Cupid and Psyche

I

Cupid and Psyche, Antonio Canova, 1796

As often happens when I have even a little time to myself, I am thinking about myths and legends. This morning it is the peculiar romance of Cupid (or Eros) and Psyche.  Stories where gods fall in love with mortals are of particular interest to me. 

I love this sculpture, pictured in part, above.  The hands of the figures are so tender, it is amazing to imagine that this was once a piece of featureless marble. The anatomy is soft and beautiful as they caress each other. They are captured in the lips parted moment before a passionate kiss. 

Psyche had the misfortune of being born so beautiful that she made Venus jealous. Making a goddess feel envy is often cause for terrible punishment in these tales. Yet Psyche prevails and even gets to drink ambrosia and become immortal herself. That Cupid falls in love with her because he scratches himself with his own arrow is unfortunate. That Psyche is merely beautiful and not also wise is also a drawback. But It is a mysterious and charming story, full of invisible forces and ardent lovers that insist on having the lights off.

Without love, the world grows old and loses its color. Cupid and Psyche had a child together, the Goddess Volupta, who personifies sensual love and is one of the Three Graces. The gods didn't have that before. It took the human touch to create it. 

What the hell is my point? I'm just rambling, mostly. But in part I harbor a secret wish that I could contain some spark of inner beauty that would cause the divine to look on me favorably and create something of worth in me. Something that is unique in the world and fills it with pleasure and joy.

Instead of God the Father, this is God the Lover, and it is an interesting concept. It would be nice to have an intimate and mutually loving relationship with a god, even a minor one. Most of the time I experience the divine as largely indifferent to the minutiae of my life experience. Wouldn't it be nice to have a kiss of greeting and have God ask, "Honey, how was your day?"

Poetry-Talk to Me

Deep thinker, contemplate me.
Wonder what my opinion is
Ask my existential input
Help me sharpen the finer points.

Don't instruct me, lead me
Down ancient paths, into unlit caves
Spread light and find, perfectly preserved
Wordless art in the womb of the world.

Take my hand even as it grows,
Filling your palm but still willing to be held.
Beckon me to behold in watercolor hue
The Impressionism of your heart.

Ask me why the dogma chafes
And why I shrug off my small town church.
Keep welcoming me to the conversation
Even if I never change my mind.

Over tea and Mozart bend
In tete a tete in foreign tongues.
Buttered batard and charcuterie
Precious currant jam now lost in time.

Wisdom passed hand to hand
And whisper kisses on my fevered brow.
I need it now, as ever and as strong
As when I was bundled in old country wool.

Eternity is now, time swirls and slides.
Folding like croissant dough and hearth-warmed.
Is there some talisman to open my ear
So I hear beyond my faulty filter?

Even if I don't understand.
Even if I cry out in pain.
I yearn to hear you murmur softly.
Talk to me, just talk to me.

Stacie Ferrante
10-30-09

Poetry-Sol Invictus

Light returning, eternal, many-faced,
Many-named orb, turning and warming.
Chase chill from weary bones;
Rise up from virgin loins and rule.

Wise men come, and fools alike
Pay pilgrimage to your pauper's cradle
Embalm you, anoint you, enrich you,
Raise you up with Benedictions.

Praise you with no understanding of you
In hymns and fevered whispered prayers.
In you we invest Peace On Earth
And Goodwill Toward Men.

We are made from stardust, all.
Hydrogen lifts us to stardust again.
Souls scattered, we intermingle
Gods and men of common clay.

Violent in delicate equipoise
Exploding and collapsing, turning lead to gold,
And energy to matter, matter to energy.
Ensoul the quickening Holy Womb.

Inside the nucleus of resting ova
Supernova in potentialis
Each child a God in its own way
Down to mitochondrial DNA.

Sol Invictus, spiraling in
Find this spiritual Lazarus a home.
Resurrect in blastocyst form
Inspire Icarus in reckless flight.

(c) Stacie Ferrante
12-18-08

Poetry-Goddess of Love and War

I drive the tempest before me
Chaos swirls in my wake
But in the eye of the wailing winds
I tremble sometimes and long for calm.

Always so happy making trouble
And loving fiercely, each in turn
Laying my hands on those who linger
But guarding my heart with poison words.

With a knowing smile and curving hips
I'll draw you close to examine you
Testing with my tongue as soft as a moth
For chinks in your armor that could undo you.

No one stays my equal for long
As I drive myself like a weary sled dog.
No one can get me to rest and dream
So they wave goodbye to my sorrow shaken back.

