Water/ free write #44

most of the earth is water.
most of our body is water.

i love being on, in , or near the water. the ocean most of all.the waves covering my feet in foam; or maybe hanging them over the edge of a sailboat; wind directing the course of things.
blue skies. blue waters.
a ripple of waves reflecting on the damp shoreline.

the ocean is a force to be reckoned with. 
i respect the ocean,even tho i love most to play in it.

free write #43/ Fabric

a love of fabric has been handed down to me from my mother.  She was always sewing something.  mending, she called it.

my favorite fabrics are cotton, denim and silks for painting. denim is my favorite to wear..my artist uniform.  cotton for cozy t shirts and batiking.

i love the thought of weaving fabrics, too. i think of muriel fisher then.  the last time i visited with her she was 87.

i keep drifting away from the cloth; drapey sensual charmuse or crepe de chine.

Free write #42/ Music

The Brandenberg Concerto

Listening to the wind instruments coming in with the strings in the Brandenberg movement #2.

i am remembering certain passages note for note.  so many sounds.  it sounds like the first time i'm hearing some of it.

wine and music and a pen and a friend to share it with: pretty neat.

i picture ladies in satin ruffles seated in the great hall, weeping into their handkerchiefs at certain intervals.

free write #41/masks

ironic that i am using a book on masks as a desk to write this on. the facts about masks are on the inside.

"to prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet"

I have a collection of masks, each with a history.

masks hide the real
and reveal the real.

i used to paint masks on shirts.  my favorite design was the richly carved masks. of two faces in one.
they were silver and shimmering pink on black with accents of lavender or turquoise.

free write 40/packages

All i can think of in terms of packages, is a poem that Roscoe used to recite on WNEW way back when.  It talked about some packages being hard to open.  "perhaps the gift is not for me".
packages can hold such wonder....art supplies for example.  contents you can create with are the best.  Most packages are welcome...some little gift to myself, occasionally.

Hair/ free write number 39

i always dreamed of having magazine hair.
i've been having a bad hair day since sometime in the 60's.
never had pantene commercial hair...long, thick, shiny with tons of body.
my own was almost always stringy and frizzed at the edges.

"look at that hair" my mother said when i'd traveled 3,000 miles to visit her.
imagine how bad my hair must've looked for those to be her first words.

i remember her twisting my hair into tight pincurls as a kid.  Later i rolled it on
soup cans to straighten it.

there's just not that much to say about hair.

Free write #38/ Coffee

java. elixir of the gods.  i brew a pot daily and share it with my free write partner most days.

so many secrets whispered over coffee; so many celebrations ending with that deep dark cup of joe.

sapphire rests her head on my wrist..my little editor.

i take mine black, no sugar.  slightly bitter.
iced coffee needs milk just to watch how
the white liquid navigates thru the ice cubes and merges with the coffee.

so many cups so little time to savor the aroma.  i sound like a folger's commercial.

expresso, with or without lemon is good too.

free write #37/ Mountains

i climbed tecate mountain the day the eagle snatched by father's eye.
i wrote that once back when words flowed more freely. not the struggle they are now,
like crossing the great mountains.
i gathered rose quartz at the base of cuchima.

hard to relate to mountains, being so far away from them now.  there's a different kind
of mountain here...made of steel and glass; severe.

ain't no mountain high enough to keep me from you.

the catskill mountains as a little kid.  mostly i remember being afraid to ride the cable cars.

i would welcome mountains these days.  magic is buried in their beginnings.

free write #36/ Computers

ode to the computer; that flat box that has it All.
the biggest library on every subject.
Lonely?  perhaps a chat room or an im with a stranger
about poetry or painting of music.
something just to pass the time when you're not playing
words or scrabble blast or chess.

i'm lost without a computer.  my life goes in crisis mode.
a true emergency.
the computer is a loyal companion for the most part.
more "there for you" than not.

Looking for romance?  typing with a seductive stranger
all night long can feel more real than a conversation with

someone you know.
even Sam loves the computer.

free write #35/ Thoughts

"thinking is the best way to travel"  (a line from a moody blues song, if i remember correctly).  its my first thought when thinking of thought as a subject to write about.

thought is what i put into a painting....another difficult subject.

"i think.
therefore i am"

thoughts come and go rapidly for me.   some forgotten before they ever make it to words.

"thinking of you" 

the thoughts dry up.

free write#34/beatles

One of the high points of my life was seeing the Beatles in person.   The first time was at the Steele Pier in Atlantic City (or was it Asbury Park?  i don't remember).i was 12.  Later on i saw them twice at Shea Stadium.

As a kid ringo was my favorite.  Later,of course, it was Lennon.

I grew up along with the Beatles.  Their music changed while i was changing.  i remember getting my first beatles album from my mom.  i played it over and over again.  i did the same with each new album.

Heard a kid on 86th street the other day saying to his friends. "i'll listen to anything but the Beatles"  silly kid.  he doesn't know what he's missing.

free write #33/ merry go rounds

i mostly remember the huge merry go round at steeplechase park with its camels and ostriches and lamas too, i think  i don't think any of horses were actually horses, but i'm not sure. there were those huge carriages you could sit in and watch the animal figures go up and down in a circle.  some were stationary.  huge, ornately carved pieces.  amazing craftsmanship i realized years later.
i would ride and ride reaching for those rings.  i don't think i ever got the gold.

my life sometimes was like a merry go round.
circling endlessly, going up and down and getting nowhere.
just along for the ride...without even the gold ring to try for.

the best part of riding the merry go round was jumping off while it was still spinning.

free write #32/Distance

i understand distance as a tangible thing having lived 3,000 miles away from the people i loved most for so long.

there are emotional distances, too, which may be worse than the physical ones.
nothing can be done.

the kitten lays on his back...he's come a long way...

distance are those lines on maps.
the creases eat entire cities
folded and unfolded a hundred times.

Fire/ free write #31

Song lyrics go thru my head:
ring of fire
i am the god of hell, fire
c'mon baby, light my fire.

i tried to paint fire in my phoenix piece.
hot and dancing, like good animation
flames tipped with blue.

there are warm, cozy fires crackling in the fireplace
and fierce, raging fires, eating everything in its path.

one has to have respect for fire.

free write #30/Cats

There are so many quotes about cats its hard to come up with something original.  i know a thing or two about cats, having had 30 + over my lifetime.  too many to mention by name.
i live with five of them now.  they are almost always fun.  Dark, delicate kholette;polydactal sam, cassie the fluff ball prone to prancing;sapphire the pretty little balinese; and rocky, the tuxedo kitten.
some cats are limber and sleek;other clumsey like poor sam.
why am i having so much trouble writing this?  its like trying to write about painting....too close, too much what i'm about.