The Curse: Part 2

  Even in death, a curse can still trap a soul and keep it from progressing and being at peace in the spirit world. 

 It echoes in my mind, still to this day, when that bruja from Los Puertos told me, “You talked a lot about him when you first started coming here—the spirit.  I think he saw all of these things going on and thought you might be able to help him.  You can help the dead.  It just takes much longer.” 

  At that time he had been a gray image in my dreams; a shadow in which visited my bedside in the small hours of the morning. We held conversations, most all of them were about me ‘staying there with him,’ and not to ‘leave.’

  As the years, days, hours in which my death draws nearer and the narrow chasm which has divided both the spirit and myself awaits closure, I think back to when the eruption, the horror in my life began.  Alas, my eyes are cleared of ignorance and I can see through the veil of witchcraft and sorcery which had been cast around me.  The glamour has long faded and the sweet-caramel scent of youth has become a stale debauchery of wisdom. 

  The same bruja had turned the table and accused me of conjuring the spirit, stating I thought he could help me, and that I ‘couldn’t control him.’ I lacked every tool and skill to conjure at that age, and never would have called upon the dead for I was much too afraid of them. 

  In the end, both I and the spirit saved one another. 

  She bound him and the others to their graves, but I released them.  I can think of no other cruelty of greater magnitude. “It will be dark, and they will be afraid,” she touted. 

 As I revisit this life-long relationship with the spirit, I know now why he was so restless, but will not say, for my wicked step-children know well what they have done. 

  It saddens me beyond all I could ever express that while the nonsense and foolishness was going on, the attempts on my life and the whores which were so busy envying me, a soul who was once a human being tried to get a message through to the world during this time of eruption.  Covered in soot from evil, I couldn’t understand fast enough, couldn’t interpret what  I was experiencing.  He shielded me from the whores, the rogues, and he led me to an intensely dark path of magick and voodoo.  These were the tools and skills I gathered on the east coast which made me strong, unbreakable, so I could return and complete what I ought have been able to do, but couldn’t. 

 Stand up to them.

  Once 2013 had passed, my life grew brighter and he showed me new things of beauty and meaningfulness.  The darkness had passed and it was once again time for happier occasions.  Days hadn’t been this more fulfilling since the early 90’s when we freely roamed the highways and took in every moment of bliss he’d experienced in his lifetime.  It was a time of completeness and content, a chapter of the amalgamation of souls. 

  The curse had never been resolved, though. 

  Many years had gone by, and the spirit asked me to learn the rosary. I happened onto a small book in a shop one afternoon which gave a detailed explanation of how to pray a rosary for the dead.

  Dreams had disturbed my sleep for weeks about nuns—strange visions. While driving my car and stopped by a traffic light in downtown San Antonio, an elderly nun stood on the corner and looked directly into my eyes.

  The spirit was impatient with me and sent me messages.  He didn’t want to wait for this assignment much longer. 

  I entered the church where his funeral had been 34 years ago. My presence was striking and I think even unsettling to the residents there.  The secretary uneasily turned on the lights and I sat in the front row, prayed each bead and verse.  While this went on, I could hear the rafters creek and pop, and there were disconcerting shatters in mid-air.  I stayed steadfast to the prayer and never flinched at the disturbances, but it was one of the most difficult things I had ever done, and my insides were afraid and shaken. 

  The spirit had saved my life and stayed at my side all of these years, and there is no question that I’ve come to love him.  Before my trip I’d found a box of things we’d bought when I lived in Brownsville, when I was young in the 80s—slide rulers, drafting paper, blue pencils.  It was just like opening a box of things from a late loved one; full of bitter-sweetness, smiles and tears.  If only I could have known you in this life, spirit. I feel I arrived too late.

  After the rosary and my tearful break, I walked away, just another stranger.  No one could have known what I was feeling that day. No one cared.  I’d done little more than frighten the superstitious locals.

 A slip was mailed to be for the donation I made for using the church that day in which I was not prepared for what I’d find upon opening it:  The devil was talking back to me.  The receipt read 666.

  I gave selflessly of prayer and by most beloved possessions in the name of the spirit, and taunt me though he may, the devil, or great evil, however one wishes to personify it, has no power over me.  Every charm and talisman I possess shields me; every prayer I speak strengthens me.

  In 1982 through 1988, I had no means of transportation, no means of completing college, my health was very poor, and people were trying to kill me. In 2014 I drove by my old house in a brand new car, my education finally accomplished, and I walked over my enemies. 

  Not only had I removed The Curse from the spirit, but I had removed it from myself.

Forward: This has been the most challening of all of the blogs for various personal reasons. I struggled with it for a few months.  While away in Bryan, Texas, I found myself re-writing the entire piece.  Upon returning home, I reviewed it and said "yes." This is exactly what it should be. This how I received it, short of a piece as it is.

 

The Curse

 

  Summoned to Korea by draft, the middle son was taken away by a downtown bus with eleven others on a warm South Texas, December afternoon. 

  The Indian woman had already lost other children to illness or still birth; the pain she felt echoed through every fiber of her steadfast spirit. An ivory lace handkerchief embroidered with delicate floral was clutched to her bosom, her black eyes flashed lightning bolts of pain as she watched the spirals of cold dust cloud the tail end of the bus as it disappeared on the horizon.

   The eldest daughter of Bishop, Texas, clung to her mother’s arm.  The year before last, her brother had bought her a new dress and she danced with him in her stocking feet when the shoes she’d been wearing started to blister her toes. His date failed,   but in actuality, he couldn’t find anyone who’d say yes to the occasion. He was too busy working and spending time reading books to socialize and get to know some of the girls from town better.  It was a good time that she’d never forget—the sister from Bishop who loved to dance. 

  La hermana si el baile.

  Her middle brother was sweet as honey and she called him ‘meloso.’

  Mother and daughter huddled together at the vacant bus depot, husband and father stayed behind to tend his fields without apology.

  When word had come that the middle son had been shipped out to Xiamen City, the station in China closest to Korea, the sting came most acute in the night when darkness saturated the countryside.  The family gathered around a hand-crafted, square wood table in prayer. The table was strong ‘though weathered from the elements and bleached on one side from the sun which caught it through a screen-covered window.  It was through this window the sweet night air entered gently bringing the rich smells of the clean country with it. 

  The Indian woman cried in the depths of her throat with a ferocious sound issuing forth as the likeliness of a growl.

  Each family of the Aztec, Inca, Peruvian, has its own familiar spirit, its guardian.  The guardian of the Aztec Gods long before them arrived in subtle, undetectable approach. 

  The prayers became chants.  The chants became a spell.  The spell became The Curse.

  In the name of Cihuateteo and Mictlantecuhtli, and all that command that which is above and below, I call upon the guardian spirit, the sum of all, the great darkness which was ever-present before the light, the most ancient of ancients, deliver my son from the military and bring him home to Texas, safe again!

  Eighteen months passed and the prayers, The Curse seemed to have fallen into the blackness of that night, had been eaten by the darkness and void, but it had not. 

  Honorable discharge, medical discharge, had brought meloso, the sweet one, home to Texas, broken, disabled and ill.

Disease.

  King Solomon bound spirits of the Lemegeton into brass vessels, blocking their entry to the world.  Over time, the spirits were released by other magi.  It is contemplated that the spirits of the Goetia are departments of the unconscious human mind, were cast away and bound into silence, then released back to the surface to manifest great evils. 

  The tragedies I’ve suffered have all been displaced into the dark corners of my mind, silenced and bound in brass vessels where they can no longer cause me painful memories.  I walk the path of gratitude and live in peace and grace, delivered from the battlefield and lifted into a sanctuary of amnesia, a frozen wasteland of sorrow-free emptiness.

They say the passion, dreams, the life within us dies inside, but it’s not true.  The dream, the desire sleeps the sleep of the winter tree until a spark of warmth reawakens it.  The winter tree slumbers in great peace, its roots firmly planted in the graves of our loved ones keeping us intensely connected, flowing unspoken conversations feed the tree all through the depth of black, solid cold, and when re-awakened, the spring brings the renewal much brighter than before, many more fruits and flowers does the soul then bear. 

In my youth I suffered a hot winter of my soul; an oddity as I shared my existence with the souls of the ranchlands in fear of them for not knowing who they were.  Although I didn’t recognize them, they were familiar, comforting and they were aware of my being a part of their interwoven landscape in a parallel existence.  I ached for the shabby, disheveled homes in the countryside for they held every happy memory I never experienced or was acquainted with in my life.  I walked the landscape of both this world and the next in sacrifice for the spirit and his yearnings to see everything again. 

