Too full of me.. emotions, agnst, fear, abandonment, judgments, opinions, dis-likes, restlessness, irritation, likes…

Where do these fleeting illusions take me?

Not anywhere productive.  They do absolutely nothing for my peace of mind, sanity.

‘Grist for the mill’ of my soul… i suppose… ah yes.. truly I know.

But if I don’t write them out and sing them, I stuff up and my soul stomach bloats… and the gas from unexpressed inner turmoil builds up and smells as it expels and gets wasted in passing moments of sloth.  Such glorious visions of disgust!

Over-thinking the time I must take to let loose, release… these irritating old parts of myself that no longer serve me into words, lyrics, prose, song, melody.. nothing gets done. Like for instance, I must have a blog – a special blog – a certain type of design, color, layout, slows the pace of expression of self…  to almost nothing.   Placing these demands upon my non-technological brain stops the progress of the flight into freedom.

So while I toil to re-work this site of mine that holds so many pearls from the depths of emotional compost, I will not hold back from laying down the words… as the bloating is expanding into unbearable territory! 

To heal we must let loose of the old and unusable – the heavy pieces of “self” that must be given away, shared.  The stories must be told.  Holding them in our centers, buried for too long, they rot and those gaseous fumes smell like sin.

Let the words flow and freedom begin..

(c) 3/4/15 – Christina James – The Phoenix is Rising.

The fear must be absorbed into something..
It is ever present, underlying, deep, like a hidden underground stream

To separate the body from the Spirit?
To think about ‘being’ without this suit of skin, bone, blood, heart, breath?

No need to breath
No need to eat
No need to hear
No need to see
No need to touch
No need to feel? I won’t feel?

That ‘feels’ harsh… it seems as though I will be nothing.
I will disappear, dissolve, evaporate, be absorbed back into the Great Mother

In my daily praise of God, in my chanting and singing of his name, I fall into a space
of such intense Love that I cry…
A longing.. a yearning… a knowing slips in and peace displaces the fear,
absorbs it like a sponge

The ‘unknown’ pushes me toward God. Pushes me toward wanting to do
whatever I need to do, to make sure that when my body drops, that my spirit rises
and I am absorbed into the One, “hopefully” with my awareness intact, where I become one with my Creator.. I merge back into the creator. And so the question poses:

Am I not currently One with the Creator, only separated by this container that I am afraid of losing? Is not my ‘pure awareness’ without the ‘me-ness’ the creator?

Taking a deep breath – the breath of life, the breath of God.. the breath of the One.. the Creator… my Creator… I am a miracle. How can I live in fear?

It’s just that the knowing.. the realization… the magnitude of the entire thing is way to much for my small brain to comprehend. I cannot wrap around the entire magnificence and since I cannot line it all up, lay it all out neatly on a page, see it clearly, rationalize it, since I cannot understand one bit how all this magic works and how on earth all this perfect beauty and amazing creation that we see everyday was created, it scares me. Funny you know…. we really aren’t ‘supposed’ to know how “magic” works are we? Isn’t that why they call it magic? I would say that sometimes, living in the mystery is a not pleasant, especially as one begins to awaken to the ‘impermanent’ stage of the physical form.

I am just the tiniest fragment…. in the big scope of things.. I am a minuscule 16th of a pin head.. maybe even smaller and that is even scarier! I want to be ‘special’ to God but how can I be if I’m only a minuscule portion of a pinhead?! BUT I am part and parcel of God… I am part of the energy.. even if just a itsy bitsy teeny tiny part.

I guess I’ll just have to keep singing God’s praises and keep falling into that all knowing Love I feel when I connect using my breath and voice to activate peace and longing and tears and smiles and a happiness that comes from no where and keep trusting even though, even now, as I write, that underground stream of fear in my gut surges that I’ll just be nothing without this form I carry around that is slowly dying.

