si miro si toco

"Quiero que sepas
una cosa.
Tú sabes cómo es esto:
si miro
la luna de cristal, la rama roja
del lento otoño en mi ventana,
si toco
junto al fuego
la impalpable ceniza
o el arrugado cuerpo de la leña,
todo me lleva a ti,
como si todo lo que existe,
aromas, luz, metales,
fueran pequeños barcos que navegan
hacia las islas tuyas que me aguardan.
Ahora bien,
si poco a poco dejas de quererme
dejaré de quererte poco a poco.
Si de pronto
me olvidas
no me busques,
que ya te habré olvidado.
Si consideras largo y loco
el viento de banderas
que pasa por mi vida
y te decides
a dejarme a la orilla
del corazón en que tengo raíces,
piensa
que en ese día,
a esa hora
levantaré los brazos
y saldrán mis raíces
a buscar otra tierra.
Pero
si cada día,
cada hora
sientes que a mí estás destinada
con dulzura implacable.
Si cada día sube
una flor a tus labios a buscarme,
ay amor mío, ay mía,
en mí todo ese fuego se repite,
en mí nada se apaga ni se olvida,
mi amor se nutre de tu amor, amada,
y mientras vivas estará en tus brazos
sin salir de los míos."
- Pablo Neruda

"I want you to know

one thing.

You know how this is: 
if I look 
at the crystal moon, at the red branch 
of the slow autumn at my window, 
if I touch 
near the fire 
the impalpable ash 
or the wrinkled body of the log, 
everything carries me to you, 
as if everything that exists, 
aromas, light, metals, 
were little boats 
that sail 
toward those isles of yours that wait for me. 

Well, now, 
if little by little you stop loving me 
I shall stop loving you little by little. 

If suddenly 
you forget me 
do not look for me, 
for I shall already have forgotten you. 

If you think it long and mad, 
the wind of banners 
that passes through my life, 
and you decide 
to leave me at the shore 
of the heart where I have roots, 
remember 
that on that day, 
at that hour, 
I shall lift my arms 
and my roots will set off 
to seek another land. 

But 
if each day, 
each hour, 
you feel that you are destined for me 
with implacable sweetness, 
if each day a flower 
climbs up to your lips to seek me, 
ah my love, ah my own, 
in me all that fire is repeated, 
in me nothing is extinguished or forgotten, 
my love feeds on your love, beloved, 
and as long as you live it will be in your arms 
without leaving mine."

- Pablo Neruda

detail from mixed media on canvas, 2017

medicine

"A story is medicine that greases and hoists the pulleys, shows us the way out, down, in and around, cuts for us fine wide doors in previously blank walls, doors which lead us to our own knowing."

- C. Pinkola Estes

in the waiting

"We stand shivering at the door, terrified and panicked that we have lost the key. We waste lifetimes in the waiting because in the haze, the painted fog of our fear, we forget to check the handle and discover it has never been locked at all." 

- Tyler Knott Gregson

volcanoes melt me down

"...and what I am to you is not real,

what I am to you, you do not need,

what I am to you is not what you mean to me,

you give me miles and miles of mountains,

and I'll ask for the sea.

don't throw yourself like that,

in front of me.

I kissed your mouth, your back,

is that all you need?

don't drag my love around,

volcanoes melt me down.

...what I give to you is just what I'm going through,

there is nothing new, no, no just another phase of finding,

what I really need is what makes me bleed...

I kissed your mouth,

you do not need me."

- Damien Rice

growing up, I felt my mouth was too big, my lips too full...

nuevas y mejores emociones

"Contigo aprendí,
Que existen nuevas y mejores emociones.

Contigo aprendí,
A conocer un mundo lleno de ilusiones.

Aprendí que la semana tiene más de siete días

Hacer mayores mis contadas alegrías
Y a ser dichoso, yo contigo lo aprendí

Contigo aprendí,

A ver la luz del otro lado de la luna.

Contigo aprendí,

Que tú presencia no la cambio por ninguna.

Aprendí que puede un beso ser más dulce y más profundo,

Que puedo irme mañana mismo de este mundo,

Las cosas buenas ya contigo las viví

Y contigo aprendí

Que yo nací el día en que te conocí..."

- Armando Manzanero

te morderé los labios

"Voy a apagar la luz
para pensar en ti,
y así dejar volar a mi imaginación.

Ahí, donde todo lo puedo,
donde no hay imposibles,

qué importa vivir de ilusiones
si así soy feliz.

Pero cómo te abrazaré,
cuanto te besaré,
mis más ardientes anhelos
en ti realizaré.

Te morderé los labios,
me llenaré de ti
y por eso voy
a apagar la luz
para pensar en ti."

- Armando Manzanero 

te extraño

"Te extraño -

como se extrañan las noches sin estrellas, 

como se extrañan las mañanas bellas, 

no estar contigo, por Dios que me hace daño.

