Blood and Tears
I saw the phone number and froze. Why were my grandparents calling me? My family has been going through major problems and my mother had a bit of a falling out with her mother; I live with my mom and, well, life just complicates when I spend time with them. I miss them, true, but I stay away from the pain. I am sick of explaining myself and sick of hearing all of the sides of the story; I am just plain tired of being persuaded and dealing with the consequences of actions of which I am not responsible. Anyway, I hesitantly answered the phone and feared for the worst. My maw maw and paw paw were coming over to our apartment in minutes and had something very important to tell my mother and me.
My paw paw has intestinal cancer. He was having internal bleeding and the doctors did some tests. It is positively cancer, though its stage is, as of yet, unknown. In very good cases, twenty percent of the patients live; most die within five years at the most.
I cried. It felt odd. I haven't cried in so long; I suppose I have gotten used to pain and disaster... have let it remain in its surreality and ignored the impending repercussions. But, I cried today. I let it out. I allowed myself to feel sad.
It didn't make anything more real, though.
And, then, my maw maw told me a story. She told me of a time when I was in the hospital with Burkit's Lymphoma and throwing up blood. I was in incredible pain and she could do nothing but sit. I remember that the very day that I was admitted was the day that my little brother was born. My dad was home with my sister. Anyway, it seemed as if I had finally fallen asleep thanks to the morphine and she decided to go ahead and rest. But, before she could settle herself, I let out a groan that usually preceded the blood. She rushed over and, instead of getting sick, I said, "Maw maw... the kids in the other rooms... they're hurting." I could hear the crying from my bed and it made me sad.
"But, Madison, you're in pain, too," replied my maw maw.
"Yes... but, they don't have you, maw maw." And I fell asleep.
This made me cry even more.
You see, she continued like this. She continued to tell me of the pain I have forgotten and pushed aside. And she kept talking of all the places that she and paw paw would travel before...
"Madison has never been to Niagra Falls, has she, Penny?" asked my grandfather, by far the calmest of us all. And that was when I lost it completely. I used to be so close to them... I was closer to them than my parents. And, due to my maw maw's own struggles with her mother and to my family problems, we have fallen apart. I always end up sobbing when I talk with my maw maw and, eventually, drew away. I just feel so guilty. I should have been less selfish. I should have spent more time with paw paw even though it hurt.
You just don't know what you have until it threatens to leave.
To those who know me in-the-flesh: Please do not tell anyone of my paw paw's cancer. My maw maw would like to keep it quiet so she can spend time with him and not be worried by others.
Oh, here are your daily poem and composer:
Mussorgsky (and friends)
Opera is by its very nature a collaborative art: an opera composer needs a librettist; they both need an impresario, who in turn needs singers, a conductor, a theater and its staff; And since opera has always been an astonishingly expensive enterprise, they all need wealthy individuals, institutions and/or foundations to bankroll the whole venture up front -- not to mention audiences willing to buy tickets for the resulting production.
The opera composer, in the words of a popular Beatles song, "gets by with a little help from his friends."
Russian composer Modest Mussorgsky needed more of that help than most. He was both tremendously talented and tremendously impractical, and a serious drinker, to boot. In their original state, most of his operas were either incomplete or deemed too "rough" to be performed as written.
Mussorgsky was fortunate in his friends, however. These included the Russian composer and master orchestrator Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov, whose performing editions of Mussorsgky's operas earned him posthumous fame. Rimksy-Korsakov's version of Mussorgsky's "Khovantschina," or "The Khovansky Affair," premiered in St. Petersburg in 1911. Just two years later, on today's date in 1913, the Russian impresario Serge Diaghilev introduced Parisian audiences to this opera, with additional contributions by two younger composers: Maurice Ravel and Igor Stravinsky. For a 1960 production at Leningrad's Kirov Theater, Dimtri Shostakovich prepared yet another version of Mussorgsky's "Khovantschina."
All in all, a rather impressive list of friends, don't you think?
"Miss Shelley, Miss Hattersley, Miss Guilford . . ." by Rosie King, from Sweetwater, Saltwater. © Hummingbird Press, 2007. Reprinted with permission.
Miss Shelley, Miss Hattersley, Miss Guilford . . .
When I can't remember the name of my third grade teacher,
the only one through ninth grade
that won't spring to mind, I sit
wondering at the mystery of her.
