Write letters to the editor to promote mental health awareness / Poem: Homecoming

It's always nice to see a newspaper on the Caller ID, in this case, Calkins Media, who I used to work for. They call to confirm I wrote the letter and want it published.

In the letter, I complimented them. Last Sunday they had a FRONT PAGE STORY on the Reach-out Foundation of Morrisville, PA which, among other things, serves as a drop-in center for people w/mental illness.

Their funding is being cut. Their modest budget is $150,000 per year, which includes leasing their office.

The founder of Reach-out was orig. a member of New Directions. She was so good I told her to start her own group near Levittown, where she lives. Thus spake Reach-out.

In my letter I suggested readers send her a donation, like I just did. (Reminder, Ruthie!)

Am reading Poets on Prozac by Richard Berlin, MD. The book features essays by about 15 poets who have published books and who also suffer from various form of mental illness.

It's good reading and also has me organizing my poetry - there's so much of it on my computer - much of it I can't remember writing. And I'm emailing it in, hoping someone will take my poems or my prose.

My always great fear is that when I was on psych meds for nearly 17 yrs, I was a better poet than I am now. Won a couple of poetry prizes while on lithium, the mysterious link between madness and creativity.


Was sitting here minding my own business when I remembered I had lima beans a-soaking and I had to do something with them.



So I made this soup. Ya know those health docs you watch on Channel 12 when you can't fall asleep? Well, I watched two of em last nite and was mightily influenced by what they said.

So into my lima bean zoup goes black pepper and fresh ginger. I season soups w/cinnamon stick and bay leaves. Never any salt.

On my kitchen table above you can see an iced drink I made for this hot summer day. It's iced ginger tea w/fresh grated ginger.

Here's a poem I have no recollection of writing.



HOMECOMING

Sixty years was a long wait
but I’m still the girl
with the long legs
and rosebud mouth
as when they locked me up

How I gazed through the iron grates
year after year
waiting for my release

A prison like no other
we had Napoleon in one corner
Sister Rose in another
I was the Empress
Josephine
in fine clothes
no one could see
for we wore
green gowns
starched stiff
from the laundry
tails hanging

Through the bars
I’d wait for the
robin in spring
his fat orange breast
sat on my gutter,
and snow flurries
floating on the pink parasol
I carried high
walking in the courtyard
ballerina slippers
leaving fish trails.

The Empress was always gay
my furnace within burned with
smoke.

Or tried to be
during my lockdown
of sixty-one years
dad drove me there
in our family Hudson
black like an undertaker

Nighttime
I thought it was a southern mansion
new home for daddy’s belle
he shook his head
as he gave them
my suitcase
see you soon
he said driving away

did they come to visit?
my memory is dim

When they set me free
when I walked through the numbered gates
I beheld the sky
my long white hair fell
upon shrunken breasts
my knees wobbled
I fell to the ground
and kissed my freedom

All I wanted
was a room of my own
noiseless
with a chair
to look out the window
at the climbing roses
growing higher and higher
while my pink parasol
rested unharmed
at the place I call home.