Te extraño - 

cuando camino, cuando lloro, cuando río, 

cuando el sol brilla, cuando hace mucho frío, 

porque te siento como algo muy mío.

Te extraño - 

como los árboles extrañan el otoño, 

en esas noches que no concilio el sueño, 

no te imaginas Amor, cómo te extraño.

Te extraño - 

en cada paso que siento solitario, 

cada momento que estoy viviendo a diario, 

estoy muriendo Amor porque te extraño.

Te extraño - 

cuando la aurora comienza a dar colores, 

con tus virtudes, con todos tus errores, 

por lo que quieras no sé, pero te extraño..."

- Armando Manzanero 

detail from mixed media on canvas

the charm of spring

"April in Paris,
chestnuts in blossom,
holiday tables under the trees...
April in Paris,
this is the feeling,
no one can ever reprise,
I never knew the charm of spring...
I never met it face to face...
I never new my heart could sing...
never missed a warm embrace...
till April in Paris,
whom can I run to?
what have you done to my heart? "

- E.Y. Harburg / Vernon Duke (circa 1933)

when you remember

on the beach with sunlight shining down on me
blessing me with warmth

"Sir, have you forgotten the promise you made in your mother's womb, to die before you die?

When will you remember what you intended?

Don't let your donkey wander loose! It will stray into your neighbor's saffron garden. Think of the damage it might do, and the punishment!

Who then will carry you naked to your own death?"

- Lalla (1320-1392)

garden of my agony

"Nadie comprendía el perfume

de la oscura magnolia de tu vientre.
Nadie sabía que martirizabas
un colibrí de amor entre los dientes.

Mil caballitos persas se dormían
en la plaza con luna de tu frente,
mientras que yo enlazaba cuatro noches
tu cintura, enemiga de la nieve.

Entre yeso y jazmines, tu mirada
era un pálido ramo de simientes.
Yo busqué, para darte, por mi pecho
las letras de marfil que dicen siempre,

siempre, siempre: jardin de mi agonia,
tu cuerpo fugitivo para siempre,
la sangre de tus venas en mi boca,
tu boca ya sin luz para mi muerte."

- Federico Garcia Lorca

"Nobody understood the perfume
of the dark magnolia of your belly.
Nobody knew how you martyred
the hummingbird of love between your teeth.

A thousand tiny Persian horses slept
in the plaza in the light of your forehead’s moon
while I for four nights laced myself
to your waist, the enemy of snow.

Between plaster and jasmine, your gaze
is a pale and seeding branch.
I searched through my chest to give to you
the ivory letters that say forever,

forever, forever: Garden of my agony,
your body fleeing from me forever,
the blood of your veins now in my mouth,
your mouth already lightless for my death."

- translation by Niina Pollari

2006 or 2007 carved wood block 

stolen kisses

"What large, dark hands are those at the window

Lifted, grasping the golden light

Which weaves its way through the creeper leaves

       To my heart's delight?

Ah, only the leaves! But in the west,

In the west I see a redness come

Over the evening's burning breast —

       — 'Tis the wound of love goes home!

The woodbine creeps abroad

Calling low to her lover:

The sun-lit flirt who all the day

Has poised above her lips in play

And stolen kisses, shallow and gay

Of pollen, now has gone away

— She woos the moth with her sweet, low word,

And when above her his broad wings hover

Then her bright breast she will uncover

And yield her honey-drop to her lover.

Into the yellow, evening glow

Saunters a man from the farm below,

Leans, and looks in at the low-built shed

Where hangs the swallow's marriage bed.

The bird lies warm against the wall.

She glances quick her startled eyes

Towards him, then she turns away

Her small head, making warm display

Of red upon the throat. His terrors sway

Her out of the nest's warm, busy ball,

Whose plaintive cry is heard as she flies

In one blue stoop from out the sties

Into the evening's empty hall.

Oh, water-hen, beside the rushes

Hide your quaint, unfading blushes,

Still your quick tail, and lie as dead,

Till the distance folds over his ominous tread.

The rabbit presses back her ears,

Turns back her liquid, anguished eyes

And crouches low: then with wild spring

Spurts from the terror of his oncoming

To be choked back, the wire ring

Her frantic effort throttling:

Piteous brown ball of quivering fears!

Ah soon in his large, hard hands she dies,

And swings all loose to the swing of his walk.

Yet calm and kindly are his eyes

And ready to open in brown surprise

Should I not answer to his talk

Or should he my tears surmise.

I hear his hand on the latch, and rise from my chair

Watching the door open: he flashes bare

His strong teeth in a smile, and flashes his eyes

In a smile like triumph upon me; then careless-wise

He flings the rabbit soft on the table board

And comes towards me: ah, the uplifted sword

Of his hand against my bosom, and oh, the broad

Blade of his hand that raises my face to applaud

His coming: he raises up my face to him

And caresses my mouth with his fingers, which still smell grim

Of the rabbit's fur! God, I am caught in a snare!

