Meditations on 2012 . . . and Happy 2013!

Photo by Rosana Prada

It has never really been my style to sit back and reflect on changes, accomplishments, or other happenings of life that occurred within the context of a year about to end. An ending year was an ending year, and reflection seemed so cliché and backwards-oriented. However, 2012 has been a bit of a different performance, and by virtue of that, it demands a bit of a different closing curtain. As December slowly winds down, I find myself looking back at 2012 and applauding myself while smiling until my cheeks hurt!

This has been a beautiful year for me… a year filled with personal, academic, and professional change, growth, and achievement. As I navigate the terrain of a new profession, I am filled with both surprise and delight. To be sure, being a psychotherapist is everything I thought it would be… but it is also so much more. There is nothing more sacred in the world, in my opinion, than to be asked to share with someone his or her life’s most intimate, jarring, traumatic, life-altering, existential, and joyful moments. I am completely humbled by that experience, and I am filled with both awe and gratitude for every individual who dared to invite me, a complete stranger, to share that sacred space with her or him.

As my clients (I'm not a fan of the word 'patients') and I scaled, together, the cliffs, plateaus, and summits of life, I scaled, alone, the dunes, quicksand, mirages, and oases of being a doctoral student. I say alone, though I am surrounded by the most supportive group of people anyone could ever imagine: my husband, my family, my friends, my professors, my classmates, and even my clients (yes, they cheer me on!). So, though I am alone in my academic venture, I am not lonely. Still, despite all the support, this truly has been, and will continue to be, a Journey of the Self.

I have learned so much about myself, this past year, and I have accomplished every goal I set… and more… with flying colors! One of the most remarkable things I learned while working on these goals is that we can best enjoy life when we can live it mindfully… in the present … right here… right now. I also learned that life’s most exceptional moments are small, discreet, and undesiring of splendor. 

It is with great optimism, enthusiasm, gratitude, joy… and mindful humility… that I look forward to the coming year… and that I wish us all a 2013 filled with crisp blossoms and sunny horizons. Now, who wouldn’t drink to that?

Happy New Year, everyone!

xoxoxo

Nevine

Narrative Symmetry

Unknown Photographer

Night falls

with orchestral precision.

We sit in the shadows, listening

to the rain outside our window

crash for a distant audience.

And you say, like you have,

so many times before,

Waiting is beautiful.

Is that not so?

But that is your story.

I have my own:

Awake at night,

my fingers tangled

inside my hair,

I wait for you.

Time slices

my longing into

a thousand fragments.

I save them all.

Contretemps

Sculpture by Olga Ziemska

It always begins with

a moment of doubt.

A don’t know.

An unsure.

That is the exacting part.

The part where

the mortar cracks and

the armor falls and

we quest for hidden stones

on the muddy bed.

The part where,

There must be something to this.

I will have the last word,

slips in.

The mind greeds for its victories,

so the words congregate,

and the stories spill.

But stories are

the swaddling clothes

of the wounded ego,

the flawed foils

of a thieved reality.

Promises. Promises.

Come. We deliver.

But one intimation at proximity,

and they smugly demand

we keep our distance.

Only the body discerns

without vacillation.

Only blood is

voiceless and

true.

Everything begins

and ends

here:

Inside this body this life,

this labyrinth this journey.

Inside this vastness this space.

Inside this wall-less temple.

Inside this wordless language.

Inside this chariot without wheels.

Vanitas

Shadow of a Woman, Megan Headley

Something demands me

From behind that glass.

Longing. Ambition.

Recognition.

perfection

And I just want to stand

Beside myself

For a spell,

To observe myself

From this conventional distance,

To ponder why

I stand like I stand,

To ponder why

I wear what I wear,

To ponder why

I look like I look,

to ponder why

i fear what i fear

But then . . .

how blind, my winged ego!

To learn of these things

I might want

to thieve myself

from this place

To re-enter myself,

To see what I see,

To hear what I hear,

To feel what I feel,

to brutalize

this unutterable numbness

And then to smile,

And maybe to cry,

And maybe . . .

to weave tightropes

between clouds

To ponder why

And how

I am who I am,

i am who i am

To ask every question,

Without pause, without mercy,

And never to find

unbuttoned and

unpainted as i am

The Answer.

Distillation, The Third

Self-portrait, Nevine Sultan

Click to read the first and second “Distillation” poems.

* * * * * * * * *

What was it that made you weep,

My Ghost?

My absences were long.

Your eyes were stone.

We were grasping

for elusive lines.

You said,

I am the arrow that struck you

in the heart.

I am the lovemarks that painted

your wrists.

I said,

I am the agitated membrane that,

when split, liberated your defenses,

disarming the chaos inside you.

But I am also your blank page,

My Ghost.

Your truths are inked,

your secrets grafted,

inside my bones.

I see my history

in your eyes.

Why do we spar so?

I said,

I told you truths.

You said,

For honesty’s sake,

I told you lies.