However, when all else has fallen away….. i.e. ‘The Great Way is made easy for those who have no preferences…” and “freedoms just another word for nothing left to loose…” (if I ever get there… and I pray hard I do), maybe this fear is God’s little hot poker… reminding me to stay aware… to keep working on it.. to keep letting go.. to keep searching, yearning, searching for the answers.. the truth.

Because this ‘fear’ that comes along and grips hard my heart at certain key times.. like when I’m hugging my husband, or talking with my Mom… or a good friend and knowing that I could loose any of them at any given moment, or when I’m thinking of the ‘unknown beyond,’ all of this only makes me want God more than ever, because everything else dies. Only God remains. Only the creator remains. All….ALL else goes through the cycle of life.. birth, living, aging, death. So I become VERY willing… humbled.. aching for the truth.. aching for Gods love to fill me and absorb the fear, and DESPERATELY SO. I don’t want to find myself achingly lonely, lost and empty as the years go on. I want to be ready when it’s my time to face loved ones dropping their bodies and when it’s my time too. I want to be ready.

As Bhagavan Das says.. ‘are you ready?’ “Sickness, old age and death are coming.. are you ready?”

Christina James
10/15/14

Is it alive?  Is it dead?  Is it slowly dieing from the poison I put on the porch around the yellow light blub.  The light bulb that is supposed to keep away bugs but it doesn’t?

Is it dead like the other insects lying near the base of the wall, underneath the stupid yellow light bulb that doesn’t work, on the porch?  All manner of moths, spiders, weird flying summer bugs and gnats?

Night after night they fly to the light and the next morning are dead or flinching and suffering.  They ‘fly to the light…,’ like all of nature reaching for the light…. their natural instincts guide them to the healing light… the light, that by a few deadly sprays of poison by a human hand, has turned on them and is deadly.

How do I justify not wanting to be bugged by the bugs?  Their life force poisoned and gone?

Everyday as I sweep the little paper like insect forms onto the Mother Earth, I begin to awaken to how I am poisoning Mother Earth.

How many years have I myself expected our Mother to just eat the poison and be OK?  How many years have I kept a deaf ear, a blind eye on my actions?  Lived in silent denial?  How can I expect our Mother to keep growing pure food for us, the cells of our bodies, the babies in our wombs, the animals and every life form?  How can she keep her seeds free of our contamination so the trees and weeds and flowers can keep producing clean air?

Everyone and everything is affected by a single spray of bug killer.

I’d rather keep the light off at night, because what’s worse?   Poisoning our earth, or attempting to ward off whatever is out there that I might think is going to do me harm, with a stupid yellow bug light?

And now… what do I do with the rest of the bug killer in the bottle that will most likely go to the dump and again be expected to be eaten by the Mother Earth?

My heart cringes in the immensity of the dilemma.

(c) 2013 Christina M. James

he kept up the landscape
and took care of stray cats
he kept us up to date
on the gossip at hand
about the people who lived
in the small cottages on Hamilton
where we lived too

his back was humped, his mind quick
his humor sharp
his laugh was big, honest and true

when Woody died and I moved away
he’d send me a card every Christmas Day
“Now when you don’t receive a card one of these years
you’ll know I’m gone,” he would always light-heartedly say

we talked now and again, rather occasionally
but this year more often as something in me ‘knew,’ as his pain grew
talking, laughing, keeping his death at bay
just for a few more months… hours.. days…

‘the one touch can opener,’
his new stray cat…
the latest on the president
small talk about this and that

his honest admission with a flirtatious hearty chuckle
that he couldn’t believe someone of my stature and beauty
would take the time to call and chat
with him.. of all people
quickly adding
he hoped Woody and Rob would pardon him
for being so forward and bold… about ‘that!’