Coming to know that spirits may request to experience those things which brought them pleasure on earth while they reside in the spirit world, a then angry, insulted, restless spirit man opted to incarnate what was to be viewed as an analogous experience behind the veil as a living experience with my help.  Terrified and maddened by all of those things I couldn’t grasp, I slipped into a compatible agreement that the feelings were valuable, meaningful and enlightening.  I learned to sleep on a dirt floor and freeze in the winter with the palm trees blowing overhead.  I learned to smell the sweet steam of tamales and bow-tie macaroni pasta the sister I never had made for Christmas, and recall the time we danced to big band music in the high school hall when her date failed. 

The sting and exhilaration of life is so keen to that which is dead! In great contradiction I had become dead to the familiarity and virtues of life when I was eighteen.  An unclean spirit which was the curse had drained my life as a vampire always drains its prey to last few drops, but was exorcised and placed into the brass vessel of my mind where it could no longer torment me, yet took fragments of my soul with it.  Often, the unclean walk before the dead to snatch their hosts away, prevent them from telling their tales and completing life lessons and experiences they could ne’er otherwise partaken in.  The mold-reeking bastard devil was cast out by my own light, and the spring of my soul then blossomed with red roses for as far as my eyes could see.  The souls of the countryside walked with me, in me, and we shared life together. 

The sun was bright, but the road was blackened by shadows, and thus began my dark journey.

The delights of the afterlife lived through my flesh brought to me an uncanny ability to know medicines, folk magic and math where I had no knowledge of these things.  The memories were clouded and difficult, so I studied these things along the way to better understand what I was undergoing.  Tools and a book of blueprints from the local stores downtown found their way under my bed giving way to puzzled looks, and I conjured a lie: These things were for my art class, and I was doing renderings of buildings which only sparked more questions as to what I was doing. For some time, I obtained commissions for renderings without any formal training.  I built small things when I owned a house, once, and had no recollection of how I knew such handy skills. 

When the spirit had, alas, tired of these activities, he sometimes liked to be my companion at the type writer and I supported his ideas for poems and folk stories. 

  At eighteen years old, before the real trouble started, the presence first made itself known and was seductive, alluring and made me fall into a trance-like dream in which we melded our personalities and I created poems from his words. 

Life of a Farmer

The Muerte came

and took me away

This took place on a cold

bitter Thursday. 

Muerte seized me from my wife

The white lady took my spirit

She took my life. 

My children called but I couldn’t answer

Death pulled me away, faster

and faster.

I saw the ground

Far below; the frozen farmland

Appeared like snow

The cattle roamed out in the pasture

Grazing, not knowing

This human disaster.

The grinning white skull

Enshrouded by robe, held me

Close and away she rode. 

Glory be, a sight to behold

The sky gives way and the heavens

Unfold.

Others awaited with laughter like

song

I knew my life had been good;

All forgiven, if wrong.

Muerte released me

At one with the sky

Never fear Muerte

But hold life close

‘til you die.

In this moment I beheld the spirit’s death experience ‘though it had been my very own.  The women who stood over him--the in-law he said looked like a broom-handle with teeth--was worried over him, the pain, sweat and suffering, the horror, then the peace. 

3:00 am brought me to the emergency room at Valley Community Hospital that night, March 1985, oxygen tent, fever of 105, packed in ice.  No one knew what was wrong but I couldn’t breathe. Thin and pale, fighting for my life, fools couldn’t see the spirits, but they could see me. 

The connection was so powerful I wanted to be with him, but the angel of death stated we had not fulfilled what was set out before us, and the task would be a long, cold voyage with tears, angel Cassiel would help see us through, and from that day forth I was the girl who loves the spirit man, the white girl who sees the spirits and had come to know the great unknown, crowned with a silver light which connects me to them, as the roots of the winter tree live and promise new life when the cold passes.  The grass widow was born with book and staff and a trail of sorrow at her feet, but an air of eternal laughter and light upon the crown.

The Dark Journey: Understanding

During the course of my trance and deep dreams, I came upon a section of time particular to me only, in the 80s and early 90s when the spirits of El Carmen had been raised up against me.

                   1884: Un Recucido de sus hijos, hijas, y demas familia

  Brought to the gravesites of many, I wondered endlessly in my dreams through this place not knowing why I was there and not recognizing where it was until many years later.

  The first conjure came with dolls buried there which were crafted from my stolen clothing by people who lived across the road from this consecrated ground.

  The second time, photos, hair and other personal belongings, wax images formed in my name were buried in the huge family plot of a man who had formed a pact with the Devil. 

 Why am I seeing this after all of these years?—the answer given was so that I could understand what happened to me and who had been responsible for the shadows raised in my life.  I understood, then, how close Death had been and recalled feeling His frigid breath on the back of my neck, His skeletal fingers curled around my arm. 

  A common farmer turned healer by grant of lesser demons had become the servant of the cauldron.  A gray shade invoked against me to cause sickness or suicide, a car accident, a gunshot, or any means in order to destroy my life and kill the living spirit so I can’t tell.  He was used to summon me and they questioned me intently about my personal business which was none of theirs.

Don’t think for one minute I didn’t know.

The eleventh daughter will serve the cauldron next and no redemption or prayer will halt this fate from happening for the evil dealt in this life must be paid in the next.  Bound to the grave will be punishment for sins against me and the three souls encased in darkness.  The living shall not hurt the dead, and the dead shall not hurt the living, but when the living take it upon themselves to play God with another’s life and to hurt the spirits of the dead, heavy penalties await. 

Imprisoned in my own house back then in fear, suffering and sickness, I found myself one sunny day walking back into time with all of the charms and power collected in my future.  I’d overcome and even outlived some of those trying to get me. Dressed in all my fineries, silks, and standing outside of the new car I’d bought a few months ago, I recalled how I’d wanted to die in that house because everyone had made my life so painful and unbearable.  Fevers, horrors, suffering ensued within those walls from which the likes no one would ever understand or even know of, and I had lived to overcome it all.  I took that moment this fine day and gloated over the past and all who’d failed to ruin me.

I know how many have walked in my shoes, have walked this path of hopelessness and despair, and have lost the battle. 

It was a dark and terrible road in my journey through time, my time, and I wished for the dream to end.  Before I knew it I was safe in the library again, August 2014, writing the final chapter of a novel and collecting articles for other works I had planned. 

When I’d finished that day in August, I had to wonder why it all took so long to arrive at this point and experience the happy events I had.  Safe from it all and wrapped in the arms of the spirit at my side, I had complete understanding of what I’d endured and what it meant to be brave and face the wind. Understanding comes in hours of both darkness and sunlight, I’ve found.  The road must be traveled to come home to the very things we want to touch so badly and truly be able to appreciate them one we’ve arrived.

What year is it?

 

2014.

 

I see through your eyes a lot of changes.  Reminds me of a world from a G.H. Wells book. Some things are not to my liking.  What was once clean and kept downtown looks like a downtrodden mess. 

 

I don’t like the world today.  I’m finished with the world and I resort to my books and writings, for I know my time is now very limited.

 

What is it you don’t like about your world? Why’d you oust it?

 

Everything is scary and uncertain.  I feel like the future is ambiguous, that there could be a terrible war.  People are hateful and petty.  My world is cast with black shadows of its misery and it is not a world I like living in.

 

Did you ever think—there were wars back then, too.  People could be just as mean then as they are now, if not worse.  People always did do bad things to themselves and to one another.

 

I suppose it doesn’t seem so intimidating—your world of long ago.  It’s like a certain book you’ve read and know how it will end, so you don’t worry for the characters.  You know what will happen.

 

Think of all the technical conveniences you have now, and all the medicines.  These things seem to make life easy.

 

They are nice inventions, and useful.  Sometimes, though, I think they complicate life more than ever.  Everyone has their faces cemented to their phones.  In this time, we have not just one idiot box to stare at, but a host of them in the forms of tablets, computers along with the renewed TV as a flat screen.

 

You can always turn those things off.

 

I suppose I could.

 

In 1944 we had blackouts.  Every town in America would turn off the lights at night so air fighters couldn’t see where they were.  We didn’t have much light out there on the ranchito as it was.  I remember laying there in the dark, feeling the hot air, sweating, sometimes hungry. 

