Monday, November 14, 2005

Trigger Poem, Weil, The Paper Bag, Women's Writing Groups, Cancer Lifeline, Week of Nov. 7th

The Paper Bag

Fill up a paper bag with
Spring sounds and
Open it in December
Fill up a paper bag with
Snow flurries and
Use them to decorate your bedroom
Fill up a paper bag with
Ribbons and
Fly them when you want a word with the wind
Fill up a paper bag with
Winter quiet and
Open it when it's time to be alone
Fill up a paper bag with
Your favorite words and
Shake it till a good story comes out
Fill up a paper bag with
Secrets and
Share them with a friend every so often
Fill up a paper bag with
Velvet
Just to have it

-Zaro Weil


“Paper Bag” from Mud, Moon and Me by Zaro Weil
copyright © 1989 by Zaro Weil

4 comments:

Puah said...

Hi Esther,thanks for your comments, especially on "You, Me." Isn't it odd the way once I've gone inside a character she stays with me with all her feelings. I can't go into the family members/feelings though, the way you can get inside them - I'm still thinking of your father [Iser] ...

Esther Altshul Helfgott said...

Response to "Paper Bag"

from Cynthia (Thursday class)

Hello Esther,

Here is what I wrote in class last Thursday, cleaned up a little.

Cynthia


The Ticket Waiting

There's something in the bottom of the bag
that has been ignored over and over.
It's lain there since collected, many years ago,
perhaps first in San Diego at a weeklong workshop
I attended in my thirties.

All these years I've known it was there, but
Like a precious jewel, or clothes too good to wear,
I did not take it out for examination or consideration.

I wasn't ready, or it 'wasn't me' all this time.

While the State of Grace we may all desire is not ours
alone to sustain,
the acceptance of it entirely rests within.
Unfold and review the instructions, please.

Trust is required, the complete knowing that safety
in the world is assured.
(Yet, who can be that sure?)

But maybe I can practice trust, perhaps decide again
and again, and yet again,
To wait, to watch, to open, with confident expectation,
for good with my name upon it.

This week I've told my friends that my endless passion for action,
outcomes, creations, accomplishments, or change,
is being tamed.
That now I choose to let things be,
To say yes to what calls.

I understand that, where the soul can rest,
meaning is defined. One lies cupped within the other, and gives permission to cease the search.

I picture myself now - and tell my friends this -
That this year I'm taking a ride around the sun!
I rest, I recline, I enjoy the view.

I breathe, think, love and be loved, and
The Earth carries me without effort,
on this trip of enlightenment.

The whole universe becomes my bag.

Cynthia Stimpson
November, 2005

Esther Altshul Helfgott said...

Response to Paper Bag from Barbara Petite (Thursday class)

SO FULL

Fill up a paper bag with dog food that Jo-z left behind when she died last
month.

Fill it up with candy to send to a daughter in Scotland because Reese's
there don't taste the same and they don't have any Red Vines at all!

Fill up a paper bag for a son with Warhammer since his birthday is this
month and he is such a sweetheart.

Fill up a paper bag for the Goodwill, St. Vinny's, and the thrift shop.

Go up on the Burke-Gilman Trail and fill up a paper bag with autumn leaves
for that neighbor from Texas who is enamored with our maple leaves and
their colors.

Finally, fill up a paper bag full of things to take on your trip, as you
run across them, and smile.

***********************************

JO-Z'S ROSE BUSH


Lap it up, a dinner of turkey giblets and kibble.

Drink from the stainless steel bowl the kids insisted I get for you when
we adopted you at the Humane Society.

Wag your tail,
Be beautiful

Under your rose bush,
the prettiest red I could find.

Barbara Petite
Nov. 10, 2005

Anonymous said...

THE TROUBLE
WITH BAGS

(after "Paper Bag"
by Zaro Weil)


The trouble with bags,
especially paper, is
no bag is
big enough.
I put an
apple in, it needs a
pear, & maybe a
banana . . . What's the
matter with a
peach, each fruit its own
psychology, its
reverent, deep connection?
--Not to mention veggies,
meat & pasta sogging
through, no telling
what you'll find . . .
Never mind:
I'm gonna
buy my lunch!


--Marilyn Valentine
11/17/05