You, My Ghost?

You said,

You made me smile

like no other could.

I said,

You made me cry.

You said,

Forgive me.

And I spread my ribs and

bared the gaping lips of

this wounded vessel.

And leaning into you, I said,

I do not negotiate forgiveness,

My Ghost.

Now, how’s that for honesty?

Found

Unknown Artist

On the eve of autumn equinox,

Something in my core…

The dwindle of summer, woven

Into pigments of yellow,

Red, and gold.

The crisp nip of air, coiled

Between feeble blades of grass.

The hollow vault of nightfall.

(do you remember?)

I am depleted… and I rest,

Surrendering my body to a thin slumber

Inked with spectral dreams.

I awaken drenched, confused,

Summoned,

Seeking your eyes…

My lit candles in every darkness.

My tongue hunts the

Throbbing skeleton of dawn

Through a slit of curtain, and

Lingers on the windowsill,

Awaiting the rise of

Morning, craving the wild.

The world

cracks

Open.

My lips part.

(i do)

Fall spills

With shuddering decadence.

(thank you)

I did not find this sweet libation.

It found me.

Saturation

Photo by Katie Barnes

I collect these treasures, one

by one, miniature breaths

culled from a vast ether:

The flaming sunset smeared on the sky

like so many dazzling watercolors,

The swelling intimation of clouds—

threatless but fearless,

The scarlet sway of the ocean,

The cursive tilt of your mouth,

The fiery urgency of your fingers

braided between my salt-crusted ribs.

My lungs are

Aghast.

Or is it the air that is too bright,

choking me with too much life?

Oh, angels of excess and overflow, hear

my prayers. Bless me with yet more

abundance and plenty.

Inside the cup of grace,

there is no space for emptiness.

Life is Beautiful: Summer 2012

Pages from my travel journal:

August 6, 2012

morning

and evening

we walk, leaving

footprints in the sand

i daydream

i stare at the horizon

i see your face

in the shift of clouds

* * *

Hotel stationery in the desk drawer. Taupe linen embossed in silver and blue. My fingers itch. I want to write a letter. An old-fashioned letter in the old-fashioned way. With real ink and real penmanship. With patience and mindfulness. What do I write in this letter? And who do I send it to?

It’s been so long since I composed a handwritten letter, folded it, placed it in an envelope, sealed it, pressed a stamp and a return address label onto it, and dropped it into a mailbox. The thought of writing a letter feels awkward… passé. The anticipation feels scrumptious. The dry touch of paper. The wet gloss of ink. The aldehyde smell of both together. The curvy ciphers of the alphabet. The simplicity of truth, written without fear of execution delivered by a single strike to the ‘delete’ key. Dark, bumbling ink spots scattered about, like purple stars in a white sky.

Human imperfection… it’s amazing!

August 7, 2012

I love islands. There is a certain magic about being on a body of land that is but a flicker of lava rooted into the ocean floor. There is also a beauty to being here and knowing I am completely anonymous. Nobody knows who I am. Nobody cares. From the random window, I’m just another speck on the shoreline. From the next beach bed over, I’m just another body sizzling in the sun. There are no needs… no demands… no expectations of me. There is only the lush fullness of life. And I am a diner at this banquet of plenty, indulging in the temptations that have spread themselves out before me, without the smallest hint of hesitation, yet knowing that if I could be this “without strings” all the time… for all eternity… if I had that choice to make… I would never make it.

* * *

This summer… like every summer… we’ve been talking about not going to the beach next year. We’ve been talking about Alaska… or Montréal. But we always change our minds when it comes down to it. We always end up saying, “Oh, but the beach… how do you compete with that?”

But … does it matter where we go?

I just love going to new places… and falling in love with them… and falling in love with the rediscovery of who we are. New place, same us… with a fresh twist!

August 8, 2012

A day at the spa: A watsu session. A nap in the sun. An algae wrap. A hushed and Spartan lunch of grains, greens, and coconut water. An eighty-minute full-body massage with hot stones and essential oils. A quick but hydrating shot of aloe vera. A peat bath. A warm cup of jasmine green tea. A carbonated bath. More coconut water. Another lazy nap in the sun. A visit to the hammam. A blast of eucalyptus. More aloe vera. A stop in the ultraviolet light room. A nod of the head. A final nap. A reverie.

This is heaven. I know.

August 9, 2012

I’ve never been a fan of Ernest Hemingway. Something about his writing style has always struck me as too sparse. Too clinical. Too distilled. But a couple of weeks ago, I was listening to an interview on NPR with Sean Hemingway, Ernest Hemingway’s grandson. I heard the interviewer say that she, too, had never been a Hemingway fan… until she recently gave A Farewell to Arms another shot. The wheels started spinning in my head, and I thought, Maybe I should try again. All the hype over decades… it’s got to be about something.