I will pause for gentle love;
Strong as earth and fierce as fire.
Sweep me into arms brave enough to hold me
Unbuckle my chariot and let the lions free.

I'll always need a heroic friend,
A place for my gaze other than the horizon.
I'll entreat you in the morning to remain
To soothe me into soft repose once more.

Withstand me as I wash over you
Give me an unbreachable fortress
And I'll lean my back against yours
And make my stand against the world.

Someday they'll tire of their trebuchets,
Leave the misty mountain to its mysteries
And you and I shall toast and boast,
And decide for ourselves what to conquer next.

(c) Stacie Ferrante
12-2-08

Hawk Sighting

I have been having some very close encounters with wild animals lately. I still am in awe of the owl sighting I had some weeks back. The other day I had a hawk swoop out of a tree I was passing under, trailing fluffy clouds of quail feathers in its wake. (I interrupted his breakfast, I guess.) But he went by SO CLOSE to me. It really caught my attention. It isn't that unusual to have a hawk sighting here, but not usually so close.

Since I put up the owl medicine link last time...

Here's some Native American lore about the hawk: (from: http://media.www.thecampanil.com/media/storage/paper936/news/2007/04/30/Opinions/Joanna.Iwata.Speaks.On.Hawk.Medicine-2888738.shtml )


"Hawk medicine. The power of perspective. The messengers of spirit. It has been said within most native cultures that "hawks have the power to soar high above the earth, giving them a perspective previously only available to the inhabitants of the heavens above." As they bring wisdom from the heavens and the value of their higher vision down to earth, they remind us that there is a bigger picture to be seen. Hawks are most often viewed as visionaries, as they use their keen insights to focus on what needs our attention in order to accomplish our goals.
They see clearly what is not visible unless sought. Hawks also teach us how to interpret and then follow our personal vision. Hawks also remind us to consider a larger perspective, one that inspires us to move through the world we inhabit with "strength, certainty, and grace." In Avalon's interpretation of hawk medicine, she also speaks to the hawk's ability to look directly into the sun and see what is not visible to the rest of us.
She goes on to speak to the spirit of the hawk that resides within each of us in our capacity to operate from a more expanded frame of mind, wherein we can access and follow our own personal truth and vision."

Remember, But Absolve

Yum, madeleines...

Oh, sorry. I got looking at this picture and was lost in thought.

I had an interesting weekend. Not so much in outer events, but in inner ones. I was very in my head, since I was writing a research paper among other things.

I should have tried to write this yesterday, but my hands hurt from all the typing I was already doing. I'll try to do my epiphany some justice here anyway.

I was a little put out to hear that the people who tried unsuccessfully to sue me for libel actually took their appeals to the Supreme Court. Then I found out that after the high court refused to hear their case, they elected to write a "memoir" about their experience. They used everyone's real name and had some not so great things to say about me and my editor and friend, Ted. We come off as a regular Hitler and Mussolini vaudeville act, twisting mustaches and all. Feh. That made me a little dyspeptic.

I decided that on Saturday I would allow myself to have whatever feelings I wanted about it, and then I would get over it. Since giving it any more attention than that would just give these people the attention they so desperately crave, I elected to make a phone call to the legal department of the newspaper on Monday and then take no other action unless...unless I don't know what.

Then I went to the gym and had an epiphany on the elliptical trainer thingie. I really, REALLY don't want to end up like that, obsessed over and continuing to be hurt by the past and allowing things to "ruin my life".

Then I thought about the various things and people in my past I am obsessed about and continue to be hurt by. How am I different from them, after all, if I still feel bad about those things?

And then I head the thought. And it was a good one: "Those people can't hurt me, because I have all the power. I can decide whether to absolve them. That is way more potent than what they do to try to hurt me."

Something like that. It came to me in a rush of feeling, and I felt the truth in it. What if I just had compassion for the people who have tried to "ruin my life" and saw that for what it is: more about them than about me. That is just sort of sad. I can be the bigger person in that scenario without feeling like a chump.

What would happen if I could apply that feeling not only to the people who wrote the book, but to heavier hitters in my life? How about all of them? What if I just refuse to give people permission to injure me, and just felt sorry for those that try? Like, real pity?

The people that hurt me when I was just a kid are still jerks. I was not the adult, and as the child in those situations I deserved love and protection. I didn't get it. But I can absolve them and refuse to be diminished by holding on to those judgments as though they are relevant to who I am now.

