Saturday, January 30, 2021

An old poem written in 2009, revised in 2011

and now revised once again reflecting my grief

 

 

WHAT RISES FROM FIRE

 

1.

the flames licked her heart

reaching upward devoured

her body, her mind

the heat melting all

 

she stood watching

as it collected to itself

all she held dear

then consumed that too

 

a smoking shadow

all that was left

everything

she counted on

 

changed & altered

charred & transmogrified

 

2.

Prometheus

Vulcan

Agni

 

Pele

Vesta

Brigid

 

fires of inspiration

fires of the hearth

sacred fires

 

goddesses

dancing the flames

and their teaching:

 

this guest

dressed in an Inferno

rising from the earth

beneath her feet

 

is not death

but rebirth

and awakening

 

3.

listening to the woodlands

sizzle

watching the land

glow and pulse

a heart exposed

beating,  beating

 

a dream in reds & oranges:

fire swirl

storm of smoke

that smoke hissing

 

mystery

give your self

to it

offer everything

 

to the sacred flames

saying

your power

cannot destroy what is timeless

 

I still stand 

deep scars charred

across my heart

I still stand

 

4.

& finally the rains came

& with them a greening

what had been there

underneath

 

not destroyed but transmuted

something new & beautiful

yet familiar

there in the ashes

 

5.

what alchemy

is this

that rises

from the inflamed heart?

 

from that pile of grief

& burnt things came

a most magnificent fragrance

myrrh & cinnamon & spice

 

rising from the ashes

smoky & velveteen

a black pearl

 

its nacre lustrous

a substance

surrounding

light 

reflecting

a new iridescence

 

 

                                                                                                Laura Pendell

                                                                                               

Wednesday, January 6, 2021

 so interesting how just writing about how “it was” brings back that feeling deep inside me that has not been fully with me for the past few years. thank you for that gift

 WHO WAS THE PRESON YOU USED TO BE?

Laughter filled the air.  I woke up in the morning with a smile on my face and love filled the air between us.  It was mutual..  Dale even wrote (about himself) to one of our old zen teachers “I laugh all the time now.”. We lived with so much shared joy between us.  Whatever projects we were working on — shared or individual — there was so much support and encouragement.  “Patience. Support. Laughter,” was the food of our life together.  I had never had a person who believed in me the way Dale did.  And that went both ways.  Early on, shortly in the weeks before we began living together, he wrote a card to me “Will you love me? xxxxxx”

AT first neither of us could believe the connection we felt or our good luck at finding each other at this later point in our lives.  We were both flying free back in 1998.  Unmoored after years of difficult marriages and not a clue as to what might be next.  Then we met and all of a sudden things began to become clearer and I think we found an anchor in each other. When you are creative finding a person who truly believes in your ability to create is the most poewerful thing.  You feel you have an ally in this process that can be both intimidating and powerful.

Some days Dale was the sun to my moon and other days the roles reversed.  There was no thought to it — it just happened naturally.  Like 2 pieces in a jigsaw puzzle that fit perfectly.

I had never had that kind of acceptance before and I blossomed with it.  Here from a poet I wrote after we met:

blossoming

I realize that I am supposed to be writing about myself — who was the person YOU used to be? — but as our relationship deepened over time many of those barriers between self and other softened and became we.

Even in the depths of relationship challenges — and yes we had them from time to time — our bond was sealed and we understood our amazing luck in finding each other and making a life together that supported the dreams we both had before we ever met.  My derams.  His dreams.  And now our dreams.

at first we marveled as we discovered all the things we shared:  our practice our love of books our love of nature particularly the mountains

But Dale was forevere curious about so many things and he opened my eyes to a world I didnt’ really know.  Our backgrounds were very different.  I’d grown up in New York City without any reliegion because neither of my parents were religious — my mother a lapsed Catholic, my father Jewish but in a cultural way rather than a reliegious way.  Dale on the other hand grew up in southern California.  His father was a Methodist Minister and his arentas were very active in the church as was the entire family.  How we both came to Buddhism and Zen in particular is a story for another time. But it is what brought us together.  And was a strong foundation from place from where to begin.

