Something Wet

The last few days, if not weeks, have taken me off track.  Getting off track means going back and forth on Facebook or through email about this measles hysteria. Getting off track means taking seriously the threats and bullying remarks. Getting off track means listening to anything but my own heart and knowledge gained from experience.  Getting off track means being interviewed by the mainstream press about this issue. I declined. Getting off track means taking myself too seriously.

Getting on track means writing both my story and a bit of fiction. It means writing in general, not responding or reacting. It also means caregiving -- lots and lots of caregiving -- to Sophie, to Henry and to Oliver. It means making money. I have two jobs -- contracts for ghostwriting a non-fiction book and for an advocacy project. I've got my Books & Bakes salon to run with two dates coming up -- February 13th and February 27th. I have to arrange all the logistics for my three-week Hedgebrook writing residency in late June -- a task that boggles the mind even more than the thought of taking my writing seriously enough to deserve such an honor.

Getting on track means wondering whether Bob Dylan's new album of Frank Sinatra covers is awesome or just really, really weird.

Getting on track means reading.

This:

A Recovered Memory of Water

Sometimes when the mermaid's daughter
is in the bathroom
cleaning her teeth with a thick brush
and baking soda
she has the sense the room is filling
with water.

It starts at her feet and ankles
and slides further and further up
over her thighs and hips and waist.
In no time
it's up to her oxters.
She bends down into it to pick up
handtowels and washcloths and all such things
as are sodden with it.
They all look like seaweed --
like those long strands of kelp that used to be called
'mermaid-hair' or 'foxtail'.
Just as suddenly the water recedes
and in no time
the room's completely dry again.

A terrible sense of stress
is part and parcel of these emotions.
At the end of the day she has nothing else
to compare it to.
She doesn't have the vocabulary for any of it.
At her weekly therapy session
she has more than enough to be going with
just to describe this strange phenomenon
and to express it properly
to the psychiatrist.

She doesn't have the terminology
or any of the points of reference
or any word at all that would give the slightest suggestion
as to what water might be.
'A transparent liquid,' she says, doing as best she can.
'Right,' says the therapist, 'keep going.'
He coaxes and cajoles her towards word-making.
She has another run at it.
'A thin flow,' she calls it,
casting about gingerly in the midst of words.
'A shiny film. Dripping stuff. Something wet.'

Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill, from The Fifty Minute Mermaid
translated by Paul Muldoon

Poetry In Lieu

Hilton Head Island, 2010

A Recovered Memory of Water

Sometimes when the mermaid's daughter
is in the bathroom
cleaning her teeth with a thick brush
and baking soda
she has the sense the room is filling
with water.

It starts at her feet and ankles
and slides further and further up
over her thighs and hips and waist.
In no time
it's up to her oxters.
She bends down into it to pick up
handtowels and washcloths and all such things
as are sodden with it.
They all look like seaweed --
like those long strands of kelp that used to be called
'mermaid-hair' or 'foxtail'.
Just as suddenly the water recedes
and in no time
the room's completely dry again.

A terrible sense of stress
is part and parcel of these emotions.
At the end of the day she has nothing else
to compare it to.
She doesn't have the vocabulary for any of it.
At her weekly therapy session
she has more than enough to be going with
just to describe this strange phenomenon
and to express it properly
to the psychiatrist.

She doesn't have the terminology
or any of the points of reference
or any word at all that would give the slightest suggestion
as to what water might be.
'A transparent liquid,' she says, doing as best she can.
'Right,' says the therapist, 'keep going.'
He coaxes and cajoles her towards word-making.
She has another run at it.
'A thin flow,' she calls it,
casting about gingerly in the midst of words.
'A shiny film. Dripping stuff. Something wet.'

Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill, from The Fifty Minute Mermaid
translated by Paul Muldoon

Redolent of the Sea

A Tiny Clue

You could spend your entire life
eavesdropping on the mermaid
before you'd pickup the tiniest little clue
about where she was really from. One autumn day
    I happened upon
her and her child
while she was comforting it under her shawl,

'You are not the blue-green pup of the seal.
You are not the grey chick of the greater black-backed gull.
You are not that kit of the otter. Nor are you
the calf of the slender hornless cow.'

This was the lullaby she was singing
but she stopped short
immediately she realized
someone else was in the neighborhood.

I had the distinct sense she was embarrassed
I'd overheard her in the first place.
I also came away with the impression
the lullaby was, to put it mildly, redolent of the sea.

Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill, from The Fifty Minute Mermaid, translated by Paul Muldoon

Mermaid Sand Sculpture**

A Tiny Clue

You could spend your entire life
eavesdropping on the mermaid
before you'd pick up the tiniest little clue
about where she was really from. One autumn day
    I happened upon
her and her child
while she was comforting it under her shawl.

'You are not the blue-green pup of the seal.
You are not the grey chick of the greater black-backed gull.
You are not the kit of the otter. Nor are you
the calf of the slender hornless cow.'

This was the lullaby she was singing
but she stopped short
immediately she realized
someone else was in the neighborhood.

I had the distinct sense she was embarrassed
I'd overheard her in the first place
I also came away with the impression
the lullaby was, to put it mildly, redolent of the sea.

Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill, from The Fifty Minute Mermaid
translated from the Irish by Paul Muldoon

**Thank you to Karen Gerstenberger for thinking of Sophie and sending me the photo of the sand sculpted mermaid -- isn't it fantastic? For those of you who don't know about our fascination and love of mermaids and selkies, you can read this and this.

The Mermaid

I drove Sophie to the beach yesterday, partly out of guilt because I haven't done so in months, and partly due to the extraordinary weather we've been having in southern California. Really spectacular days, people -- the kind where I wish that I were a surfer, a lag-about, a stoner, a -- well, never mind.

Here are some photos (I put my sunglasses on her for a moment to see if she noticed, and she did) -- Sophie, as usual, felt the pull of the ocean, her apparent home. It's difficult to walk with her, so strong is the pull toward the water, and when we did, she didn't seem to even feel how frigid the water was on our feet, the whoosh of it sparkling over and over.

And here's a poem from a book called The Fifty Minute Mermaid by the Irish poet Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill and translated by Paul Muldoon:

The Mermaid in the Hospital


She awoke
to find her fishtail
clean gone
but in the bed with her
were two long, cold thingammies.
You'd have though they were tangles of kelp
or collops of ham.


'They're no doubt
taking the piss,
it being New Year's Eve.
Half the staff legless
with drink
and the other half
playing pranks.
Still, this is taking it
a bit far.'
And with that she hurled
the two thingammies out of the room.


But here's the thing
she still doesn't get -
why she tumbled out after them
arse-over tip...
How she was connected
to those two thingammies
and how they were connected
to her.


It was the sister who gave her the wink
and let her know what was what.
'You have one leg attached to you there
and another one underneath that.
One leg, two legs...
A-one and a-two...
Now you have to learn 
what they can do.'


In the long months
that followed
I wonder if her heart fell
the way her arches fell
her instep arches.