 

In 1970, I slept upstairs in a farm house.  There was an attic door next to my bed and the flies would come in through the cracks of it in the fall.  I laid there in the dark and sweat not because I was hot or hungry, but because I was afraid of the flies.

 

You’re afraid of the darnedest things.  Flies are nothing. Swat them away. 

 

I believe I am afraid of silly things.

 

War wasn’t different back then, either, any more than it is in your time.  In December of 1950 they picked about a dozen of us for Korea.  Drafted.  Seems like the worst of everything always happened in December. 

 

I don’t remember hearing a lot about that war.

 

Sometimes they called it the ‘forgotten war.’ We went, we served, and then we all went back to our lives after it was over. 

 

I see you’re carrying two books at your side—what are they about?

 

These are about the war.  I don’t have a notion to share my experiences with you at this time, but I can tell you some facts.  Later, if I feel up to it, I’ll tell you what happened to me. 

Lin Piao was the leader of the Fourth Field Army.  He lead a surprise invasion—no one seen it coming. Back then, everyone was afraid of communism—loss of freedom to be what you wanted, have opportunities, everything that this country stood for.  That’s the reason behind the war.  It wasn’t about protecting South Korea. It was about protecting the world from some other threat. 

It seems throughout all of the history I’ve read, people have always been afraid of something. 

Always some shadow of fear hangs over our heads—something imminent and dangerous, promising to ruin life as we’ve come accustomed to.

 

It’s the nature of people—always need to take away from the weak.  I once told you: Protect what you love. 

 

I remember.

 

That goes for everyone.

 

He’s smiling at us from across the room—Double A.  I see him at the table over there. He’s the one in the white T-shirt. He’s looking at those maps again.

He’s been waiting these days.

 

What’s he waiting for?

 

He’s waiting for Lolly.

 

I see.  Will he have a long wait?

 

He won’t have as long of a wait for her as I will for you.

 

I don’t know if that’s good or bad….

 

In your case, it’s good.  You want to stay alive as long as you can, because you’re learning things, doing things that will matter.  Only so much time to get it finished, so don’t waste it. 

 

Aren’t you going to tell me any more about the war?

 

You have the books now—read them.  I’ll tell you one more thing before we part.  Elvis was there, too. 

 

Was he there the same time as you?

 

No—he came a lot later.  It was 1958.  It’s funny how one guy gets so much attention and the rest of us were just regular Joes and nobody cared—well, no one but our mamas.  I remember seeing that on the news back then.  We had a tiny TV and everyone bunched up around it to have a look at Elvis getting a haircut at Fort Chaffee.  I already had my tour, finished with college and was working at the time. 

I have to laugh—I can imagine everyone around the TV looking at that!  I can see it as if though it were my very own memory.

 

It is your memory.  They’re all ours because I’ve shared them, because I live through you and I gave them to you. 

 

I’ll keep them always in my heart, as I keep you, spirit.  You’ve shown me such beautiful and interesting things.  Somehow, through all of it, though, I believe this is a world you wouldn’t want to be in right now.

 

You’re very wrong.  It’s a world I wish I was a part of.  Don’t think I can’t leave it of my own will and go deep into my world.  I can, and I have.  Those are the times you don’t feel my presence.  This is a world you should want to be a part of while you’re in it, because you carry the message, and you make a difference.  Don’t be so afraid of it—don’t sweat the little things, like flies.

 

I was born right when the Great Depression was reaching its worst.  We didn’t feel it, though, down here San Pedro.  Most of had nothing or very little, we all farmed and soon as you were big enough to hold a tool or peel back a corn husk, you were put to work.  Corn was one of the biggest crops for years because it usually weathered cold spells and you could usually get about four reaps a year on it. 

(Red Cross photo 1930)

 

 

I was born when things weren’t too bad in America.  We rented a farm house where corn was grown twice a year and the fields were turned over during winter because it was much too cold for planting.  There was dairy farm up the road, and a little further, a pig farm. 

 

We always killed a…puerco…what’d you call it?—a hog—on holidays.  That was tradition.  In the winter, its blood was cooked with spices or herbs and everybody drank it for a kind medicine or tonic. 

 

I see….

 

Don’t give me that wide-eyed school girl look.  Just in case it crossed your mind, we aren’t vampiros, lobos, brujos or any other weird-o things in your imagination.  Look into your family and see what home-remedies they might have used.  How about that castor oil they used for ‘bout everything? I don’t need to tell what it does to your insides.

 

They did use that to treat nearly everything back in the 30s.  You’re right.  I remember hearing about it.  But—about the brujo part of it---

 

--Along with medicines, a raw egg, prayer to Guadalupe and a glass of water by the bed at night got rid of all of those other mental problems and bad dreams.  We didn’t have flu shots then, and no one went to the dentist or the doctor.  You got a tooth-ache, they stuffed a wad of cotton in your mouth soaked in clove oil. All the folks every place else in the world during the Depression missed all of the conveniences they once could afford.  We never missed what we didn’t have.

 

While we didn’t starve when I was small, we did have a hard time making ends meet.  We had two gardens on each side of the house and grew different fruits and vegetables.  We canned a lot of food and put it up for the winter.  I didn’t have to do any heavy work, but I did break green beans for supper.  Imagine…had we grown up together, we could have had both corn and beans for supper. 

 

I like that idea, but I’m still not believin’ you’d like my era. 

 

I would have; I feel like I belong here.

 

One thing you’re forgetting.  Other people would give us a real hard time because we would have been from different places. They wouldn’t approve of us being together.

 

I would be willing to take that chance, but it was never written that way.  I wish I understood what my connection was to you, all of the places you’ve been, spirit, and the time period you lived.

 

I told you not to go looking for yourself in my yearbooks, in Brownsville, in Bryan, or the train station.  You won’t see yourself in any of those places. 

 

Will I understand someday?—Will I know what it all means some day? 

 

Not in life, you won’t.  If you had all the answers, you couldn’t be at peace and live the life you have now.  Some things are secrets for our own good, you got that?

 

I suppose so.

 

Things from a long time ago are shadows of what’s done.  The road ahead is made of the same materials—it’s what hasn’t yet been done.  People spend most of their ‘nows’ in either yesterday or tomorrow.

 

Yes, they do.  We’re always holding on to that wonderfully delicious moment of happiness, or anxiously awaiting what is to come. On the darker side of it, we may relive the same nightmare again and again, and fear what is to come that the same nightmare lies before us.

 

In my world, we travel between the two by remembering or by looking ahead.  Some things are hard to visit because we want to stay forever in the moment and never go forward.

 

Can you take me to the place in your life which was one of the happiest memories?—Something you haven’t yet shared with me yet.

 

I can’t take you back that far. I might not be able to bring you back.  Better not chance it.

 

I’m willing to take the risk for what I may learn.

 

Don’t rate your life so cheap.  You might find it comes in handy to talk to people on the earth.

I have a better idea.  I can show you. Take my hands and look into river next to us. It holds all the memories of everyone here.

 

I see a woman with dark skin and eyes, black hair swept back. She’s wearing a navy-blue house dress and standing over a wood stove; something’s boiling in a metal pot.  It’s hot out and the steam is causing her to perspire even more and she mops her forehead with a white handkerchief.  I see a young girl and two boys with her. The girl is trying help, but the boys look as if they’re waiting to eat whatever’s in the pot.  The woman smiles and I can see she has the same arch to her eyebrows as you.  Her dark eyes light up and I know she loves these children, but the older boy is her favorite. I can feel it; I can sense it, but I don’t know how. She’s putting her hands on each of his cheeks and kisses the top of his head.  The smaller boy looks dismayed as he tugs at her dress. 

I’m outside of the house now.  It’s a gray stucco house and has a blanket over the doorway.  A man is sitting on a wood bench reading a newspaper.  There’s a big white envelope tucked in his shirt-pocket.  It’s too big for the pocket, but he’s stuffed it in there anyway.  It must be something very important.  I know this man; I’ve seen him before.  He’s you father.  The woman inside must be your mother. That was you she kissed on top of the head.  Oh, my gosh--you’re so adorable!

 

That’s enough moosh. Let’s not get all sappy. 

 

That was a beautiful memory.  Thank you for showing me this; I’ll keep it with me always. 

 

It was a summer on a Sunday afternoon.  Papi was home that day, and everyone was happy.  The envelope in his pocket was some money he saved to pay tax on the land.  We had the farm tax relief law back then, and the tax wasn’t as much as it had been before.  He was very proud he could pay it.