Meeting Dale and moving to California and eventually making a life together as lovers, as partners, both gave me the opportunity to explore so many things that had seemed “just dreams” for years.  He never told me what I should do (as both my father and my first husband had) but instead opened the world to me where nothing was forbidden.

And I blossomed.  I flourished.  I learned to be happy.  I learned to find joy in each day (and yes each night).  I learned to share my life with another who wanted to share his life with me equally.  we were partners in every sense. We both gave each other the space to be as creative and as happy as we couold be.  Because when you are creative, and supported in your creative projects, there is a joy that rises inside you that is contagious.

We wrote together and we wrote apart.  I was in the studio making books and art.  He was in the herbal itchen making potions and lotions and other wonderful elixirs.  

Just one small example of what I’m trying to share with you all:  for many years the banned alchoholic beverage absinthe had fascinated me.  It showed up in my poems.  I drank Pernod — a watered down version of the original absinthe.  Dale, as ah herbalitst, collected herbs and made his own absintehe followed the original recipe from old herbals.  The first night we spent together can you imagine what it was like for me when he offered me a glass of the “vrai absinthe” which I’d dreamed and imagined for much of my adult life?

We gae each other permission.

When that has been denied at best and squalched at least (???) what seems like all your life that is a very powerful thing.

So I went from afunctioning person to an ectastic one.  A oife of joy and amaziemtn.  No limits to the good result as we say in one of our zen sutras.

May all beings be so lucky.  And so blessed.


Tuesday, January 5, 2021

 

+who am I and why am I here?
Mantis Hill is an alias. My name is Laura. Mantis Hill is the name my husband Dale and I gave to the beautiful land we found in 2002 and have lived on since 2003. Mantises are an omen, oracular and can help you find your way home. The first year we were here there were more mantises than you could count. Hence the name.
Dale and I met in 1998 in Death Valley on a zen backpacking trip. At t;he time I was still in New York and he was in Santa Rosa California. We both had a zen practice with a teacher based at a zendo in the Foothills of Northern California and found ourselves on this backpacking trip at a time when both of our marriages were ending. The spark between us was undeniable and 2 months later I moved from New York to California. Our first year together was a bit up and down because we were both coming out of difficult marriages. But after a year we began living together and got married in 2003 -- the same year we moved to "Mantis Hill."
It was about as idyllic as could be. We are both poets/writers. We shared a zen practice. We loved being in the mountains. We are (were?) the same age. We both cherished books and were able to build a library. For many years we had a camp at Burning Man (before it turned into a huge expensive gathering). After we met Dale wrote 8 more books. I wrote more poetry. It was a beautiful dance we did. We had wonderful energy together. Well that energy still exists. I carry it now for both of us.
In 2014 Dale was diagnosed with liver cancer from having lived for many years with HepC (undiagnosed). Not all that unheard of for folks in our age group who grew up in the 60s. 2014 we traveled back and forth from the Foothills to UCSF each month for treatments. Dale was on the transplant list but his doc didn't think he could keep him alive long enough for him to get to the top of the list. Dale reached out to our community and a live donor appeared and volunteered half of his liver to save Dale's life. The transplant was in March 2015. It was a success and we all breathed once again. The next two years were full of the extra kind of joy you share when you realize how more than lucky you are. However on the Ides of March in 2017 a CT scan showed that the liver cancer had metastasized to his spine.
The wonderful docs at UCSF did everything they could -- radiation, surgery, chemo, more radiation but by the end of 2017 it was clear that they could no longer forestall the inevitable. Dale went on Hospice in December 2017 and passed on January 13, 2018.
Yes -- it will be 3 years next week.
I wandered around in a fog of grief for 2 solid years. I took myself into isolation because I didn't know what to say to anyone and no one knew what to say to me. At some point I found Megan's book and reading it allowed me to begin to attend weekly grief groups at our local Hospice. But I still kept to myself.
A year ago on the second anniversary of Dale's passing (sorry I still cannot use what I call "the d word") I went to a week long intuitive painting retreat. I spent a week with a very supportive group of women and made plans to return to the world. Then Covid struck us all. It was as if the universe was telling me it was too soon for me to rejoin the world. So here we are a full year later and I have been pretty much isolated now for 3 years. Yes, I live alone. I never had children. Dale has a daughter and so I have a step-daughter -- and a granddaughter born 2 weeks after Dale's liver transplant -- but we are not close.
So here I am on this amazingly beautiful 12 acres in the Foothills enjoying the rocks and the trees and the pond and so much nature. Dale is still very much with me. But I knew I had to do something to mark this 3rd anniversary and help me carry this grief which quite honestly is still overwhelming and paralyzing even at the 3 year mark.
I am attaching a photo of the two of us at Burning Man in 2007 that a friend took because of the rainbow.
Apologies -- I am not skilled at FB and so the picture is not in the comments because I am not sure how to do that. And I also apologize for going on so long -- that's the writer/storyteller in me.