Already things are happening as a result of this shift in perspective. I have been validated in my truth. This idea will work. It doesn't mean I don't learn from those experiences or remember the events. But as the one doing the absolution, the power is all in my hands. I finally get it.

So, David and Beverly (King) Pegasus, I absolve you. In trying to hurt me, you have given me a gift. In hating me, you have taught me how to love myself so I never end up like you. It is a powerful lesson, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Sacred or Profane?

I'm a combination of prodigy and late bloomer. When I was super young, I had a natural talent for some things, particularly in the realms of spirituality/sixth sense. My gaze had a way of unnerving people with something to hide. Some grownups found me to be unaccountably creepy even when I was being cheerful. Unlike my cousins, you were more likely to find me with my nose in a book than outside playing softball. If I did go outside, I was just as likely to be talking to a tree as another person.

For a while, the way I was different mattered to some people, either in that I had some spark of wisdom about me or I was totally crazy. Or both. For a few years, I was about as disconnected from everyday reality as it gets, all without the expense or legal troubles that accompany those who take drugs. It was wonderful and miserable at the same time. I was like one of those crazy Hindu savants on a good day, and on the bad days, well, yeah, not so much. As you might gather, it kinda depended on whether I was in an accepting environment or not. Much of the time I felt genuinely haunted, as much as a person can resemble the haunted Tower of London on the inside. I had some accomodating friends who took care of me essentially. While I am grateful to them, it has rendered those friendships unbalanced, perhaps for life.

On a few occasions, I delved into my natural inclination for Eastern thought and New Age hoodoo and really got somewhere with it. I managed to become both more grounded and more profoundly connected to whatever force animates me. I got a little full of myself, perhaps, but at least I had perspective. Whatever spiritual forces were at work on me had some meaning and I felt more at ease with it. I meditated. I came up with some framework for how my head worked. I started to act (be?) more "normal". I learned how to shut the door on those clamoring spectres and tried to get on with my life albeit with a late start.

Cut to today.

When I went back to school for my nursing program prerequisites, I didn't know I would have such a knack for Biology. Go figure, I'm now doing as well at science stuff as I used to do well with other more creative things. My lab reports amuse as well as inform. I get a real kick out of doing things you can actually PROVE.

But something has happened to me in the intervening years vis a vis my spirituality. I was already agnostically leaning, but something has happned to make me utterly disconnect. Not in a haughty, "I'm a scientist now, therefore athiest." kind of way, but in ways that make me almost as uncomfortable as being too connected did.

I feel like at least one turning point came to me in the Anatomy lab. I had really worried about how seeing and handling the cadaver was going to affect me. However, unlike some of the other students, I took to it with ease. Some of them thought I was creepy because I was willing to be in there with him for long periods by myself. There I was, back to being unintentionally creepy, for totally different reasons. Or maybe the same ones?

You know what was comforting? There was this dead man, and there was no LIFE in him at all. While I had feared that I would find some remnant of who he was clinging to him, there was nothing, only the facts of his biology. He had a stent in one of the arteries of his liver. The first time I held his heart in my hands, I felt really grateful to him. Here was a guy who had given his body so that I and countless others could learn something. That's awesome. We were all really respectful of him.

But as I have moved into a place in my life where I have been under a lot of stress, having even a pinch of simple faith would be handy right about now. And I lack it in a way that feels like an estrangement not only from my old friends but from God/Goddess as well. My mother keeps telling me to pray, but I feel like I did such a good job of closing that door, that now I find myself outside it, dying to get in but terrified to knock.

I'll forge ahead, regardless, even if it isn't very good for me to be as coldly scientific as it was to be floridly spiritual. I also don't want to look back on my past and see nothing but pathology there. As such, I find I just have to not talk about it, or not talk to people who frame their view of me with the timber torn from my temple.

Maybe that longing goes away in time. Maybe if I spend more time in the presence of the empirical, the logical, my yearning for a place in the mystical will fade. I fear that it won't, mostly because other things or people I have longed for are still with me.

Somewhere outside that fear is likely where the truth lies. I'd hate to be the world's most uneasy athiest, because to deny that God exists is a lie I don't dare tell myself. I know for a fact that there is something out there, outside the permissions of my consciousness. Just because I can't hear it speaking to me anymore doesn't mean it doesn't whisper, hoping I will strain to listen.

Firefighters Wanted

Know any firefighters? Especially from San Francisco?

I'm doing some research for my next writing project. I want my protagonist to be a big, strapping fireman, and I need to research what it is really like to have that job/lifestyle. And I want to set the story in San Francisco, because I love it there so much. New York has the iconic fireman status, but I don't really know New York as well.