I had to laugh, and now I cry
to realize his lonely heart was slightly wooed
his pain dulled and soothed
humanities caring and compassion – devoured soul food

a friendship formed and dropped anchor
years holding steady with Christmas cards and light cheery phone chatter
has been pulled up and put on the shore
my dear friend Dick Gondick has gone home

(c) 2013 Christina M. James
4/4/13

The heat and humidity of the WORST day one could EVER imagine in the deep South, lives inside of me with a will of its own, overtaking me at any given second with its GROSS STICKY SWEAT!

There is no waiting for the complete assault.. one must arise quickly upon the first sign of warmth…TEARING off all clothing, RUNNING AND DIVING into any nearby snow drift.  It is the ONLY relief.  An ice cold pool would also nicely do.  Or perhaps a cheap household fan that one MUST carry around like a purse.  It MUST go where you go.  Plug it in and BE READY at any and all times.  Sometimes I fantasize about a fan that one wears like a hat with a toggle switch like a lamp. 

Many times during these Winter and Spring mornings I have quickly let my robe drop and stepped out onto my front porch into the frigid air that then immediately lifts the GROSS, STICKY, HUMID, 5000 DEGREE moisture from my sweltering body… the relief is wondrous, pure glory!

But warmer Spring days are coming and Summer looms… and I’m just flat out doomed.  Perhaps I will carry around an ice chest full of  freezing water containers,  pouring them over my head as needed. I  can just wrap my hair in a towel paired with matching earrings with maybe a t-shirt with red glittering letters that reads “‘HOT FLASHING’ Please Ignore Me.”

Mother Nature may I ask, may I inquire, as to the reasoning in your amazing bag of tricks? The reasoning behind the need to make every woman a TOTAL INSANE BITCH while she does her best to smile and carry on as her entire beautiful body turns into a gross sweaty ICK? 

What is this torture?!  This physical insanity?!!!  Some kind of test?!!!  My patience is running thin and I can’t presently say the same for my suddenly rounded back end!  Is this also part of the plan?!  “GROSS, SWEATY, 5000 DEGREE WOMAN WITH LARGE ROUNDED BACK END?!”  I know you won’t answer so I can only complain, bitch, wail and moan myself through, visualizing the rapid and desperate tearing off of every scrap of clothing, and DIVING WITHOUT ONE THOUGHT OF HESITATION WHAT-SO-EVER, into huge voluptuous snow drifts all year!

And so they say….”This too shall pass.”  Well… THAT is the ONLY blessing of the HOT FLASH!

(c) 2013 (3/23/13) Christina M. James

Like the high piercing cry of the hungry Coyote
Wailing in the canyons of my empty spaces

Loneliness hangs like smoke from a leftover fire
Some unseen part of me choking, running toward fresh air

Many afternoons like this one
Mingled and twisted with despair
Indulging distraction, falling into addictions lair                                                                                    Manically stuffing down all of my fear

Severing a union filled with hunger and confusion
I magically appeared in your eyesight where I danced desperately unabandoned
The child unseen from birth finally free

Intertwining…
Rolling, swaying, sweating, praying…
Holding, crying, weeping, wailing…
The hollow deep, still empty, still aching

Romance so sweet…
Passion unmatched, love complete
Your soul turning toward heaven
My soul finally birthing the woman in me

You… slipping away
As I clutched tight the endless hope
For the miracle of your revival
Lost as you inhaled one last time and let go

Rising up, the world illuminated
Your final journey home

Many afternoons like this one
After you died
Sun slowly setting
Casting shadows East
The grief filling all of me

One day I too will leave
God my only constant
His Love my only reprieve
The only thing that soothes
The Hollow of My Humanity

(c) 2013 Christina M James (3/13/13)

the earth remains and is bare underneigth the night sky
the moon shines down lighting up the ember and ash strewn mess

the earth aches beneith the burnt rubbish wishing
someone or something would come and rake it away
rake and rake and rake until only the fine brown dirt is left

my fine brown earth… says Mother Earth
my fine brown soft and fertile Earth…

what did I allow to be built upon me so heavy, so full of nothing?
things things and more things… collecting dust..
now look at them as they lay upon me useless and full of nothing… no heart.. no soul… lifeless mangled trash

what was I thinking to allow such obstruction to sit and weight heavily upon me?

what did I think it would get me?  that it would beautify me?  that I would keep up with the other patch of earth next door with it’s manuicured gardens and huge stucco mansion?