I remember sitting on that bench outside with him.  Everything was real quiet back then. I was nine years old at this time. The year was nineteen thirty nine.  The war was just around the corner, then.  Papi was never drafted because he had a heart condition.  He worked on the farm and drove rich snooty people around in their cars for extra money.  Even though the Depression hit hard, some people around town always found a way to profit and have money at that time.  They lived through the worst years, and nothing seemed to keep them down.  Back then people didn’t funnel drugs.  They smuggled goods across the border. 

 

Somehow, I can feel the emotions you felt back then.  It’s like I’m in that atmosphere.  It seems like so much happiness. I just don’t have the words to fully describe what I’m experiencing.  It’s like this high or wave of energy, emotions, all wrapped in this wonderful time of long ago. 

 

Our time together is over for now. 

 

I don’t want to go….

 

The next time we’ll visit the old country.

 

I look forward to it, spirit.  I have so much to share and so little time to write it all down.

 

 

 

What year is it?

Nineteen fifty four. 

Photo Courtesy of Texas A&M University Archives

 

 

I’ve never seen you like this before.  Why did you appear to me like you did in all those other dreams, with your hair combed down, old cloths, almost like a ragman from a childhood nightmare?

Look inside of yourself…look in the mirror.  I appeared to you as an image of both yourself and me.  Look at the features you drew in all of the drawings of me.  Don’t they kind of match up and combine the both of us?

Yes. I can see the resemblance of both of us in these drawings, now.  As I live spirit, so do you. But…the eyes are completely yours, for my eyes could never hold that depth of love, horror, madness, amusement all at the same time, yet with such a far off gaze as if though you were miles away. 

I was sent to be your nightmare.  Every bad quality I could have ever had come with that conjure.

I like you better this way.  I feel like I’ve connected with your soul and who you really were-not some dark image from the shadows.

I like you better this way—seeing things for what they were without all of the hype and foolishness.

Why are we here?

I’m taking you on a journey to long ago.  I don’t know how else to explain things to you except to show you how it was back then.  Take my hand.

I’m not wearing any shoes….

You won’t need them.

  I’ve fallen on the ground, looking up at you, as always, the sunlight around your head like a yellow halo, soulful eyes looking down at me.  In a place of beauty and grace, I can sense every essence of it; a place where many souls have passed over, a place of eternal memories where wars were learned and many had been sent to fight. 

 This building, I think, has been here the longest.  It burned, and this one was built in the early 1900s. 

The air is cleaner; everything is quiet and peaceful in this time. 

It looks peaceful…wait until night.  Things get rowdy.

What’s that old car coming up the drive?

Willys-Knight.  An old car from the early Thirties.  It won’t be long before they have that wrecked and under a tree.

I have to laugh out loud…why do you say that?

Because it just wouldn’t be the same without at least having one wrecked car propped up under a tree around here.  I have a feeling that one’s seen its day.  One of these guys will have a few nips out the bottle and that car will be done for. 

Where are we now?

The library. It’s a good place to get away from it all.  And there’s some dames inside at the desk to look at.  Not for you to look at, I guess.

Photo Courtesy of Texas A&M Archives

I’m jealous.

Don’t be…we’re in heaven, in 1954, and y’all can be Daddy’s angels.

As long as I can be your only angel for this hour, I’ll be content.

I have things to show you, so come inside.

Before we go, I have to ask you something.  I have to know. Why did you bring me here, and what are we doing?

I told you.  I have things I wanted to share with you—it’s a gift, for both you and me.  I didn’t stay alive long enough to be able to come back and look at it all.  It was something I needed to do.  You get to learn something along the journey.  I think you’ll like it.

Why did you choose me?

You listen.

I feel so close to you. You’ve been a lover, a father, a friend, a teacher. 

Maybe I feel close to you, too.  Think about it. 

General Reference

Photo Courtesy of Texas A&M Archives

 

Who’s that man sitting at the table over there?  He looks familiar.

That’s Double A.  He’s the one I asked you to print a picture of and set it up by mine.  Remember?  He joined us a couple of years ago and works here.

That’s funny.

Why do you think it’s funny?

Not that I’m laughing or find it to my amusement—I mean it ‘in an odd way’ that he should be working here.  I suppose he would be off doing something else in the spirit world.

 

We’re all marked by events that stay on our souls and we come back to them when we’re in spirit.  He came back here to finish helping people find things they were looking for.

 

This looks like a math book you’re going to show me.  And you know I’m not that good at it, so you’re giving me that deep gritty laugh like you do. 

 

How can I not laugh at someone who doesn’t know how to do a math problem without her calculator? We didn’t have those back then, mi guera.  Try doing it in your head.  You can.

 

You have more faith in my abilities than I do.  I’d like it better if you drew Bosco cartoons for me.

 

We’ll leave that out for now.  How about a history lesson instead?—we’ll read about the water fountain they put up at The Grove a few years ago. 

What’s The Grove?

It’s a place where they have dances and games.

Did you play in any games?

No reindeer games for me.  You know your place around here.  I think you understand what I mean.

Yes.  I know what it means to stay in your place—or at least stay out of places where maybe you’re not welcome.

 

A memorial was put up for Drake out by The Grove.  He was a big guy—important guy.  He was killed in World War II.  His folks set up the water fountain and the memorial in his name.  Here’s the picture. 

 

Photo Courtesy of Texas A&M University Archives

Did you know him?

No, but I take a lot of drinks out of that fountain. It’s something I remember, that I wanted to show you. 

I love all of the things you show me.  I can’t help notice you always have this ring on. 

It means a lot to me.  Not everyone could get one—not everyone could finish.  It never came easy. 

I’ll wear it for you, for as long as I live, and I’ll give it to the collection someday.  As I’ve said, because I live, so shall you. I will be your voice of things gone by, I’ll share it with others so they too, can remember.

It’s more than I could have ever hoped for. They tried to silence us both, bound me to my grave, tried to take you out right over it.

You saved me, and therefore, I will stand in for you and the souls of this place and recall their memories as best I can.  I don’t know sometimes how to put it all into words because so much of what you share is pictures and feelings.  It’s difficult for me to capture the essence of what passes between us, what has passed between us all of these years. 

You’re a lady of many words, and I’m sure you’ll find them when the time comes.

 

Now I know why you used to tell me “Howdy.” I thought you were playing with me, but you were giving me a hint.

 

I didn’t want to tell you.  I didn’t think you were ready to know everything at that time.  I know you.  You like a mystery, so I keep you coming along like a bird after a row of bread crumbs.

 

You’re hard and course, spirit, but I love you in spite of it.  I’ve never loved anything else, and that’s the God’s truth. 

 

Yes, you have, but I chased them all away because I’m selfish that way, sorry to say.  I wanted to keep you like a little angel---

 

--and I’m thankful for it, because I know what perils could have awaited me and I’d much rather sit on the docks watching all the other boats go by in the sun than sail the stormy sea.  Maybe I too, am selfish, for I never let you go.

 

I never leave you.

 

Life was so beautiful here in this time--the people were elegant and graceful. 

 

It wasn’t what you dream it to be—not always.  It was hard, and it was a hard square for me in these days, even after I came home from the war.  It changed me, scarred me forever.  I don’t think I told anyone that.  My mother lost other children—she blamed papa and his Spanish blood.  I never thought that was so.  I think life was a lot harder in those days, and to stay alive took a lot more work.

 

The light is flashing over my shoulder again.  I have to go, my love.  I kiss your lips and your beautiful hands and await the next time we share these memories.  I have no one to share you with, so I will share you with the world.

  The spirits are confounded and in utter chaos at what has come about.

  We walked into the Holy temple, to the great judge several years ago to talk on behalf of someone.  The dream was ferocious and I awoke sweating, shivering and 

choking for air for my time among the dead had been very lengthy.  I was called upon to link this world and the next, to do a great favor.  the spirit clung to my arm 

fervently as we plead the case before a being enrobed in black with a powdered face.  There were many fineries in this place; great and massive oil paintings of 

events which were notable to the world, tapestries of Coates of arms with names embroidered on them, gold trimmings on the benches and pews, cherry wood panels 

covering every windowless wall, and only a small opening in the  ceiling allowed a heavenly light to flow through on our heads.

  An agreement was reached, and I never knew what it was for many years to pass.  One day I realized we had went to the great sky to plea for a living person and 

an error they had made be forgiven.

