Monday, March 28, 2011

The mother tree

Small canker-like sores on numerous places around my scalp below my right ear and covering the nasals made for uneasy hygiene routine- so off with the hair- it's going to fall out anyway- Much Better. My energy seems to have returned to about 70 % which is just what the nurse said it would, also I'm suppose to be very susceptible to infection- unfortunately poor F. came down with a nasty head cold so we have a system of quarantines going on in the house.  HOT fresh ginger lemon aides with a little Cayenne pepper sauce, and savory sweet potato leek soup- with lots of hot chilies there too- I can't taste much of anything except salt or sugar- I imagine my tongue cells have changed somewhat making those areas of my taste buds very sensitive. Nothing tastes quite right except super bland food- this is okay too. All will pass. in the mean time I'm exploring how much sugar and salt we put, or the food industry puts, into everything- Really it's occurring to me- this is a real health threat- even the most banal things like frozen yogurt from Yogurt Land are way SWEET! Sodas unbearable, chips or snacks of any kind positively puckering. Try tasting an egg without butter, or cheese, or salt, or pepper, or mayo there is a mineral and earthy -ness that says -life.




Aubrielle and went to my secret Forest today-At first she was AWWW Why do we have to g to the secret forest??? Then of course she was climbing the trees- for me, much happiness.
At one point a tree twig fell into my shoe like a polo tassel- and then we find the great mother tree - Its left 'breast' quite notable.

~

Friday, March 25, 2011

THE POOR BODY—Meredith Stricker


This week Shari helped me unearth the floor of my studio after long long post-surgery weeks of fortune making, it was a devastation. From the edge of the chaos Meredith's beautiful painting glowed and rose above the din. At once I saw and remembered - THE POOR BODY, Meredith's haunting and figurative masterpiece which she first sent to me in 1986 when we lived in Chelsea. She and I worked on a performance of the text with an audio reading and her recording of the goat herds in Greece. We presented this guerilla style at a friend's gallery space [Magda Sawon's PostMasters], in lower east side of Manhatten. Meredith painted and gifted me this painting many years later- NEVER has it meant as much as the true completion of this cycle 
= N. as in 'not'  here— is the poor body - for what remains and  for what will ALWAYS be LEFT- of   n (cup) ah ah ah thinnest nipple—•—•—•—•        

 thank you dear dear M., for everything always •••


ORIGINAL PERFORMANCE NOTES


THE POOR BODY 
PostMasters Gallery, New York,  http://www.postmastersart.com/
1986 choreographed & performed by Elizabeth Lahey text; sound, & stills: Meredith Stricker 
videography: Frederic Lahey

Soundtrack of cicadas rising and falling, constant. Sheepbells at dusk on Lesbos, running in the distance and closer, deeper. Percussive cascade of bells against the roar of wind over dirt paths and thistles.
The text is read slowly, rhythmically into this landscape of heat & oleandered springs, becoming a map for movement.
A woman walks toward us - the poor body: a cactus or moon, our mother, an anorexic girl, Queen of Heaven, carcass, living pearl.
She follows the sound of bells and heat, spiraling like a DNA helix, spinning with increasing intensity, opening and closing, filling and emptying:
<(washed out) (luckless)>
She lifts her arms & reaches out - an orexia
whittled down to n, beyond nothing
cup overflowing = desert
she, holy cactus blooming