I forgot how to breath with all that sitting on top of me!

i can’t wait until the rakes come and the bull dozers and the garbage trucks! yes that’s quite appropriate – GARBAGE trucks.. to get all this stuff off of me so I can be free… so i can see the sky, so i can feel the rain.. so i can feel the wind and the trees dropping their seeds upon me… so i can freeze with the winter snows…. so I can be part of the seasons again…  so I can expand and feel my breast fill with pride at the flowers, plants and trees that take their nourishment from me…

so i can feel the gentle hopping of birds and the stomping of the dear and the horse; the prowl of the lion and cougar and the scurrying of insects and the burrowing of moles…

so i can feel them lie down upon me in death as their bodies sink into my being…

oh how lonely i’ve been… dark and buried under brick mortor, cement, and sheetrock…

God please send the insurance agent quick… so the rakes will come… i want to see the blue sky and watch the clouds drift..  before the rebuilding begins

(c) 2012 (1/1/2013) Christina M James

years and years it’s what I wore
in my mind.. in my dreams
the ‘insecure attention whore’
love me… see me… want me…

i tried so hard
but nothing fills a form
that is only a ‘put on image’
with ‘insecurity’ underscore

“how long will this last?”
I once ask
a salt of the earth woman
teacher friend
‘as long as you need it’
‘as long as you wallow in it’
‘as long as you hug and squeeze it’

the old Indian parable:
two wolves, one bad, one good
Grandfather…how to kill the bad one?
don’t feed it.

my air filled form is losing air
sinking down into a crumbled
lifeless pile of image onto the floor

i threw the air pump away
it costs a lot of money to pump and I can’t pay
Dear God… help me find my way
one foot steps, the other follows
into Desert, Earth and Sky

not heading out full to be emptied
this time i’m heading out empty to be filled

(c) 2012 Christina M James

No, instead I’ve been moving again.  Relocating.  AGAIN.  We’ve been ‘moving’ again.  This time back to Oregon to the glorious green trees, rivers, lakes and ocean.  Lodgepole Pines, Firs, Madrones, Manzinita.  I love most trees but the tall statuesque Firs and Pines of the Northwest seem to be my relatives… my kin.

We landed in a modular home in the woods… glorious views from every window… with trees rough, strewn, tall, leaning, old, young… and the beneigth the rolling Earth, swaying up and down in tiny hills and valleys.

This is now the 10th move since I left my first husband the 2nd time, as I left him twice and this better be the last for awhile.  I’m pretty sure it will be since there is no money left to move anymore and where else would we go?  Unless I come into a big chunk of money and we can truly find the dream spot on earth full of forest, stream, and NO traffic noise, this is it for awhile.  We’ve got the forest, the stream – not a stream at all.. but the mighty Rogue River which is only 10 minutes away and the traffic noise is minimum so why not stay forever?  Well because there ‘IS’ traffic noise.    The dull hum of some throughfare below this plateu of forest we have landed on.  It broke my heart when I heard it… as I was imagining dead silence… with only the wind’s voice rising and falling, the rain’s beautiful hypnotic hum and the occasional squeaky aching of the forest shifting.  Some deep ancient soul life within me has been reaching and searching for that silence all of my life.   At times I’ve found it… lived in it, relished and delighted in the glory of it – the absolute silence sitting peacefully in my ear drums… the grounding quality as it plants my feet fully down upon the Earth Mother and allows that ancient Soul life in me to float deep within as my emotions rise and fall like the wind.  Walking and at times only hearing my footsteps… my breathing… my heartbeat.. the inner ache of sadness.. happiness.. the yearing of ‘life’… Yes I’ve been there, I know the place well and sadly it is not here in this beautiful park like forest where we have landed.