I also need some good sources about antidiluvean (pre biblical flood) cultures and lore. Particularly about Nephilim and angels.

Also, has the whole storyline involving the "Angel of Death" been done, well, to death? I have this good idea, and I really like it, but I want to put a unique spin on it if possible. I'm going to read some similar books to see if I can add something to that mythos.

I'm trying hard not to psych myself out on that score. I work in spooky urban fantasy for the most part. Supernatural and spiritual themes run all through my work. But lately I have stalled out on new projects partly because I have had that "nothing new under the sun" feeling about some of the ideas I am having.

That may at least partly be due to lack of confidence. But I am willing to take my time to research this one well and develop strong plot and character outlines first. I don't want to jump in and get muddled around the middle like I sometimes do. Although I do think it is funny when my characters get painted into a corner and have to find a way out.

The Cheerful Chapeau

Image: http://www.qualityfleece.com/hats.php

I had a pretty crappy day Friday, so crappy in fact that I don't even want to go into my feelings about it to write it down.

One of the things I had to do was take A for a visit with her bio-dad, which means that I have an hour to myself downtown. I walked to my favorite coffee house, the one where that cute boy flirted with me. I think the cute boy has moved on, because I haven't seen him on subsequent visits.

It was bitterly cold outside, so even though it didn't match my coat, I was wearing a pink fleece beanie hat sort of like the one pictured above, but with little embroidered snowflakes on it.

Another scruffy-looking, blue eyed, dark haired boy was working that day. This place seems to employ a number of them. I ordered the usual, a medium sugar-free hazelnut latte.

He asked me how my day was going, and I was having such a bad one that I was prepared to lie and say I was doing great, because telling the truth, even a little, would have caused me to leak from the eyes in public. He then smiled at me and said "You must be having a great day. What else could you do with such a great hat?"

I had to smile. There I was, feeling about as low as I could be, and some angelic person came along to lift me up just a little. I wouldn't be shocked if I never see that kid again. It was almost like he was placed in my path to keep me from feeling morose when I needed all the strength I could muster. I'm always grateful when that happens, because to me it means that I still have the power to see spiritual forces at work in my life.

When I was done with my coffee I walked back to the county office to pick up A. Her father chose to get confrontational with me and said some hostile and emotionally blackmailing things. I managed to draw myself to my full height (5'3") and held my ground without resorting to saying all the things I was thinking. He is still almost a full foot taller than me, and has a criminal record that includes violence, but I set my jaw and showed him that I wasn't the marshmallow that he thought I was. I doubt it made an impression, but I guess I needed to do that for my own good. Being afraid of him will get me nowhere, and it doesn't help me assist A in sorting out her feelings about him later in life.

After I reported his inappropriate conduct to A's caseworker, I felt pretty shaky and upset, but I jammed that cheerful chapeau on my head and pressed on. I'm always going to have a fondness for that hat now. It has angel-attracting properties.

Hail, Janus!

In Roman mythology, Janus (or Ianus) was the god of gates, doors, doorways, beginnings, and endings. He was worshiped (via animal sacrifice, given Roman custom and practice) at the beginning of any new venture, births, deaths, marriages, and as a young person entered adulthood.

Janus is usually depicted as having two faces: one looking forward and one looking back. Sometimes one face is young and the other more mature with a beard. He represents a unification of past and future, and how the present is the gateway to both.

I need to get my head wrapped around that.

In our current "civilized" Western culture, we don't have a god for changes, for big transitions; I think we really need one. Christianity, with its one God, seems totally focused on the next life and chooses to ignore the past, especially the events before one is "saved" as unimportant. It might be easier to embrace change if we accept that part of us will always look back, but that we can look forward at the same time. That is a type of optimism that I might be able to practice. Far easier, anyway, than the relentless cheeriness of only looking forward, as if the past didn't matter. That kind of Pollyanna-ism always seems to fall short for me.

During times of war, the doors to Janus' temple were always left open, only to be ceremoneously closed when peace was declared. This didn't happen very often. Life is change, and conflict seems woven into the fabric of who we are. It would be nice, I guess, if we could have a little peace and shut the door, saving the moment for a little bit longer before we charge ahead into the next cycle of beginnings and endings. But isn't it better to know that even the ancient Romans knew how to celebrate the transition?

While it would be pleasant to have a few still, quiet moments, I'm going to see today as my Janus gate. I may still look back, but that doesn't mean I can't still look forward at the same time. If I keep the gate flung wide, then the new things in my life can come.