  Disrupted in horror as I lay sleeping weeks ago and haunted by dreams of encasement in dark places, the spirits whispered a sorry secret to me as I found myself 

between the light and dark of my slumber.  

  The old master had done great sin against me; something had been raised against me as a hand is raised to a child; the child struck for no reason.  

 The souls of long ago have risen from their earthy graves to introduce themselves and make my acquaintance.  They are images in my dreams but I connect with them 

through my promise to the spirit I have wedded; the ghost bride clings to her life from the dark to the sunrise, for the task which has been set upon her head is a 

tremendous one; a task which may at last break and kill her.  

  Oh, happy garden of eternity please forget not to welcome me when my hour arrives for the pain is terrible and haven't much strength left to fight all which has been 

brought to my battlefield.  

  My hours in the sun have passed and the light has become grey and uncertain. The tides are angry, lightening fires the sky.  

  Dreaming of what had past in Bilbao long ago--young beauty was captured and drained of all life and glamour until she was thin and old.  Frail hands were 

strong enough to aim the cross-bow at the old master as he paraded through town in a blue coat of expensive cloth, piercing his evil heart, and he fell over 

a rope in which caught his body.  The rope was strung between two close buildings to deter the carriages from passing.  He'd fallen over this rope with both arms

hanging before him.  No art piece could have been more intricately planned, dangling about, head hanging forward, once flaxen hair turned to a rusty brown of 

wavy locks which were tousled by  the wind that day.  

  No judge had come to claim her neck in a hanging, for the villain had been killed.  

  The dream of the judge of the mighty skies brought us to the bench to plead that no head had been claimed, but senseless foolery and nonsense.  The dame 

has now paid the price in this lifetime for the villain she killed for us back then.  A senseless hanging; a life soured and spoiled in the wake of the bottom of a cup.  

 We haven't any more magick in our black bags to cause a miracle, so we lift our eyes to God and pray the psalms of old.  

  The judge of the great sky denied us access last night.  We stood on the courtroom marble outside the massive door, but  we were granted no entrance.  

  Spirits are now gathering from the lineages to plea with us.  They acknowledge me, and I them, for my wicked step-children have wedged themselves into 

a ravenous corner.  

  

 

     I'd never had a long stay in Brownsville since 1994--a proper stay which lasted several days.  From the early 80s up to 1988 I'd resided there.  I had to think of all of the places I'd been over my time including the golden days of life in Laredo.  These days will always be referred to as 'the golden days' because the life I had at that time was the most happiest. I enoyed the work I had at the paper back then.  I seemed to have almost everything I wanted.  I'm sorry I let those days get away from me.  New York was a necessary evil, though.  I needed New York to learn the things I've come to know.  I learned every arte of magick and healing I think that is beknownst to man, from the masters of the craft; I learned how to defend myself, how to gaurd everything and everyone I hold dear.  I defeated people I should have been able to ward off long ago.

  We all must face that which will either kill us or make us stronger at some point.  I faced many, many people and circumstances in this lifetime in which I don't really fathom how I was able to overcome, I just know that I did.  

  The early years of my life were spent growing up along side the cornfields of Ohio, then the wooded backdrop of my next home there.  These were quiet years which allowed lots of time for contemplation on minuscule topics and the beginnings of communications with dreams and spirits.  Although I didn't understand any of these gifts or abilities at the time, I knew I had them.  I just didn't know why.  After all of these years, I have even more questions, and I still don't know why.  

  Out of all of my journeys, all of my homes temporary or permanent, I always come back to Brownsville.  Maybe it's because something there calls me to, had called me there to start with, or maybe it's because that's where I feel I belong, maybe the spirits trapped in that area reach out to me, I can't be certain.  Maybe it's because I learned the most important things of all when I lived there.  I dreamed of being there the entire ten years I was in New York.  I was searching for something.  I was being called by someone.  I know who it was. He wanted me back there, he'd ask me not to go, but I had to.  We both know why I had to go.  

  The un-named and forgotten of the Rio Grande called me back: Where had the white lady gone? --no longer here by the river.  The white girl who sees them--the dead and forgotten-they wanted me back home. 

  The souls of the damned who'd died and lost their identities welcomed me back, but the living were afraid of me.  I have forever known what it is to be looked at and have people feel afraid or dislike me for whatever reasons; I'm no stranger to the outter ring.  After all, I have no business being here in this lifetime; it was a quick decision, I'm sure of it, that I came into this life and missed the very soul I'd come back for. If only I'd been my grandmother's child.  But the souls I'd come to visit with welcomed me, and I crossed them over--and I'm not talking about getting them over the river on earth, but the river on the other side of the spirit world.  It was a difficult task for I had limited time and strength that day, but many had passed over and were freed.  I know the day will come when I will be called to the task again, and God himself will make it known when the next time is to come.  

  Besides some unreasonable spiritual journey, I went back to Brownsville for myself.  When I was living in New York and writing at the time, I conjured every memory I could.  It's funny how one stitch in time has its own special existence, its own essence, spark of life, if you will, which can't ever be recaptured.  Everything was so different when I visited.  More than anything, I was different.  How I perceived everything was now very different.  I knew now how I'd let people run me off, intimidate and terrorize me.  They were cowards, each and every last one of them--picking on one young girl too defenseless to help herself, using black magick, illusions and lies to do so.  I dare any of them now to come and face me.  I know they wouldn't, and even if they did, they would need a friend or two or three to come with them. 

  Going back to Brownsville was exactly like coming back to the closet at the end of the dark hall--the one you were so afraid of when you were little--only to find there were no monsters in it, only some cheap threads, a mop bucket, some rusty old hangers and a broken light switch.  That's all which was ever in there.  Werewolves are only little boys in masks who are too ashamed to show their faces and who dabble with the forces of the dead thinking the dead are going to help them.  When those little boys get to hell one day, we will be waiting for them with a dunce cap.  No real witches would ever come back and try to play God with other peoples' lives for money--only cheap gypsies engage in this.  

 I'd come back to see the sunlight and to comfort the souls of the ranchlands.  I'd come back to the dusty old closet to prove to myself once more there really wasn't anything to fear; only childhood nightmares.  

 I knew why the things had happened to me that did--I needed to stand up for myself, but I couldn't back then.  I was too afraid.  If it were me today, everyone would have been set before the courtroom.  And I do mean everyone.  I was being abused and no one should have to take that kind of abuse.  Ever.

  Bad things are meant to be forgotten, and I put it all away after some thought and rejoiced in all of the good things.  I had lived to tell it all.  People who didn't have my best interest had all been ousted.  I was free.  More than anything, I was free to experience good memories and to share memories with someone very dear to me.  I could explore myself now for who I'd become and be glad that I didn't become some stastistic or casualty for someone to laught at--now I was having the last laugh when I look at all of them and what they've done, what they've become when they tried so hard to get me.  It is a sweet victory but still bears a bitter fruit.  

  I have to say here, or this writing would not be complete, that I wish with all of my heart the spirit Melo wasn't tied to someone I greatly dislike, but he is.  And there's nothing I can do to change this, ever.  I can't imagine my life without the blue house or the ranch, the spirits or Melo, and I prefer to block out anyone bad associated with them, for this has been such a beautiful and meaningful part of my life.  It has touched my life and my heart, and those lives around me, forever and for the better.  Like most other unworldly happenings, I'm not completely certain why or how, or what all of the details behind it might be.  Along the way I have shared my life with a soul who has been by me and very slowly I've discovered who he was--out of the shadows, the lies and myths, without the aide of any human being.  I hope some day I can only write it all down. 

 

 I feel so blessed that I've had not a second chance, but a third chance to come back and explore not only myself, but the spirit as well, since he has become such an integral part of my soul.  Now I can truly look at things with some better sense and understanding, to see it for what it is, or was.

  

  

 

 

  Three decades I found myself bound by the daemons of the old master; dissociation from all that surrounded me, all that I had once loved only brought me to places sending me writhing in pain and abandonment.  

Tepid emotions poured from every hole in my soul as I walked against the wind on Lexington Avenue, the scream of cold steel on the rails when the subway reached its destination below my feet in the snow.  Lost in the wilderness of concrete and muttering foreigners from all corners of the world, I walked on looking back over my shoulder hoping to see someone I had known.  Nonsensical whispers into the silver air, a beckoning voice came from somewhere within me, asking where I may find my way and for anyone to tell me where I was going, replied in black silence. Death's sweet kiss had missed my lips but I was still bound by curse, by the myriad of devils which clung to the very strands of my hair, refusing to be exorcised.  

