Sunday, January 12, 2014

Sunday morning



Complacencies of the peignoir, and late
Coffee and oranges in a sunny chair
And the green freedom of a cockatoo
Upon a rug mingle to dissipate
The holy hush of ancient sacrifice.
She dreams a little, and she feels the dark
Encroachment of that old catastrophe,

from Sunday Morning by Wallace Stevens

Along with the verses of W.B. Yeats' Adam's Curse from which I titled this blog, the above verse is one of my very favorite in the English language. I can't think or say the words Sunday morning without thinking complacencies of the peignoir, and the rest just rolls off my tongue, shimmering. I imagine I first read the poem, which is part of Wallace Stevens' collection Harmonium, inspired in part by the boy I loved who scratched Stevens' words on bits of paper and left them lying around. To Iris, he wrote once on a slip of paper and the cryptic To the Carolinas. The square of paper lay on my pillow. I feverishly flipped through my Wallace Stevens The Collected Poems and found that poem. The pine tree sweetens my body. The white iris beautifies me, I read.

Poetry floats and it makes a shape into which I've often stepped to make a life.

Sophie is dozing this morning, off and on, and as we move into week two of seizure freedom, I think how ill-equipped I am -- perhaps we all are -- to express gratitude, particularly as a non-religious person. I refuse to believe in an active God who has the whole wide world in his hands, who metes out justice to the wicked, or who has a divine and inscrutable plan that accounts for even extreme poverty, suffering children, devastating weather, rape, or epidemics. This lack of faith in an all-knowing god, or a universe that is anything other than constantly changing and chaotic, has prompted me to wonder if a more appropriate response to the despair I've often felt at Sophie's condition would be to go into the street, rip at my clothes and my hair and wail. In a similar way, I refuse to credit an active god with the miracle that is Sophie's two weeks of seizure freedom. I feel a modicum of guilt with that confession, a product, I suppose, of my Catholic upbringing and all the "religious" people that I know who so earnestly pray for me and for Sophie. While I am grateful for the intention, I admit to shirking, inwardly, when people say Thank God! or Praise the Lord! in response to Sophie's break from seizures. In a way, I would like to believe that God had a hand in this, because then I could crawl on my knees to Mecca in ecstasy or perhaps to a shrine. My response could be the dramatic opposite of the ranting and raving despair I conjured before. I could go to church every single day and kneel in adoration and gratitude, as opposed to feeling almost shell-shocked that a good day follows another good day and then another and another.

Here's what I believe. I believe these two weeks were gained, as it were, by my own dogged persistence to obtain CBD for her, by The Husband's backbreaking labor to make the money to buy it for her, by the efforts of the farmers who are growing it for her, and the individuals who have worked to bottle it and get it to us legally. I believe these two weeks were gained by the power of the internet to connect those of us seeking help for our children with epilepsy and by the glorious and chaotic bounty that the universe holds for us, even in spite of our very alive-ness. I believe in coffee and oranges and complacencies as much as dark things around the corner. I believe in the implacable sun.

29 comments:

  1. Oh, Elizabeth.

    This post is the embodiment of what is holy, what is divine. A kind of "god-ness", if you will.

    (I find the concept of god easier to comprehend when I use a lower case "g".)

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  2. This may be your best post ever in my opinion. Or, it could simply be that you have summed up how I myself feel so very perfectly, so completely and beautifully.

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  3. Oh, Elizabeth. This is beautiful and like Mary, I feel like you've summed up so much of how I feel about faith and belief and also? Damn, I love those WS poems. This post is a prayer--the only kind we have to the only god we have--the here and now and us up to our necks in it.

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  4. That photograph, like the one of Sophie in red, takes my breath away. You are a warrior mother and Sophie is a teacher and your whole family is part of the great effort of creating this miracle and that is god to me. I am so humbled to be able to witness this part of your journey. Most of all, I love looking into Sophie's eyes.

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  5. That last paragraph, all that - coming together and connecting - that is God, for me. You said it so beautifully.

    I read you every day, Darling Elizabeth and I am overjoyed at what is happening for Sophie. Her steady gaze into the camera, her smile the other day - breathtaking. But somehow I missed the fact that she has been completely seizure free for TWO whole weeks. Now I am breathless again. Amazing, simply amazing! You must feel as if you are in another world. I am so happy for you and so grateful that you share this with us. Amen, indeed.

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  6. My glass of wine is raised to dogged persistence and backbreaking labor - and glorious and chaotic bounty.

