of this post far outreach many others in the Cafe.. as ever and always, Rachael, you make me think and wonder.

[Marie Anzalone]

Thank you so very much, Emma. I am sorry I have incommunicada for a while. My computer has been needed by someone else for 3 weeks, I was out of town and offline completely for a week, and then I had a week of crippling depression and physical pain due to a medical condition. I have spent what little time and energy was left over in actually finishing the reading of 3 novels (there has been almost no time for pleasure reading in 3 years) and exploring the trappings of the big scary L-word. Somewhere in there, I lost my poetic voice, and I am trying to get it back.

Almost all of my work, dear friend, is an attempt to reach out to others. Sometimes a personal note, sometimes to tell a story- but always an attempt to connect. It always warms my heart when a reader feels what I am trying to convey in my work. That something in them identifies in some way with something that came from me. It is my way of feeling less alone in this world. It takes a lot of energy from me to read and write the way I do. There are days when I simply do not have that energy to give. This site used to energize me, and recently, it has done the opposite. I try to guard my time, as I am under the gun and cannot afford to constantly try to prove people wrong who want to think the worst of me. I must THANK YOU, my FRIEND, for being one of the ones who always, always, always makes me [and damn near everyone else] feel good about myself. Your gift is amazing. My birthday is tomorrow. It's lonely and I am flat broke, but your kind words this morning, just letting me know I am remembered, were a wonderful gift that are helping give me what I need to make it through the day today. Thank you.

[Horizon K.]

I came back for just a moment to comment on this... I agree... We all have our special safe places.  If we are lucky, we can find that place inside ourselves, or tuck ourselves into some fold of nature and inhale... But sometimes this place can best be found in someone else... 
Your poetry crawls into my heart Marie... Always...
Horizon

[Marie Anzalone]

Horizon, if you get this, PM me. I have a message fro you from a mutual acquaintance.

and, thank you very much for the review and the kindness in it. I had a week of really bad hormonally induced depression that really, really sucked. Everyone who reached out in any way large or small, and helped me feel less alone, a little more understood, helped me.

[Cool Handless Luke]

I tried camoflauge
but living flesh gives up the lie.

There are many lines here Marie, that I could just as easily copy and paste and point out how they stand out to me. I shall be reading this on many occasions I suspect because the artistry of your description touches a place in my soul where I too have found myself wanting to curl up inside and hide. This is fine work with a sense of honesty and vulnerability. As always when a poet gets real even to the point that it puts a few chinks in the armor it catches my attention and draws me in. That's what poetry is to me. I read this and pointed to the screen and said aloud in all crudeness "that's a f****n' poem right there - that's the s**t!"

[Marie Anzalone]

Far too many of us, my friend, know what it is to live inside a battle zone of one kind or another. I wrote this one recently, in a daze, after a particularly bad episode with someone I tried but failed to love enough. It feels raw because was written raw; it is vulnerable because I was vulnerable when I wrote it. Tunnel vision sets in, every move becomes deliberate to avoid showing that you are trembling, to avoid giving up the lie, mostly, though- to avoid further provocation of a volatile situation. They say that time heals wounded and broken hearts and minds and spirits, but it does not. Only love does that. I have always coped, found ways to tap the strength in trees and animals and small comforts; but I never stopped trembling until I let someone hold me again in a loving gesture.

Crudeness? LOL I was accused on site, on Thursday, of using language too foul- when I pointed out how some men on site talk to and about women, the sexually degrading and slanderous and vicious and threatening language and words that are used. I was eventually blocked when I pointed out the irony of being censored by a user clearly complaining about censorship. Five minutes later, walking down the street here, a man wearing a cross deliberately ran down an 8-week puppy in the street in fornt of me, just to get a reaction out of me. He ran over it, then backed over it, and ran over it again.

Often, I do not think my language is either storng or foul enough. Some days, I do not even want to live to live in this world.

So never worry about language around me, LOL. I will always defend your right to use it for special occasions...

[Mike Emil]

you need more stacy keech in your life, girl
that would put things right

[LJW]

We seek out refuge globally and personally.

In the end we discover that neither can happen without the other.

Relatable, intelligent, introspective, emotive work, as always.

[Marie Anzalone]

Thanks, LJW, I always appreciate a review from you. That concept of refuge- yes, it is so necessary. A safe space. How long do we go through our lives looking for somewhere safe, a place where we can be authentic? The idea of refuge is so fragile. I read a line once somewhere- cannot remember where- about someone's world being as fragile as a dandelion head gone to seed. One puff from any direction, and it all goes away. Human vulnerability does not get much more frail than that.