Sacrifice freed me me, still my heart could not discover the truth and my head could not tell me the difference.  

Years passed like dead leaves falling from the oak tree outside of my window, and where I had once found myself sleeping on a mattress on a basement floor, I now slept in all of the fineries of an upper floor and grand bed with posts.  The world of mighty spirits, ghosts, daemons and angels had delivered me up and rested me in a place of beauty and solitude, only for me to place my head on my wrist, crying in both exhaustion and wonderment of how I had made it this far.  Limbs of the oak tree pawed nervously at my window and the bellowing of the wind through the tin roof made a small choir singing for my pain.  It wasn't as grand as anyone else would perceive it--this life I now lead.  It was paltry, insignificant and meaningless to anyone. No human cared for my life in any manner; it had no value to anyone, now, not even to myself.  I had no value or worth to anyone--only what my monetary value was, and a  young foreign man proved to me this was the case.  It was only the gold on my hands and the balances in my bank account which assured any advantage to me whatsoever.  Adrift on a sea of placid waves, calm sky of never ending dusk, I sailed on, wondering still what really had passed back then.  Turning to the helm of the ship I asked the ghostly captain of my voyage to show me, to explain to me why all had passed that did for I could have no peace from the devils upon my head until the truth shone upon it, revealing.

On the thirteenth day on the day of Saturn I was struck by the old master, a soul from the days of the first Queen Elizabeth, and evil was shot into me, falling twenty five, thirty years back, and then sixty years before my time.  The journey began.  The sea turned dark, the ghostly captain handed me a crumbling map and abandoned the navigation of the ship.  The winds wailed, angels wept torrents, scorpions and bees stung my skin and lightening struck the bow, yet only scarred the wood, allowing me stay afloat.  

At that moment I was liberated.  Some truth was revealed and my heart found her way to harbor.  I was revealed in the mystery that the shade was what I'd loved all along and not the old master, not the medium.  I was liberated from him, although he posed in the same clothing, he could not pass the glamour any longer at his age; he'd lost his strength and valor, and every soul he'd conjured now turned on him in betrayal.  

Spreading my arms to embrace the furious sky and thrusting back my head with laughter I was, at last, liberated; every devil in my hair combusted and fell to its demise and the rain washed me completely clean of them.  No prayer, nor sacrifice, no burnt offering under any tree or celestial angel had rescued me from the bondage; it was my own self, the reflection in the mirror, which had exorcised and freed me; it was myself which liberated me.  

Gold on my fingers and in my pockets now have no worth. I am now my own value.  I can liberate. I can set free and cast out the evils.  Freedom brings power to liberate fellow beings, to make a difference and to have a place.

 

To be continued....

 

  I look back on the days of long ago, days which have passed sweet, sharp and stinging and lay each day aside like a fine cloth, comparing them to my own days of being ousted, betrayed, closed out of

circles; on the outside looking in.

  I was cast out by the very people of my skin for my way of thinking and unique disposition.  Relocated only to find myself in a wiry trap of darkness and betrayal as I fell into a river of the un-named and forgotten

souls screaming for redemption and prayers.  I was sent into a coma of a world between life and death which was a quiet, pleasant and far from the road to town.  When I awakened, it was at the sounds of weeping and I never knew it was my own until I found it a challenge to breath.  We were both born of the same river, touched by the same roadside which gave us life and took us away. Born in a stucco building 

by the road, taken away from the new house by the very same road, losing all that had been gained and acquired, trapped and blamed for abandonment, released and set free by a bride of lifetimes ago.

  I reviewed your life and seen how you were stripped of your dignity; chastened to the core by insults from the same kind of people who had stolen my composure.  Bullied by supreme people who thought they were much higher and worthier than us, we join hands in this matter of experience and wear a facade of arrogance, coarseness and defensiveness which betrays our own hearts and inner feelings as we take the harsh words which cut red river valleys of blood through our souls.  

 After emerging from the muddy earth we were washed and renewed by the rain.

  Eleven minutes after the eleventh hour of morning brought death; pain through my chest and every shred of dignity taken from me at that moment more so than any other moment of my existence.

  Eleven minutes after midnight I experienced no pain but only solitude as my heart stopped and I reached across the veil which separates the two worlds for your hands, spirit, for you had always been with me 

the moment I walked into your house; it was at that moment I regained all dignity, then lost it again as I was ripped back into the material present for a mission lying ahead for both of us.  

  It was at these moments we became dignified, for we were strengthened and immortalized, created to be revered by the creatures who defiled us long ago. The moment of eleven has become the 

hour of our immortal souls which are intertwined together in love and understanding.  

  

  

    Touching your hand, my love, as I drift into a dream this eve, I am taken back to schools of long ago.  Country school, dusty chalkboards and janitor lingering in the halls with a 

wide push broom, whistling Big Bands tunes then humming Spanish ballads, paned windows dulled by the dust storms riled in the windy heat give little illumination to the small

rows of desks in each room.  

  Fleeting memories of my own days in a country school mingle with these images.  I'm holding the cherry cake I baked for a junior high picnic under ancient trees with wide trunks and scrolling

roots protruding out of the earth and diving in again; the presence of many haunts and souls which came before my time lingering in such a place.  

  I have come to know I am owned by no mortal man and tame only under your fluid caress; I abide by your wishes solely as we are taken to days far older than the human I now behold in the mirror.

 Sprawling before me are grasslands yellowed and dried from the stinging heat of the day, clouds and memories of soldiers on the lawn, drilling.  Inside the library walls is a good place to get 

away from situations, and certain people.  Leafing through the torn pages of old books from 1929, their musky, heady scent takes us back to days before we existed in the forms

we've come to know.  

 The chemicals inside the old lab have the same effect; whisked away by quiet thought and contemplation, the storm on the dusky pink horizon promises to quench the land and send the soldiers 

to their quarters.  The forms are only shapes and outlines except for those who can see us.  

  When the rain spilled down all ran for shelter; we were in the shower stall and attacked by a German boy and some others; that is why we keep our side and they keep theirs.  Where is Double A when we need him?-- Off some place much more tranquil, pouring over  crumpled maps and geology books safe within the library walls.  We gather the strength to walk the course as if nothing has happened only find the parched grass has revived to a rich green and the boys have all become drunk with whiskey, blackening one another's eyes and wrecking their cars.  Rain washes away the pain of the parched land; it washes away the pain and shame of a man's soul, too.  

  A journey ends, my love, and we part again.  I carry this memory with me, intertwined with my own, even though it can't be mine for I never lived in that time.  My hand slips away from yours and in the pink horizon a storm sets in for the morning, freezing the already cold ground and washing away the pain of parting with you as I walk through the world as it is today, leaving behind the maps, beakers and  the damp, dusty books of long ago.

  

 

  The revealing insight has come upon me at last as to what the Garden of Eden genuinely spoke of in its message.  

  Once in my solitude and narrow cell, black and white at my feet and shining moon gracing my head, I didn't feel any pain.  Fossilized, hard and impenetrable, oblivious to 

the raging torrents and stormy sea on the horizon, all of the shadows cast at me were absorbed by the mirrors set up in my mind.

  The Garden of Eden was nothing more than a swath of land, a narrow cell where the pain was never felt, nor right and wrong defined.  This never implied that the pain 

and horrors, the dark side of life never existed; it was a mere illusion of bliss and pure innocence embedded in solitude and ecstasy. Magic is only an illusion which melts away when 

the truth is revealed.

  My feet are now set on the battle ground and I see the shadows I never could before, I feel the pain once more as my armor has been broken and my spirit bleeds into my throat

all of the elixirs of life, the unclean spirit snarls and awakens for the demon was never fully exorcised; it returns to seek revenge on those who have driven it from its homelands.  

  What was once black and white and provided for me a firm foundation has now become a marsh filled with the blood which were once my tears.  

  It is not a matter of whether or not knowledge, pain and darkness exist; it is a matter of being conscious that they are about us every moment.  How we perceive these images is what shapes 

them as unintelligible nonsense or terrifying enemies.  

  Ousted from my shelter of spiritual bliss and cast into the flames of war, I stand ready defend all that I hold dear.