I know not what fine wire is round my throat,

I only know I let him finger there

My pulse of life, letting him nose like a stoat

Who sniffs with joy before he drinks the blood:

And down his mouth comes to my mouth, and down

His dark bright eyes descend like a fiery hood

Upon my mind: his mouth meets mine, and a flood

Of sweet fire sweeps across me, so I drown

Within him, die, and find death good."

- D. H. Lawrence 

detail from mixed media on canvas, 2017

tigers and strawberries

- mixed media on paper from my journals -

“There is a story of a woman running away from tigers. She runs and runs and the tigers are getting closer and closer. When she comes to the edge of a cliff, she sees some vines there, so she climbs down and holds on to the vines. Looking down, she sees that there are tigers below her as well. She then notices that a mouse is gnawing away at the vine to which she is clinging. She also sees a beautiful little bunch of strawberries close to her, growing out of a clump of grass. She looks up and she looks down. She looks at the mouse. Then she just takes a strawberry, puts it in her mouth, and enjoys it thoroughly. Tigers above, tigers below. This is actually the predicament that we are always in, in terms of our birth and death. Each moment is just what it is. It might be the only moment of our life; it might be the only strawberry we’ll ever eat. We could get depressed about it, or we could finally appreciate it and delight in the preciousness of every single moment of our life.” 
― Pema Chödrön

tigers and strawberries my dear...

mixed media on paper

I just want to be with you...

"If you, if you could return -
Don't let it burn -
Don't let it fade -
I'm sure I'm not being rude -
But it's just your attitude -
It's tearing me apart -
It's ruining every day -
For me -
I swore I would be true -
And fellow, so did you -
So why were you holding her hand?
Is that the way we stand?
Were you lying all the time?
Was it just a game to you?
But I'm in so deep -
You know I'm such a fool for you -
You've got me wrapped around your finger -
Do you have to let it linger?
Do you have to, do you have to, do have to let it linger?

Oh, I thought the world of you -
I thought nothing could go wrong -
But I was wrong, I was wrong -
If you, if you could get by -
Trying not to lie -
Things wouldn't be so confused -
And I wouldn't feel so used -
But you always really knew -
I just want to be with you..."

- The Cranberries, circa 1993

love bites

Last night I dreamed a dog was biting me...

snapshot of a playful snapchat moment with my pups

despeinada

"Mereces un amor que te quiera despeinada, con todo y las razones que te levantan de prisa, con todo y los demonios que no te dejan dormir. Mereces un amor que te haga sentir segura, que pueda comerse al mundo si camina de tu mano, que sienta que tus abrazos van perfectos con su piel. Mereces un amor que quiera bailar contigo, que visite el paraíso cada que mira tus ojos, y que no se aburra nunca de leer tus expresiones. Mereces un amor que te escuche cuando cantas, que te apoye en tus ridículos, que respete que eres libre, que te acompañe en tu vuelo, que no le asuste caer. Mereces un amor que se lleve las mentiras, que te traiga la ilusión, el café y la poesía.” 

- Frida Kahlo

gloriousness and wretchedness

"Life is glorious, but life is also wretched. It is both. Appreciating the gloriousness inspires us, encourages us, cheers us up, gives us a bigger perspective, energizes us. We feel connected. But if that's all that's happening, we get arrogant and start to look down on others, and there is a sense of making ourselves a big deal and being really serious about it, wanting it to be like that forever. The gloriousness becomes tinged by craving and addiction. On the other hand, wretchedness--life's painful aspect--softens us up considerably. Knowing pain is a very important ingredient of being there for another person. When you are feeling a lot of grief, you can look right into somebody's eyes because you feel you haven't got anything to lose--you're just there. The wretchedness humbles us and softens us, but if we were only wretched, we would all just go down the tubes. We'd be so depressed, discouraged, and hopeless that we wouldn't have enough energy to eat an apple. Gloriousness and wretchedness need each other. One inspires us, the other softens us. They go together."

- Pema Chodron 

dance with me

"The first layer of consciousness is inertia. It is a level of non-movement: it is a level in which your energy, whether on the dance floor or in your psyche, is simply stuck.

Everybody experiences inertia. It is the groggy, barely conscious state when you first wake up in the morning. Or when you return to work from vacation. Or when you are in momentary insecurity about something or other. It is the state of despairing inaction when you've locked into the same routine day after day. The drugged passivity of TV watching. The stoned immobility of drug-taking, drinking. The moral and intellectual laziness of just getting by.