THE POOR BODY 
AVE.
Ave dirt, one thousand cracked thornbushes, ave Lady of the House, her arms folded across thin acrylic sweater, ave small voice, unintended saplings ave sisters, one quarter, one quarter, the blunt palm of my hand turned upwards as her phases, reeling turn (faces) to earn a healing - cup, white (washed out) (luckless) as in orexia, `what we long for' a moon there, her faces, ave 
AVENUE 
An avenue as in reaching for A way is a cup She steadies herself and leans toward this thin blue bone china teacup, gold-trimmed & clean A way is a cup if there's an opening, spirit rushes toward the newly emptied place, as an open palm means gift she psalms a new measure The power of positive as money appears greenly as a pear tree free as unzoned honey oh majesty of purple grains tis of thee, a way: ore lucite, agnite, ignite, vein or (a d'or ation) (a door) away - solemnly the way discreet money rustles - wings of it, or A blank way, the path closed pauper cup: empty no harvested paper cup: crushed, foolish, reaped to zero - blocked - blacking Ex haus ted X'ed out No dough Na - da cause Demeter wintered the grain increasing poverty the poor pouring riches increasing unheard of empty gain no grain auctioned rain initiate pain sane as an-not one n 
N. = (CUP) 
n, where n. means born & nephew & new nominative & noon normal & north northern & noun & number ave! n. thou most reduced of moon of beggarly cup - oh and overfilling white you hold one (sandy dirt part way up) where it lives (sand colored thorns, thinnest nipples) cactus flesh (the uneaten desert) treasure - sea green fin, firetooth (baked, fired - as ceramic) but raw still, uneaten Still & steady yet you flower - what thinking spare thou in desert chests of certain dirt. Thou, ammunition of not moving, aim of sharp fixity. She sharpens (shark) water (someone's lost or spirited water) Whitens her entirely dry body she's an icon to water absented water, her inside name wa - wa - wa - wa rapt waterer rein - pure reign narrow wet (wit) ness not violate her
 CACTUS BODY 
And you don't walk on my table, no desert lightning heightens you, yet you survive suburbia's verbia. And don't talk or seize or read, breathing More slowly. Mating, `self-propagating,' priestly Hollowed. Hallowed. Splinter, tallow thou ash green candle, a screen for what soul-crate painted box plant. Root bound, you kneel not before us. Fierce plant, secretest one, cactus Fact that we trust. Solid - you opaque this still life "What are she?" What being sheds her here, not grain unusual, unusable. A watcher Splintery icon. Dark, lunarative Silent as ink. Not troubled, troubling Unharvested - poor body, she's also a figure the rich one, the poor one in her anti abundance, she never dances. Fruitless a-parently (not american plains) She's all fruited: agave, signero, candle, mescal, nopales, prickly pear - plain she explains painted 
                          soul crate 
                                          tell me your nature 
                                                                        in your words 
                                                                                               your nature 
                                                                                                                  in your own

Thursday, March 24, 2011

Test Tube friends…forever green


This link letter π  
———Came from Magpie and her raven headed child Aiden- and it is such a perfect watch- 


Aiden showed me this website and video after I said (as all gustatory events allow) a small soliloquy on behalf of Aubrielle's entire 7th grade class's decision to FAST today out of kinship with starving communities around the globe! This morning Aubs, sad eyed and worried about her upcoming fast- said "You know we spend more money in a year on perfume- than on sending food to countries that need to eat?"- Oh the eyes of our babes as they confront the exponential world of numbers!! Bless them! Please Watch!!


I had my 3rd CROWN placed in my eatin' hole this morning- I had had to have an emergency root canal 5 days before I had my breast surgery, and today was the last round in a approximately a 2 year battle to save ( and LOSE) that tooth- I now have so many crowns in my head- The Logo M made up for Fortunes & Charms is a mere shadow of the porcelain gems keeping my teeth afloat- Anyways—— I was there bright and early with Dr. Flores- Yes, I have an amazing dentist whose name means flowers- and she is the belle du jarden of dentistry!! 

After I had energy and drove to the Great Harvest Bakery on Colorado Blvd., where they were just pulling out of the ovens whole wheat cinnamon raisin bread, " too hot to cut". I swooped up a loaf and decided to surprise the Corvis design studio with a treat! M. heard my mournful chemo-woes this week, and I just wanted to reassure her and ALL others- that I was indeed among the moving.