  The mother attacked out of spite and evil to attempt to revenge her mother's karmic and rightful downfall, using the man with green eyes and black hair as her assailant, I will strike the

children if need be and burn the village where the witches dwell, driving them from the Garden along with serpents until peace reigns again.  My life has value as do the spirits of those 

who crossed to the next world and should not be summoned for black work.  For those who work iniquity, the short gratification they revel in one day will have a tragic outcome soon.  

  A bony man gives advice to cripple my feet, but knives cut the pain in half and I have heeled.  Slow and patient boiling of my skin is passed by for I hear them speak of each evil deed.

The spirits of the cemetery with the arch have all turned against them in disgust at their disgrace and drunkenness and take repose in God himself, where they wait in the Garden,

Untouched by the blackness, the sun setting on their souls and illuminating them like hot coals on their earthy horizons, standing together hand in hand, my hands embracing the ghostly specters as i reach

over the threshold. 

I have left the old master untouched, yet he launches mischief and I return it with the foul devils that pour from him; he yips as a dog and cries, "Witchcraft has been sent to me by the 

white lady!"  'Tis only my returning what was set out to harm me, and healing it with love and light, of which both burns his sickened mind and spirit.  

  Wars always end, and days of peace and tranquility return.  It is then I retreat to my Garden with those beloved, in a time of long ago.  Surrounded by white clouds and roses, we know the storms are present, we know the thorns are there, but in perfect love and delight these minor discomforts never trouble us.  

  Those who have fallen so far into the darkness are no longer redeemable; the old wizard plead for help and exorcism, to be delivered, but when his powers were stripped, he called them back in and is now

a lost cause for which case we bow our heads and turn away from him with no reprise.  Sleep, my son, my wicked step-child, sleep through the full moon tonight and the moons thereafter.  The ghost bride sings you to sleep from the Garden's walls which you may never enter, for you have eaten every apple the tree of knowledge had bore, and the pomegranates, too.  The serpent has wound himself around you and the bony man making you one tormented creature, forming yet another serpent which slides on its belly in the days ahead.

  

 

  I will be adding new photos and clip art to the blogs later which will be custom art, Canstock or my own photos as it is difficult to determine these days what can be used as clip art.  I am a very 

visual person and I like adding images to the blogs and pages.  I have decided to add some of the blogs to a composition of various poems and writings, therefore as time progresses not all of the posts will

be available online.  

  Today I was asked what the blogs are about and where I get my ideas.  For the most part, they are abstract and poetic in form.  I don't really know sometimes where my writing comes from, but I am certain it is from somewhere deep within.  I can't say I get an 'idea' as it simply comes to me.  

  Articles on pages are researched or are written from personal experience, and when necessary I make references.  Since the days of the limited Explorer site, I've made my pages much more accessible.  

  In the future I will be placing all books and writings under the company formed. The Blue House, LLC.

 I don't know how long it will take to finish all I am working on, but this site is always a place to come to be an informed citizen on my works, publications and whereabouts.  

 Happy reading.

 T

  Time, youth and beauty can never be recaptured; certain paths to opportunity may be closed and never embarked upon again.  Still, what has been been lost may be regained in different forms.  Disrupted and driven to the edge, buried alive in a cellar for years only to rise from my sanctuary and nameless grave has strengthened me so I can no longer feel the pain and can withstand almost every storm.  Having risen from dust and mold from my tomb, with a promise from God's lips to return what had been taken, and to wash clean all the transgressions and curses placed on my head.  

 

  In frustration at the fact no amount of demon-conjuring or death invocations have affected me, physical actions were contemplated but these too, have failed, and the eyes are upon them who think they are hidden.  Darkness and obscurity can only reign so long before the light shines on them and they run like insects out from under the rotting wood in which they hide.  Each spirit of the dead set against me I have taken under my skirts to shelter; each demon sent forth I have lulled to a deep slumber.  While sleeping under the ground I had made friends with the roots of trees, the gnomes and the creatures residing in these places, and met many a soul that had passed on.  

 

 

  My return is as silent as a frozen wintry landscape, as loud and commanding as the impending storm, as common as the gentle breeze which causes the tussles of ripe corn plants to bow again and again, and as extraordinary as the flow of lava burning everything in it's path.  Invisible to all who see me as I am unexpected, and in my silence I remain unannounced until I command the attention.  

  Forces of nature have been tampered with by many; the forces of life and death disrupted.  We rise, walk and seek the blood of those who sought to destroy us or to mold us into a wax image and poppet to do their bidding.  We have returned in a form unfamiliar and unmistakably alive to touch that which was ours, to weep for that which has become so dreadfully and devastatingly lost while we were asleep in our earthy confines.  Wedded by the very people who brought us together for harm's sake, we our intertwined and bound together in eternal love; we will take back that which we have sorely lost, or perish trying.  To perish will only send us deep into the world of spirits and we wait at the dock for new incarnations as we have done so many times before.  

 

  Return us to our home, we pray, where we touch everything we worked so hard for, everything we fought to keep so that we may restore it to all of its grandeur and stature, no matter how meager and poor the others may view it to be.  Ashamed of it all, they speak of it as an inconvenience and never acknowledge they were part of such a place.  It was home, and it still is.  Time will not erase what has been, and it is a deep mark on our hearts we bear always.  Embittered by it all, yet we understand the need to conceal that which we find difficult to acknowledge; as we never admitted the divorce between the mother and father, and announced publicly it was still a marriage though it was legally and emotionally dead long ago.  Human err is sometimes too hurtful even to admit to ourselves.  

 

  I stand alone now, and through my insight and the tears which cloud my eyes as I see through the veil which divides the living and the dead, I return to touch that which is beloved and through me the ancestors of that land, day and age, relish the moment.  

 

I decided to add this short story to the blog.  I wrote it a while back--too short for AP or Voices, but just right for a B-log.

 

                                                                                        

                                                                                                     

 

                                                                                        The Black Candle

  Swirls of sage leaf smoke fills the room with its pungent, stinging aroma; a large black pillar candle atop   a makeshift altar, flickers and bounces, its flame reaches high into the air, then sinks down to a twinkle.  A fortyish woman dressed in a black Tau robe speaks a prayer to the ancient gods, asking for healing and protection for her father, who lies ill with cancer, one thousand miles away. 

  A neighbor in the apartment complex happens to spy in on this scene through an open and unheeded vertical blind, and quickly rouses the other neighbors that  a ‘dangerous’ witch is raising spirits on the premises.  The black clothing, tall, thick black candle, spicy sage smells and muttering of prayers surely are something heathen and evil.  Those he told either laughed, discounted his story, or took warning to stay away from the woman in that particular apartment. 

  ‘Wicca’ and the practice of ritual has become a sort of integrated part of spiritual life even in house-holds which carry a conventional religion like Catholicism or Judaism.  Elements of ritual can include meditations, prayers, affirmative statements, self-discovery or soul-searching components, symbols, rites, tools and pageantry to help contact the subconscious and even unconscious mind in order to tap its potential. 

  The occult and alternative religions such as Voodoo, Santeria, Wicca, and other magico-religious beliefs* have long been feared and mistaken by spectators as something to beware of due to its usage by gangsters, unsavory characters from history and in the present.  To be correctly stated its misuse by such people. Criminals will often use mystique, religion and symbolism to frighten and intimidate rival gangs or other peon drug traffickers.

  The color black is most always construed as something bad, whether it is a candle, or a human being.  As in the example above, the spying neighbor of the woman has taken into context that the spiritual work being conducted is automatically evil because of the black robe and large black candle.  Had the woman been wearing a white robe and the flickers were popping up from a white pillar candle, this may have eased the spy’s suspicions; it is all within how pictures are perceived.

  Had the spy only known that the black candle is a powerful ritual tool for focusing the arrest and banishment of illness and danger, he may not have been so apt to gossip or conclude.  The garment worn is to represent the mysteries of the universe and the depth of the subconscious mind.  The Tau robe may also coincide with the ritual itself, which is banishment of death and darkness.  Just as gargoyles were used on church landings in medieval Europe to drive away demons rather than winged seraphs defending every arch and wall, the color black may be used to nullify the powers of darkness. 

  The black candle has had a negative annotation when aligned with occult practices throughout history.  Some magical texts contain specific instructions to cause harm and peril to an intended victim. No question can be raised that the figure of a man or woman molded from black wax, on occasions, has indeed been used by many a scorned lover, friend, spouse or relative to impair another.  The law of magic in the words of the famous occultist, Aleister Crowley: Do what thou wilt,** denotes the will of the magician is what determines the nature of the magic as black or white. 