I’m sure there will be pockets in the 24 hour span of each cycle of time where the noise will drone into a simmer rather than a distant roar…. and I’m sure I will find places on the land where possibly the Earth drops into a gentle valley where I can find a silent spot… and darn it Woman there are much worse things to be had in our world… Lord have mercy on my silly whinning… but someday before I die… once again I will find and live on a wonderous vast expanse of land where there is no ‘traffic’ noise.

For isn’t all ‘pain’ relative?  The pain in my ancient Soul is real.  It clenched itself into a tight ball in my stomach when I first stepped out of the truck and planted my feet on the ground of this plateu and my ears picked up the distant distinct drone of TRAFFIC.  I felt it recoil and begin to grieve in the knowing that this was it for awhile as I began to weigh the other benefits of this place against that disturbing humm.

What has happened to our ‘ears’ comes the question?   From 2002 until now, I have looked at many homes as I have searched for places to live, be, exist, sleep and eat.  I always inquire about the noise factor and I have been continually surprised what people do not hear.  “Shut it out,”  “Turn on the T.V.,” “You’ll get used to it and soon you won’t hear it,” “I don’t hear anything, what are you talking about,” “Oh my gosh… I didn’t even notice it until you said something,” “well, you have to live way out in ‘no-where’  to get away from all noise,”  have been the run of the mill comments about the ‘noise.’   Am I hyper sensetive or is that ancient Soul in me longing for freedom from the ‘distraction’ of noise… the noise we create as we go about our busy, faster and faster, bustling lives of staying ‘distracted?’

We have lost the ability to live without distraction and we have lost our connection to that ancient Soul that ‘knows’ the extreme value of silence… the necessity of it…

The fridge in this rental home is a big noise maker… the buzzing florescent light… the clocking of the stove clock.. the roar of the central heating system…. at least when you walk outside, cries the ancient Soul in me, I was hoping you’d have found a place of dead calm silence.

For the time being, my friend, my guide, my aching yearning to flow as deep as you can through every part of my emotions, thoughts, without the least bit of ‘noise,’ for the time being, this is as good as it’s gonna get and overall you have to admit… looking outside when the fridge and the heater have stopped their rumblings and I’ve turned off the light with its intruding florescent BUZZ, looking out at the magestic trees reaching for God…  every cell is filled with wonder and mystery regardless of the ‘noise’ of lives busy distractions.  For the time being… this is is home I tell myself and the ancient soul within me fills me with its surrender, submission and I cry.

it’s bold, it’s cold,
manipulation is the game
it cuts, it rips
anything and everything to pave its way

there’s no hope for power
devastation of the soul
devastation of all good things
brainwash the babies, sacrifice the old

it fibs like a demon child
while it stares me in the face
challenging me to try and slap it down
but instead I turn away

no one can win against its force                                                                                                            most can’t wake up to save their lives                                                                                                  but when the time is ripe
Love will sever the chord

swollen bank accounts and bellies                                                                                              expensive cigarettes and caviar
dinner parties darling, arriving in the governor’s car!                                                                      unaware and ignorant…                                                                                                                                petty and pretentious pawns                                                                                                                        atop their slaughterous thrones of powers glory                                                                                     in the thin air above moralities laws  

there’s no hope for power                                                                                                                            it lies to keep its place                                                                                                                                  anything and everything it will say                                                                                                            to keep your head upon the plate

its wicked face disguised in social status whispers in your ear
as it shoots your veins with words full of seduction into ignoramous fear
it controls and keeps us trapped
while we waste our lives believing all the crap

what is there to do, what is there to say
as the world spins itself through a trillion stars in space

little men slinging hurtful words and false facade                                                                        wearing ill fitted faces and playing God

Lord forgive them for they truly know not what they do                                                                     Lord help us all as we fall…

(c) 2012 (10/31/12) Christina M. James