Sean Hemingway spoke about the release of a new edition of A Farewell to Arms, one that includes thirty-nine different endings his grandfather had written before choosing what was to become the definitive ending for his novel. I have always been intrigued by other writers’ rites and rituals of the craft. So I got online and ordered a copy of this new edition. I also ordered the Penguin translation of Fernando Pessoa’s The Book of Disquiet. I packed these two books and my journal into my carry-on.

And today, I have been reading Hemingway…

I had gone to no such place but to the smoke of cafés and nights when the room whirled and you needed to look at the wall to make it stop, nights in bed, drunk, when you knew that that was all there was, and the strange excitement of waking and not knowing who it was with you, and the world all unreal in the dark and so exciting that you must resume again unknowing and not caring in the night, sure that this was all and all and all and not caring.

… and observing the small granules of sand swept by the delicious breeze from the ocean and lodged neatly in the crease between two pages… and listening to the lazy sound of the surf… and feeling so very lazy myself.

I think I’ll close my eyes now.

* * *

folded sun chairs lean

against whitewashed walls

scoping the foamy slope

of the receding shore

August 11, 2012

How crisp the ocean, this morning! How shockingly, brilliantly turquoise! And how crowded the beach! I close my eyes and, suddenly, I am a participant in every conversation, a member of this circle… and that one. I am an active sharer in each person’s universe. I can hear even the most distant chatter between two… or three… or five. I sense the pauses between words… the breaths held in upper chests… the tongues pressed between teeth for discretion… the giddy smiles filled with sunshine. I feel every exchange as though it were mine, though I recognize these connections are external. Still… when I shut my eyes, as if to separate myself from another’s world, it is almost like I have stepped right inside it.

I feel like an impostor, a voyeur.

I crave for my own reality.

I open my eyes.

Something shifts.

I cringe.

I curl inside myself

like a burning leaf.

I come to a realization:

It is when I am most

surrounded by people

that I am most alone.

* * *

i am at home

in water, inside

the liquid ether of

that primordial womb

August 12, 2012

I finished A Farewell to Arms early yesterday afternoon. The sun was bone white… almost invisible… as I read through the thirty-nine endings (actually, there were more than thirty-nine). While I will continue to maintain my “Not a Hemingway fan” status, I did find a few passages in the novel to be quite lovely. As for the thirty-nine endings, I was hoping to find one inspiring ending. Sadly, they were all so dreary… and abrupt. Rather than evoke emotionality in me for Henry’s loss, Hemingway’s style and voice evoked a sense of distance and detachment… and possibly even a bit of anger. Maybe that was his whole point, after all. Maybe Hemingway meant to evoke in his readers the feelings of emptiness Henry experienced when he lost Catherine. I’ll never know. The only thing I know for sure is this: Ernest Hemingway is not my cup of tea.

This morning, I started The Book of Disquiet. And something I read snared me inside its rawness:

To goldenly stagnate in the sun, like a murky pond surrounded by flowers. To possess, in the shade, that nobility of spirit that makes no demands on life. To be in the whirl of the worlds like dust of flowers, sailing through the afternoon air on an unknown wind and falling, in the torpor of dust, wherever it falls, lost among larger things. To be this with a sure understanding, neither happy nor sad, grateful to the sun for its brilliance and to the stars for their remoteness. To be no more, have no more, want no more… The music of the hungry beggar, the song of the blind man, the relic of the unknown wayfarer, the tracks in the desert of the camel without burden or destination…

Pessimism? Realism? Submission? Or… trustful acquiescence to the beauty of existence… and the cognizance of being alive? Whatever Pessoa’s truth, this is what resonated inside me as I read his words: Life is beautiful.

* * *

Reading.

A brief kiss.

A light sleep.

A flighty dream.

A rhapsody of images.

The cawing of seagulls.

A soft awakening.

which dress shall i wear for dinner tonight?

The insistent calling of the waves.

A stop at the water’s edge.

Four seashells.

eeny meeny miny moe.

More reading.

another dirty martini… with extra olives, please.

Another kiss.

The inebriating vibration of the universe.

aaaaaaaaaaaaaah…...........................

Can I just say, though? I’m missing my house today. There’s something solid and grounding about waking up in the middle of the night and knowing exactly how to stumble through the dark without bumping into things and hurting myself. I know

precisely where the footboard of our bed is from where my toes rest…

precisely where you place your leg after you turn over and shift closer to me…

precisely how my hand moves in the dark, seeking succor from unquenchable yearnings…

precisely the sensation

inside my lungs as

our house loosens

its armor in the dead

of night… and breathes.

August 14, 2012

waves pull at my bare feet

sand gushes between my toes

anchor and release

anchor and release

* * *

Some mornings, I like to read poetry while we enjoy a slow breakfast. There is something about the blend of bread and butter with words that is sublimely elemental.

This morning… sitting beside the pregnant swell of the ocean… I want to share breakfast only with you. I want for no stranger’s words to separate us… not even the most lyrical words and phrases.

I want only bread.

And butter.

And pulse.

And the benediction of salt on our lips as we kiss.