Tuesday, March 22, 2016

promise

Dear Ones,

I am going to start posting small pieces from by book (project? manuscript?) a few times a week.

Reactions are welcome.

l

Tuesday, February 23, 2016

PS 87 Redux

re·dux
rēˈdəks,ˈrēˈdəks/
adjective
adjective: redux

brought back; revived.


 


Just about one month ago the phone rang in the middle of the afternoon and Dale answered it.  After listening intently to someone he smiled and handed the phone over to me saying "It's your friend from Elementary School -- Helen Epstein."


 


What?  How?  


 


I took the phone and it was as if 57 years evaporated in the space of 57 seconds.  


 


Helen didn't miss a beat telling me how difficult it had been to track me down.  Well, yes.  I've traveled under the radar for most of my life.  I've changed my name not once but twice.  And, of course, they were still looking for me using my maiden name.  That's all they had.


 


Somehow they found me.


 


Helen told me about the Reunion planned for May 7th back in  Manhattan.  I gracefully declined.  She asked if I would prepare a "Timeline" -- you know, a summary of my life since 6th grade.





Actually the timing of this request was interesting.  Some of my friends might call it synchronicity.  Others might just say "Hey Laura, the universe is trying to tell you something."  





I'm just encouraged.  After all that's gone on over the past 2+ years, life here is beginning to settle.  We are no longer making frequent trips to San Francisco.  Life has changed from being about illness to being about wellness.





Last December I had dusted off that manuscript I put away in 2013 with plans to return to it once again.  Here was a chance to write a very brief summary, now called a Timeline, and use that as a segue back into the larger work.


 


I  wrote the Timeline and it has been sent to my former classmates, along with a few others, to give them an idea of how they might address the past 57 years.  I've heard back from a few of the people I knew back then.  Wonderful, heartwarming notes (to which I have yet to respond but am ever so grateful to have received).


 


And I am limping back into my own manuscript.  With its ghosts. And revelations.  


 


The world is looking both much wider and narrower right now.


 


Thank you dear PS 87 friends for doing all that you did to find me.  I know it wasn't an easy task.  But I am filled with gratitude that you kept on looking for this woman who values her seclusion and shuns most forms of social media.


 


Voices from the past pointing me towards the future.


 


 


 

Wednesday, June 10, 2015

3 months and still healing

Hi All,

This Friday, June 12th, will be 3 months since Dale's transplant. 

Healing continues, albeit too slowly to suit Dale.  Which leads me to wonder "Does anyone ever think they heal fast enough?"

There have been no major setbacks, but the road to full health is a bit rocky and it just takes time for the liver to regrow (we are told by the docs that it should be almost full size by now).  Stamina is still a major issue.  Dale was planning to teach at the International Herb Symposium which starts this weekend but had to withdraw.  He's just not at 100% yet.

Meanwhile, Dale's donor, the generous and selfless Matt T., also continues to recover.  His recovery has had its share of ups and downs.  Since Matt's a "working man" he has lost 3 months from work and is also not quite 100% so hasn't returned to the work force yet.  Major abdominal surgery is a big hit to the system, even when you're healthy.

Dale has set up a "Donor's Fund" to help Matt through this period.  If you feel moved to contribute to this fund, you can make a donation through PayPal sending money to amulet@botanikos.com.  Or you can send a check made out to Dale Pendell and marked "Donor's Fund" in the bottom left corner.  If you prefer to use the traditional method and send a check -- it can be mailed to Dale at PO Box 1423, Penn Valley CA 95946.

I hope that this finds everyone of you in good health and enjoying the turn towards summer.

Blessings and love to all,
laura