Friends of Bill W.

[ArkansasPiscesGrrl]

Sitting here drenched in feelings of gratitude at the miracles of my life over the past 6 years since I found my way into the rooms of AA on Nov 8th, 2006.

Thanks to you, dear woman, for posting your thoughts in these daily poems and writings. I learned that I had to give back what was so freely given to me. That is what you are doing as well, giving back such richness to us all.

Thank you!

[LeftWriteFemme]

November 9

CLINGING



Large bugs cling to the soffits, upside down, as an alternative to the rain soaked landscape. I salute their efforts to find security in a shrinking list of possible locations. Awkward situations place me, fingertips and toenails holding position, trying to avoid life’s harsher choices. Bitter, chilling options are cheerful alternatives to no options at all. I can take the difficult positions as an advantage. I have survived and this is the goal of the game. I am here come what may. I make the best of the worst times so God can help me make the best of the best times.


Turn with the tide.
*
Picture Window


When God sticks His face in my window it brightens my day.
What that shining face looks like in other windows I do not know,
but I try to memorize the eyes, the brow, the winning smile
before my time is up and the wind shifts.

The flash of a friendly face lights up the house,
my yard, the corners of my soul.
I imbibe the rich glow before it moves on,
letting my core charge with incandescence, warming my mettle.

I am long and longing for this happy countenance
and only when the blocks tumble in my mind
do I realize that it is two- way glass in that window
and stick my face in it and offer it to God.

[LeftWriteFemme]

November 10

I DON’T SEE HOW



This is the smallest of the fragile excuses I use to keep from doing things to make me happy. Petty in a way I would never be with others, I rake my desires and tiny little hopes over the coals. Tired platitudes are plated up as first serves by my short order shortsightedness. Protecting crusted-over nonsense, I live the life of a lockout, not even a squatter on the fringes of my dreams. I stumble in my efforts to see hope, joy or my purpose, ignoring the fact that I must step from the box before I can see the horizon or more.


Rub your own head.
*

Olive Juice


For whatever the reason olives are often pitted
and once they are pit-less
there seems to rise an irresistible urge to fill that wound,
whether with pimento or children’s cubby little fingers
as they fish them from the can.

There is an opening, an answer must be found.
When I find my center gone
I have that same yearning, fill that hole!
It is an imperative,
a need that must be met no matter how poorly.

I will stuff just about anything in that gap;
the list is longer than the Bell directory
and yet none of it is an adequate replacement
for what has gone amiss.

So here I stand rife with questions.
What to put in there, what to keep out.
Is cream cheese preferred to cobwebs?
Prosciutto better than ice?

Nothing is better than some things
and the right thing is better than having given up.

[LeftWriteFemme]

November 11

QUILTER


What more comfort can exist in the world than a conglomeration of turned edges and love? Fancy stitches or not, the assembled world of cloth stands testament to devotion and diligence. Careful collections, meaningful to the collector and mysterious to the possessor, fulfill the primal urge to shelter and be safe. Time is testimony to endurance. Thread against thread, solidarity is strength embracing flexibility. The bed of life is made and remade daily with the affection of kind quilters’ needles of love.


Find a room for zeal.
*




Wrong as wrong as wrong can be

To be wrong in my family and in my past
meant to be tortured and I prefer death to torture,
so being wrong meant death or longing for death.

I tried never to be wrong
as a way to stave of the desire to leap from tall buildings;
I did not turn into superman,
wonder woman or mighty mouse through my efforts.

I did turn into someone else;
I became a cartoon of a real person,
two dimensional and overflowing with irrational color.

Now I see how wrong, wrong can be.
Wrong is not an allowable excuse to be tormented.
It can be the turning point for knowledge if I choose
or the stairway to something deep dark and ugly;
my choice, always my choice.

[LeftWriteFemme]

November 12

EIGHT MISTAKES CLOSER


I am eight mistakes closer to perfection. As long as I fall forward, progress is being made. I fail meticulously toward my goal, more cannot be asked. Loss, pain, frustration are strong teachers and great motivators. I suck each splinter for knowledge, extracting juice from every fragment for information. In spite of sprains and strains, I have stretched, attaining almost my full height. Growth is a wonderful thing, though cost is always involved. Mistakes are an unavoidable price but well worth the expense. They are an expense that pays dividends, dividends that move me toward perfection.


Stretch your body, flex your mind.
*


Clean Underwear

The ease of the trip is often determined
by the quality of the packing.
When I am entirely ready, travel is easier.

I wash the laundry early to give myself a head start.
Lay everything out and walk through each day’s needs;
roll up my outfits and tuck each into my bag.

I try to take less than half of my ‘what if’ worry items
and cut short my ‘disaster plan’ thinking.
If I pack positive thoughts and clean panties I am fine
and if I forget them …………………
I can always pick some up along the way.

[LeftWriteFemme]

November 13

FLORAL ECSTASY


I could eat fields of buttercups and drink down ponds of water lilies. Wear foxgloves and a pair of lady slippers, too. I could wrap myself in bridal wreathe and underpin with nettles. I could rise with the roses, lay with the lilies, shade with the sage, sing with the trumpet vines and run away from home with a Turk's cap on my head and a pansy in my pocket, until the four o’clocks say it’s time to come home for evening primrose and then bed.


Increase your tool chest by one.
*

When I’m Gone



When I’m gone ……
I hope they’ll say I tried real hard and did my best
But more likely will be the lament;
she didn’t live up to her potential.

When I’m gone ……
I pray the song will be one of tinkling bells and uplifted voices
But more likely is a disparate confusion of musical chairs.

When I’m gone ……
I wish that my banner will be raised by knowing arms
But more likely will be a shuffle of my undecipherable notes,
then the circular file.

When I’m gone ……
I would like my dreams to fly
to the ears and eyes of friends and take refuge
But more likely these dreams will chase me down the long corridor
and be nothing but my shadow in the long dark night.

[LeftWriteFemme]

November 14

THREE TOYS FLOATING

I bat the ducks across the surface of my bath. Soaking is supposed to calm me. I’m waiting. I assure you my impatience is no help to this process. These yellow, tub-bound misfits grinning at me don’t fill me with the joy of living, either. I have blown bubbles until I’m blue. I smell like a French elevator from the bath oils. My hair is stiff with conditioner; my face packed with mud. “Do the right thing," said my sponsor. She is such a pain. Here I am, bubble bath to my armpits, and not a hint of peace. Her question rings, “What do you want?” But isn’t it obvious? If I knew that, what would I be doing wrinkling in this swilling vat? I wouldn’t. I would be out doing my ‘thing’, whatever that ‘thing’ is. How I’m going to figure myself out I don’t know. And ‘she’ is no help, (you know who ‘she’ is, she the sponsor lady)
So what do I want?
World peace. A clue. Maybe just a hint.
But I know part of it. I know more than I admit.
I want sobriety and happiness, dignity and respect, enough time to do these things, and love.
“Well," says she, “those things are easy. Work the steps, then the traditions; practice them, do service, and take the advice you give to your own sponsees.”
I stick out my tongue in her general direction.


Creep toward the unknown.

*


Surfs Up

The first time I arrive at the beach the tide is a shock to me.
I had no way to anticipate it.
As the days pass I calm, realizing there is a rhythm
and that the sea won’t escape the shore.

Over time I begin to anticipate the movement
and then rely on it.
I learn to live with the in and out nature of the water
lapping the lip of sand;

What it brings and what it takes away.
I am human, I adapt, I survive.
How do I make the jump to blessing the moon?
How do I touch the divine?