When I arrived- surprise on me, the entire CROUIX family was home on Spring holiday. We ate wrist thick slices of butter sopped bread and the gluten was as fine and textured and springy as any in Paris!! Friends


Later I stopped at Whole PaYCHECK, Foods, bought pine oil, for aromatherapy and the most beautiful specimen of GINGER I've ever seen, for tummy tea- turns out Bach Flower remedies are all in the head- 


and good old essential oils is what I needed! I skipped the ALOE VERA juice - which was the reason I stopped in the first place, because it blatantly advertised ANTI-OXIDENTS- - Least there be confusion- Chemo- is all about the OXIDATION process! Hence the aluminum flavors metallic tongue and galvanization of hinges.


NOTE: Please try this recipe: 
one Fresh Flour tortilla, 
1 table spoon of cream cheese- softened or whipped
smear of butter
6 SNAP PEA® style freeze-dried snap pea snacks (I used Caesar style)


Take one Fresh Flour tortilla wipe both sides with butter and lightly pan warm each side until soft and wimpy- remove from pan to plate- spread a layer of cream cheese
place Snap PEAS® on a row- along the middle, roll up like a tootsie, and careful when your eyes roll up into their sockets cuz it is soooo delish!! Great for a QUICK app OR a potluck!! Seriously!


After a lovely visit, and Whole Foods, I drove past Washington (WASH) Park, and discovered in a sublime moment a hidden (in plain sight) grove of ancient Cypress, Hemlock, THE Pines, Monteray and Douglass, Spruce and Juniper. I sat in an among them, circumnavigating with my Qi Gong breaths, surveying the residue of last nights holocaustic winds. I have found my passion for this season of Chemo- The EVERGREEN. For 6-7 months I've been collecting rag paper and special vellum for some unknown drawing project- 
I know now what blue— what green, what ever green will lay itself down across the bleach white fibres of bristol and Arches, and BFK. Joy! Tears of pure JOY today in the secret wide open forest — the ever joy of ever greening ever blue and green and smells of ever…evergreen
Evidence soon… Enjoy the video I made in our garden- lilacs wind, flags pine and cawwww

WE LIVE BENEATH THIS 6 STOREY TREE

Sunday, March 20, 2011

sharing—and may we all shine going easy filled with light

From G-upon  seeing e.s Elm- 
                   ~•~
When I am among the trees,
especially the willows and the honey locust,
equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,
they give off such a hint of gladness.
I would almost say that they save me, and daily.

I am so distant from the hope of myself,
in which I have goodness, and discernment,
and never hurry through the world
but walk slowly, and bow often.

Around me the trees stir in their leaves
and call out, "Stay awhile."
The light flows from the branches.

And they call again, "It's simple," they say,
"and you too have come
into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled
with light, and to shine."

Mary Oliver


THANK YOU DEAR GREE

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Synchronizing ones' actions—radioactivi…TEA

This morning I took the first 2 of 36 prescribed deximethosone tablets, tiny robin's egg blue pills the size of baby aspirin with perfect little scores across the middle, 16 mg per day. I will take 4 each day beginning the day before, the day of and day after each chemo-infusion- I rather love that word, infusion- conjures up an image of a russian or english tea house with scones and cubes of sugar, gloved hands amid the silver utensils administering the freshest brew, above all—manners, decorum, polite conduct
The tea ceremony——The Royal Society of Chemistry's Dr. Andrew Stapley has written about the chemistry behind brewing tea, and some traditional ceremonies using leaf tea appear to closely mimic his suggested method, including the idea of synchronizing ones' actions with the temperature of the water. 