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  7. I think that it is perfectly holy to believe in poetry and shimmering spaces of light and farmers and friendships and connections and hard, back-breaking work and the power of love. Those things are, to me, as tangible and important as someone else's God. And, in the end, whatever it is to which you can attribute two full seizure-free weeks, I believe that the reveling in the moment, the freedom of breath and sleep and CBD is so incredibly vital that attributions pale in comparison. Love, love, and more love.

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  8. Frankly, whatever it is that we should toast here, from your last paragraph's list to the Flying Spaghetti Monster, that's cool with me. I toast!

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  9. I believe that your beliefs are correct. (And oh, for myself, how I believe in coffee!)

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  10. wow two weeks… seizure free.. I'm assuming this is the first time this has ever happened in sophie's life? … such cause for celebration at her new beginning and yours as her mother…. enjoy

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  11. http://rt.com/news/france-medicine-marijuana-approve-386/

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  12. I love that sleepy teenager looking at the camera on a Sunday morning. Is that a picture of peignoir? I will have to look it up ....

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  13. I see it comes from the root word meaning "to comb the hair" ... Sophie has quite a bed head there ... Good luck with that job :)

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  14. beautiful post; wonderful news. sophie's serenity is a tribute to your (and your whole family's) vibrant energy and determination and intelligence. may these calm weeks flow into months. xoxo

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  15. I am so glad for Sophie and all of you, to read that she has been seizure free for 2 weeks. I really wish, hope, even pray, that she may never have another one, for the rest of a very long and happy life.....

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  16. You're going to think me completely crazy, but I highly recommend Theresa Caputo's new book (The Long Island Medium) as a way of making sense of the senseless.

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  17. I switched from believing in that meddling god to believing in a benign presence, but I think I'm starting to outgrow that one too. I think you have given credit where credit is due. I talk about you and Sophie a lot, to Noah and to my mom and dad and friends, about CBD and this journey you all have been on, and I do feel a sense of happiness and wonder. And I might say "thank god" reflexively, but I always, always bristle at "Praise the Lord!"

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  18. I think there is holiness in poetry, steely determination, hard work, and innovation. I think there is holiness in all of us, really. I am so full of hope for you and your family.

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  19. Of this I am certain…Sophie’s success is because of you, your selflessness, your sacrifice, your blood, sweat and tears. Celebrate you dear Elizabeth, for Sophie’s joyful awakening is a true manifestation of the pure love and steadfast devotion you share with your precious daughter (and family) every single day.

    It is an inspirational victory and one all of us enjoy witnessing. Thank you for sharing it with us.

    As far as God is concerned, “perhaps our role here on earth is not to worship him but to create him”

    Like your poet, Szymborska, perhaps nature gives us a clue of this existence.

    I would love to save this topic for a future discussion with you in person over a glass of wine (or perhaps a bottle of tequila) and an entire evening together to do nothing but talk.

    I appreciate your poet's heart, mind and spirit.

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  20. I think Sophie is a pretty funky chick, and I'm looking forward to seeing more of that beautiful funk!

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  21. Many years ago I read a novel called "The All of It" by Jeannette Haien. It's about a woman in Ireland who confesses to her priest "the all of it," the complete story of why she never married the man she lived with for decades. I loved the book and loved that title especially and somehow those words came, over time, to signify the holy to me, the all of it, the whole story of how what comes to be comes to be. What you write here on this blog and in this post is the all of it in how Sophie came to freedom from seizures. You have crawled on your knees already, and now it's time for the shell shock and the awe and the wonder of all of this coming together for her, for you, for the Husband and Oliver and Henry and that big white dog whose name has escaped me for the moment. The all of it is yours to be with in whatever way feels right for each and every one of you. If there is a divine Divine, such honesty and determination as yours reflects well on it, Elizabeth.

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  22. "Poetry floats and it makes a shape into which I've often stepped to make a life." You offer a shape into which we can step today, Elizabeth. YOU are so beautiful.

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    Replies
    1. Dane Dakota -- I love your name and wish you weren't so frustratingly anonymous. Thank you for visiting and thank you for your kind words.

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  23. I completely understand you sentiment. My youngest son is now 18 months seizure free. This is after multiple seizure events and medication adjustments over three years. The last was 18 months ago when he had three seizures in the span of 4 hours, which was the most helpless that I have ever felt in my entire life. I wish you both continues success and infinitely more days, weeks, months and years of being seizure free.

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  24. I believe in your love for Sophie and the power of your words to reach us all and in what 14 days can do.
    xoxo

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