Like a fan blowing cool air in summer, her face
bends down to me, strands of her hair-
it must have been long-or the rayony
swish of her skirt lightly brushing my arm
as my pen writes the letters very precisely, rounding them
in the new cursive, her voice a glissando
tinseled with laughter, her eyes crinkling-
the one who left to get married!-
up there behind her glasses,
the glow of her.
My paw paw has intestinal cancer. He was having internal bleeding and the doctors did some tests. It is positively cancer, though its stage is, as of yet, unknown. In very good cases, twenty percent of the patients live; most die within five years at the most.
I cried. It felt odd. I haven't cried in so long; I suppose I have gotten used to pain and disaster... have let it remain in its surreality and ignored the impending repercussions. But, I cried today. I let it out. I allowed myself to feel sad.
It didn't make anything more real, though.
And, then, my maw maw told me a story. She told me of a time when I was in the hospital with Burkit's Lymphoma and throwing up blood. I was in incredible pain and she could do nothing but sit. I remember that the very day that I was admitted was the day that my little brother was born. My dad was home with my sister. Anyway, it seemed as if I had finally fallen asleep thanks to the morphine and she decided to go ahead and rest. But, before she could settle herself, I let out a groan that usually preceded the blood. She rushed over and, instead of getting sick, I said, "Maw maw... the kids in the other rooms... they're hurting." I could hear the crying from my bed and it made me sad.
"But, Madison, you're in pain, too," replied my maw maw.
"Yes... but, they don't have you, maw maw." And I fell asleep.
This made me cry even more.
You see, she continued like this. She continued to tell me of the pain I have forgotten and pushed aside. And she kept talking of all the places that she and paw paw would travel before...
"Madison has never been to Niagra Falls, has she, Penny?" asked my grandfather, by far the calmest of us all. And that was when I lost it completely. I used to be so close to them... I was closer to them than my parents. And, due to my maw maw's own struggles with her mother and to my family problems, we have fallen apart. I always end up sobbing when I talk with my maw maw and, eventually, drew away. I just feel so guilty. I should have been less selfish. I should have spent more time with paw paw even though it hurt.
You just don't know what you have until it threatens to leave.
To those who know me in-the-flesh: Please do not tell anyone of my paw paw's cancer. My maw maw would like to keep it quiet so she can spend time with him and not be worried by others.
Oh, here are your daily poem and composer:
Mussorgsky (and friends)
Opera is by its very nature a collaborative art: an opera composer needs a librettist; they both need an impresario, who in turn needs singers, a conductor, a theater and its staff; And since opera has always been an astonishingly expensive enterprise, they all need wealthy individuals, institutions and/or foundations to bankroll the whole venture up front -- not to mention audiences willing to buy tickets for the resulting production.
The opera composer, in the words of a popular Beatles song, "gets by with a little help from his friends."
Russian composer Modest Mussorgsky needed more of that help than most. He was both tremendously talented and tremendously impractical, and a serious drinker, to boot. In their original state, most of his operas were either incomplete or deemed too "rough" to be performed as written.
Mussorgsky was fortunate in his friends, however. These included the Russian composer and master orchestrator Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov, whose performing editions of Mussorsgky's operas earned him posthumous fame. Rimksy-Korsakov's version of Mussorgsky's "Khovantschina," or "The Khovansky Affair," premiered in St. Petersburg in 1911. Just two years later, on today's date in 1913, the Russian impresario Serge Diaghilev introduced Parisian audiences to this opera, with additional contributions by two younger composers: Maurice Ravel and Igor Stravinsky. For a 1960 production at Leningrad's Kirov Theater, Dimtri Shostakovich prepared yet another version of Mussorgsky's "Khovantschina."
All in all, a rather impressive list of friends, don't you think?
"Miss Shelley, Miss Hattersley, Miss Guilford . . ." by Rosie King, from Sweetwater, Saltwater. © Hummingbird Press, 2007. Reprinted with permission.
Miss Shelley, Miss Hattersley, Miss Guilford . . .
When I can't remember the name of my third grade teacher,
the only one through ninth grade
that won't spring to mind, I sit
wondering at the mystery of her.
Like a fan blowing cool air in summer, her face
bends down to me, strands of her hair-
it must have been long-or the rayony
swish of her skirt lightly brushing my arm
as my pen writes the letters very precisely, rounding them
in the new cursive, her voice a glissando
tinseled with laughter, her eyes crinkling-
the one who left to get married!-
up there behind her glasses,
the glow of her.