Meanwhile, in the studio window this morning—the elm tree branches are swelling against their skin- synchronizing their own leaf blooming actions with the temperature of the air…
So far what I'm hoping happens is that the steroids will mitigate the terrible inflammation and unbelievable weakness I've been experiencing in my right, (or the non-surgery side) arm. For months prior to surgery, when the cancer was a mere twinkling in a young radiologist's eye, my right arm injury- a late summer round of tennis service gone awry, has brought tears to my eyes.  I've been heard saying I feel like a plastic baby-doll with it's arms pulled out! however, if I don't deceive myself, just now my right arm just managed a full 360º shoulder roll with out the fireworks, so my fingers are x'd.  
INFUSION ILLUSION  SECLUSION DELUSION CONTUSION RETRIBUTION ABSOLUTION — a certain ……tea
3 AM meditation ends today with : …"may I free all beings". In the tradition of buddhism, we dedicate our efforts of mindfulness (with an intention for bodhichitta arising), not for our own benefit, but the benefit of all others, the irony of course is without a clear intention of also benefitting ourselves we are no use to any one else, the bodhichitta does not arise. I look at the elm- I think, 'in a few weeks it will be covered with small perfectly green leaves, benefitting itself with sun catching chlorophyll producing intention', but it's shade, it's oxygen-production benefits all beneath it. What has happened? 
Q. What do we intend to free all beings from? A. The ocean of suffering, in sanskrit: samsara. Samsara or suffering as practiced with, through insight mediation, is the cyclic [grasping- desire- wanting, of] birth and the [aversion, disdain, hatred of] death of being- - the confusion particularly for westerners is we often only think of one kind of birth and death in our limits of imagination. But here I'm speaking of a birth and death of 'BE'-ing-  Being…  being, ……………… and I understood in a synchronistic moment of dedication and intention, an action of mind, as the un-birthing, the undying, and the un-be-ing of 'ME'. With the words …MAY I FREE ALL BE INGS" freeing ones', capital 'S'-self. Call it altruism, call it generosity, or selflessness, it is the freedom from BE- ing, ME-ing a freedom from reactivi-……tea

I like to imagine the japanese nuclear workers in a tea ceremony of ultimate proportion. Ultimate bodhichitta, a gesture of selfless ness, the un-being of the atomic workers in Japan, as they dedicate their efforts to the freeing of harm to their families, their country, the selfless un-being of the hundreds of rescuers, the un Be-ing of stranded thousands at the food shelters passing up their ration of water for another who may need it more- their kindness saves them, their un-Be ing benefits first themselves, and as consequence, then others, for no water is as nourishing as the wisdom of self-lessness, there is no thing more beneficial than the freedom of an awakened heart full of un-be ing.

This freedom is a kind of NON-action a no-brainer in the strictest sense of the phrase-, like the elm as a symbol standing there outside of samsara, outside of suffering- no causes, no conditions or movements of a mind concerned with self—just swelling with certain tea.
—this post is for the Japanese nuclear reactor workers-——"synchronizing their actions with the temperature of the water"…

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Revised - A steroid and Asteroids


Looking East over East River NYC. 

Looking up on WWW for full moon with Pleides (astroids)

Looking into the future:

  • Coming up this Thursday/Friday/Saturday: dexamethisone [Dexamethasone is a potent synthetic member of the glucocorticoid class of steroid drugs. It acts as an anti-inflammatory and immunosuppressant. It is 20 to 30 times more potent than the naturally occurring hormone cortisol and 4 to 5 times more potent than prednisone.
  • Anti-inflammatory   / 

    Oncologic uses

  • Cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy are given Dexamethasone to counteract certain side-effects of their antitumor treatment.
  • they told me to keep my lungs and heart from swelling!!
  • Side note: Long term use of dexamethasone under the brand name Oradexon is widespread among prostitutes in Bangladesh in spite of the dangers, because it helps them develop fat easily, an attractive feature in this poor country Ha!! IT MAKES YOU FAT, because you want to eat everything in sight!! Nice!]

  • a steroid, 2 pills am / 2 pills pm •  dexamethisone a steroid, on Friday (2) am • taxitere and cytoxin 1pm  (3 hours) • then more deximethizone, a steroid on Friday (2) /pm • and deximethizone a steroid, on Saturday (2) am/(2) pm• ALL L COINCIDING WITH largest full moon on equinox with ASTEROIDS (actually stars) (Pleides) • Sunday • whew - no drugs — SPRING!!!!!!!  





& well, Yes, it's a lttle sad and a little scary- breathing in  & breathing owwwwtttttttttSo where am I with all this? and where will I be??
here's  a little multimedia answer to that- 
 looking out my window!!
(view from my geranium)-Enjoy!