The only question is whether you choose to live in inertia or pass through it in the flow of your life - day to day, year to year, cycle to cycle. Inertia is seductive. It has characteristics of the ecstasy we're seeking and knew in the womb. It's natural, effortless, totally accommodating. But we're made to move, to become, to grow, to change, to create, and the true paradise of ecstasy lies not in inaction but in action that is so totally absorbing it seems like no work at all. Quickly the false ecstasy of lazing around, indulgence, and passivity takes its toll in the self-destructive effects of imploded energy...

...As a temporary resistance to the demands of life, inertia is simply a place from which to start. As you recognize its grip on you, you can confront it with movement and vitalize your being with the energy of change. You can summon the dancer within, the part of you that instinctively knows how to explore the full range of the body's rhythms. It is natural for the body to move, and the simplest way out of inertia is to start moving it. Stretch, lean, shuffle, swirl, with or without music, alone or with others. The easiest way is just to ease into flowing movements that will gradually seduce the body into the other rhythms. Dance is always available no matter where you are and is a ready catalyst to get your energy moving.

If you live in inertia - "waking sleep," Gurdjieff called it - as your basic energy level, as most of us do, your reality is comprised of a structure of unquestioned beliefs and frozen attitudes that are a bulwark against change. Movement and change are feared as painful and disruptive. The status quo seems to offer a haven of security. Truthfully, you are a wallflower at the dance of life, refusing every offer to move, out of fear of the unknown or of making a fool of yourself; you don't make the effort. But this holding back - hanging on tight to everything, especially your body, which becomes the repository of all your repressed feelings, thoughts, and action - used up all your physical, emotional, and mental energy. And you have nothing to show for this use of energy but the same old patterns and a deteriorating body and spirit. Because you don't dare to breathe life in and let it out, you live on a very restricted energy supply.

At bottom, inertia is the level of being unconscious, the home of the victim, the place where life just happens to you and you're unaware of your responsibility to create your own reality. It's the level of the pregnant woman who obviously chainsmokes, the macho laborer who stupefies himself every night with a six-pack, the high-powered executive who's married to his job and measures everything and everyone, including himself, by company standards, or the actor who has nothing to say without a script.

In inertia we want our life and friends to be stable, predictable, homogenized. It's so much easier to be in control when things around us don't change and we have the security of the known. We stay in an unhappy marriage or job or situation for years and years rather than risk the uncertainty, the adventure, the pain of venturing forth. In fact, all our "adventure" is planned and prepackaged, innocuous and ultimately dissatisfying - we buy the hype of cruises, cars, beer, movies, to sate our frustrated desire for true novelty and authentic experience. 

Often we turn around and watch even our children lock themselves into routines and perspectives that suffocate them, choke their growth and spontaneity, and snuff out the sparks we saw burning in them when they first entered the world. It hurts as we watch them lock into the vicious spiral of victimization, resentment, isolation. Or of flattery, melancholy, and self-importance. We know all the dances all too well. We taught them the steps. We reinforce these patterns rather than acknowledging our children's pain and guiding them to face the challenges that will nurture their growth. Because we are not bold, not warriors, we don't empower our children - to their lifelong detriment. Seeing their weakness, cowardice, and compromising is to watch parts of ourselves die, the parts that are young and fresh and full of promise.

Listen to the voices of inertia: Don't rock the boat. You're making a big mistake. Don't act impulsively. You've got to plan ahead. Be careful. Be prepared. But think of your family. Think of your friends. But if you do that... Don't burn your bridges. You'll regret it. You'll be sorry."

- Gabrielle Roth

so, my dear I invite you to step onto the dance floor with me...it is time to seduce the body into other rhythms...

ancestral wisdom

One of my earliest memories is that of sitting on the majestic throne-like lap of beloved Grand Mother and kissing the Pre-Colombian eagle goddess pendant suspended from a long gold chain reaching her solar plexus. The shiny hammered talisman glowed in the sunlight, becoming warm in my hand, silently transferring ancestral wisdom.

from my journals 

rhino skin and elephant balls

"You need rhino skin

If you're gonna begin

To walk

Through this world

You need elephant balls

If you don't want to crawl

On your hands

Through this world

Oh my love if I reveal

Every secret I've concealed

How many thoughts would you steal

How much of my pain would you feel

You need eagles wings

To get over things

That make no sense

In this world

You need rhino skin

If you're gonna pretend

You're not hurt by this world

If you listen long enough

You can hear my skin grow tough

Love is painful to the touch

Must be made of stronger stuff

You need rhino skin

To get to the end

Of the maze through this world

You need rhino skin

Or you're gonna give in

To the needles and pins

The arrows of sin

The evils of men

You need rhino skin..."

- Tom Petty

Equinox Blessings

spring blessings...

this image of my beloved little fairy goddess was originally captured on Snapchat by my sister, Christine Sacasa and was then playfully filtered on a smartphone 

it may become part of a little book I am working on...