  Throughout the dawn of Christianity, priests, pastors and leaders of this faith have condemned all paganism as evil, and in this event, the burning of a black candle along with donning of black robes presumably instills fear in most who should behold the likes of it.  Little or no thought is given to the latter paragraph: The will of the magician is ultimately what determines if such a practitioner is in fact, a good witch, or a bad witch.

  The power of magic and ritual may tap into the subconscious mind to help achieve a goal, give focus to energy being directed to a person or thing, and is a potent tool to be used with care.  Just as a gun may be used to protect from intruders in the home or from animals on a wilderness hiking trip (rather than brandishing it about to harm and frighten innocents) so must the black candle be used as a powerful device discreetly and with correct intentions.

 

 

*(Magico-religion is a type of belief which contains parts of pagan ideas combined with conventional religious thought, as with Santos or Santeria)

** Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.  Aleister Crowley, 1904 The Book of the Law

2012

  Lucky are the ones who have the capacity to love, to hate, to cry, for many people go through life and work through each day as a task only without ever experiencing the fullness of emotions. Some live through all of their feelings, instincts and array of emotions each day, suffering the pain of each of their colors which can sometimes bring one to very sea cliff of madness.  Through this madness is born the poet, the actor, the artist and the thinker; those people who've evolved or dwindled into hermitry and all of its dark blessings.  

  Going through life in such an idol manner as to feel nothing, but to mechanically work through each moment of mortal life is lacking in all the depth and dimension of each experience and what it could have been.  Each longing for that which is beyond our grasp, each desire for someone beyond our embrace, those very things which waste and crumble, or lie deep in the earth, sleeping under the stars have such gravity and pull for those lost between the worlds of life and death.  The earth is populated with some many, but the connections here fail miserably and all is to be done is deliver the messages from one side to the other.  

 

  The capacity of heart that can fully love and go forth without fear knows no bounds except for the spiraling end when it has shattered to the ground.  Most fortunate of all was the receiving party to be graced as to have obtained such love, and the receiver must always dash it against the stones.  Therefore, those walking between life and death will love that which has fallen, that which is deep in the earth, those things which have wasted away to ash and splinters as these are all safe and certain; they have no other lovers and cling to a solitary hand which bridges, connects their lost worlds to the present.  

 

 Beyond the gift to feel every sting of each tear, each elation of a smile, is the capacity to understand it all and make good sense of it.  It is without the understanding that we turn to madness, or perhaps only silence.  

 To be without a single tide of sensitivity must indeed be a bleak and void life, yet so glamorous and tempting for those suffering; to be able to turn off an emotion as one would a water spout seems a grand illusion too fabricated to ever be true.  To believe in love, sorrow, joy hate and fear feels much like a fairy tale to those who have no capacity to understand or experience life through their spirits.  Nightly slumber and early morning dreams are black and formless; the fire of life has not ignited them for they are weary of each day and the circumstances which come with it they dare not to hope or wonder outside of that which is most common.

  To suffer from emotions is a gift taken beyond death and rewarded in the silence in which He brings; a broken, extinguished soul is no better than it was in life.  The promise granted is that we all have the capacity.

                                                                                                                                                    ~end~

  I found a very short letter typed on an old-world typewriter later this evening.  It was strange how it just fell out of some old books I had as I was looking through the train trunk which holds very old writings and 

things from long, long ago.  I think I may have written this when I was a teenager, but I just can't recall ever having written it.  I thought it befitting to tag on to 'Capacity.' Wherever it came from, it seems to echo a kind air that something is unattainable, unreachable until common ground is reached.  Or at least that is how I perceive it.  

                                                          Why the Trouvere Loved The Scribe

  The Trouvere had tried vainly for years to gain access to his own heart, but then you know how that goes; try and try again. 

  One day a scribe passed by, the Trouvere noticed this and asked, "I hear that you are a scribe in this land." 

  The Scribe replied, "Yes, that is true." 

  "Well then," continued the Trouvere, "is it not also true that you are a poet and a seer of visions?"

  "Yes," replied the Scribe, "but how could you know this?" 

  "Ah," smiled the Trouvere, "you see dear Scribe, I am all of these things and more. Tell me, do you find it difficult to exist in this dreary world with so few like you,

so few to relate to?"

"So I do," said the Scribe with her chin resting in her hand and looking thoughtfully into the distance.  "Tell me, dear Trouvere, can it be that you 

share my desolate thoughts and desperate feelings?"

 

  "I assure you,"  said the Trouvere, "that I feel all of these exactly as you do." 

  "At last," sighed the Scribe, "I have found one who is as I.  No longer does the nature of my muse compell me to stand alone even in the most crowded room."

  "I must confess to you, dear Scribe," said the Trouvere, "I too felt a dreary isolation because of the nature of my thoughts. Henceforth I shall not walk alone 

for now I now know that I am not alone." 

 

 

 

Basquelands in Spain, 1650s.  

  There lived a nobleman who possessed a charmed coat made of lavish quilts of silk, each square a lustrous color, each holding a special meaning and power.  The coat, they say, was sewn

together by the gyspies who lived by the mire inland from the sea.  

  The nobelman was outwardly kind but inwardly he was never sincere; he never did a favor selflessly without expecting a good reward, or coming back to claim such a reward

when he deemed fit.  He romanced the gypsies with gifts of grain and meat from the village brought to them by night in a carriage.  

 

  A young woman secretly became engage to his cousin, a laborer with poor eyesight who hadn't many worldly goods and couldn't afford all of the comforts of life that the nobleman was able offer.  Using his status and power, he demanded that woman break the betrothal to his cousin and marry him.  When she refused, her father sold her to the nobleman in marriage for a high price.  

  From: The Man in the Frockcoat  2002

Aside from all of the story blogs, this post is for what is to come.  

2013 has left at last, taking the Year of the Snake and bringing the Year of the Horse.  The snake always has preceded the horse in succession.  

Last year was a strange year I still don't really understand, but again...the infamous saying: It is what it is.  Maybe some sense of it will come at another time.

Some great good was accomplished, though, last year.  I move forward and fall back in time simultaneously as I continue with charitable efforts to strengthen

and protect that which I hold dear as my life moves deep into the gray fog of questionable.  

The re-release of my novel will be in the next 12-18 months.  I will not announce it until after it has been produced.  The previous version will be taken out before 

much longer and reprinted under the new ISBN.  During this time period I am working on other projects, some AP and Voices material.  

I don't know what adventures lie before me; I can only guess, but I will go boldly and without fear into whatever lies ahead.  It's all anyone can do.  

On these words, I go in peace tonight.

 

 

To my surprise I was assigned a soul to keep.  Not that I hadn't always kept my sister's soul, but now I have the authority to officially keep it close and look after it.  Falling back to a time which 

alas does really belong to me and not to anyone else.

I brought her to you once before, and now I'm bringing her back for you watch over.  Tend her like a child.  She's cold and needs your warmth.  She came to me to  give you the message,

because she knows you will listen to me.

Why, after all of these years, after all of this time?

It's what you need to do right now at this time.  There's a season for everything.

Now I keep her close to my heart.  Some people feel cursed to live with the images of the dead and their spirits always near; not me.  I feel so blessed.  God has given me something wonderful 

and I no longer fear it, I no longer feel troubled over it.  My life makes more sense than ever--always near when death sweeps into the room with her white dress, even when I was born

Two deaths devastated the family upon my birth, and ever since the sight has flowered in me.  Connecting this world and the next; not so much delivering their messages, but validating their presence and helping them to walk into the next world and be at peace, and healing the hearts of those they have left behind.  I hold the train of the death bride as she walks through the isles.  

Two spirits, one a sister, one a stranger, neither of my blood-kin, but both I love most of all, more than anyone else.  No one knows what lurks in a heart, and rarely do we tell.  When I take flight to the world of the invisible, I will seek their presence at once.

mpowered by life at this moment, I send them warmth, healing and love.

Before the soldier walks to his sacrificial post, before the old woman fades into her lavishly laced bedsheets, I will touch their souls and connect them with the great presence of what lies between.  I wear the task like a silver crown, use it with reverence and graciousness.

For as long as I live I will pray for each soul, give them warmth and water, and reveal their messages.  I bridge the worlds between us; a ghost bride I have become.  I resolve to the task. Death is a jealous lover and no others shall be put before him.