[Tree]

We all seek out these spaces. We all have our safe places. There were many areas in this write were I began to imagine the scene, tried to slide into your mind. ''I tried camouflage but living flesh gives up the lie.'' I was going to post a different poem today but had a hard time getting a few things right with it, but in it I roll along into that same theme, trying to become invisible... for whatever reason the poet seeks this illusion because it is necessary in order to document, we want to notice, but not be noticed... That last haunting stanza has stayed with me, I suspect I will be thinking for some time about that.... This poem is thick with meaning though, and it is begging for several more reads. In the sixth stanza I was moved by the writer's desire to connect with the tree, feel its ''heart beat''. But I could never ''laugh'' at that as the poet suggests but instead I feel pity for those who would not understand the desire to do, so....

[Marie Anzalone]

I appreciate the time and consideration you took with this review, my friend. Our approaches are so opposite, aren't they? In a way I think we both try for invisibility. You by focusing so much on the snapshot of a single scene, as if viewing through a telephoto lens so that the narrator becomes indistinguishable formt he story itself; myself by putting myself so deep into it that I try to disappear within my own analysis. I wonder, though- if you don't reveal more than oyu intend, and I don't create more smoke and mirrors, by our respective approaches? As for the trees, this tiem of year in New England you can walk up to an old maple or oak, say 150-300 years young, and literally hear the sap running through it like a heartbeat pulsing blood through veins. it is ebough to make one want to leave concrete bunkers forever and dance in open green fields, unafraid for once to just damn it ask for joy, that place that feels like somewhere you might like to have a small modest home one day- not perfect, with craks in the walls and leaky roofs and uneven floors. Somewhere that fits like a treasured old jacket. What better refuge in life could there be than having a friend like that?

[Tree]

When you pointed our two different techniques for attaining the power of invisibility I had to laugh, that was right on point.

[Marie Anzalone]

oh I know :-)
I am quiet, not blind

[Marie Anzalone]

miss you so much, my dear friend

[Sam]

Good Job! Your details make a flow to your piece of writing! :)
Not exactly my type, but very good, otherwise!

[Marie Anzalone]

Thank you for your review. Like most of my writing, the words describe a scene, an event, a feeling. Take them literally. This one is a story.

[Emily B]

a cup of tea, maybe, and a quiet silence from someone who knows what it means to be, and green grass, yes . . . i almost took my young friend to an area of refuge this morning, i dropped him off with his sister instead, he wanted to check on her and make sure she's doing okay

[Marie Anzalone]

Thank you for understanding, and for understanding how cryptic I need to be. Events have escalated is all I can say. I understand about your young friend. When I had my aodpted "son" here, I taught him about the refuge of the woods. The first summer, he could not leave the yard; now I drop him off for 8 hour stretches to wander trails and write his poetry. In cas eyou ever wonder if you are doing enough, I share a recent story: my charge is doing his senior thesis on lessons learned in life and love form his 3 summers here with me, learning to find his feet, the ground under them to support him, and the stars above his head to guide him. I am about as proud of that as anything I have ever done in life.

[Emily B]

do you think we would take the chance if it wasn't for the paths that led us here?

[Marie Anzalone]

When I did my trauma therapy (now there is an opener, right?) I becmae very good friends with a young woman, also a PCV, going through therapy for the same reason, similar stories, etc. She healed enough to return to finish her service; I had more work to do. We were both told, though, that our finding each other, and sharing that journey, had an effect of great synergy... our shairing part of that journey had a far greater effect on us than working through s**t alone would have.

I feel the same way, here, Emily. There is great synergy. The whole is far greater, far wiser, far more beautiful than the sum of the parts.

Dare greatly, my friend. That is what this life is about.

[gombeggar]

such well winded words...i am honored to read yer works always

[Marie Anzalone]

thanks, gombeggar. sorry I missed you when I was in town. Mom had me crazy busy the whole time. I was allotted a few hours to sleep but nothing else.

[gombeggar]

unexceptable... u will pay for yer indescretion

[Marie Anzalone]

come up and make me...

[gombeggar]

;)

[gombeggar]

don't make n ol' man pine

[Marie Anzalone]

yer not the type to pine... I would say larchin' is more yer speed as ye gets older

[gombeggar]

do u mean 'larch' s in the tree...or lurch...as in the adams family?

[Marie Anzalone]

open to interpetation

[gombeggar]

getting older? shame girl...only i'm allowed 2 ruminate about mah ponderously long years :P

[Marie Anzalone]

I'm thinking that is more of a universal affliction than you are maybe giving it credit for being

[gombeggar]

perhaps hubris overtakes me for a moment ;)