words can do naught
without the power
of imagining
When we communicate, any old way, we spark imagination in ourselves and in our listeners. Creation. Magic. It's simple.
I am so sorry I missed that those were her last words regarding you! I flippantly told you that, if that's what people think of you, then make sure you actually do nothing. You did so much for her!!! I wish you could stop feeling so guilty. Is forgiveness of self a Catholic thing?
Another impromptu and inspired poem from the master - THANK YOU!
Words without the power of imagining - there is soooo much to unpack from that! Your talent for hammering words into haiku, or 3-lined verse, whatever it's called--- it's sublime. As was this:
WHAT, did you DELETE IT....? I can't find it now! The "do nothing" verses.
And I thought everything was forever on the blockchain.
THANK YOU for kind attention, your gift of words, your endless inspiration, @owasco!
Flippant? You? Not at all. She was asked to reminisce about the five sisters and our childhood together, and for me, she came up blank. Carol never did much of anything. Well, there are contemplatives who lead lives of silence and meditation who might assert that much can happen beneath the stillness of a surface, but I didn't bother to "go there" - I was and ever am a schlub, not a mover and a shaker, not the life of the party, not the one who'll set the world on fire. So be it. I am an idiot for letting it get to me at all, that deathbed commentary on the five sisters and the who made no impression on Lori.
So, yeah, I'm actually embarrassed that it cut to the quick and lasts and lasts, and I'm wallowing in the guilty of all my sins of omission. the things that I have failed to do - and yes, Catholics do teach forgiveness, and the saints manifest it better than any Protestant role models I grew up with. Maybe I should have grown up surrounded by mystics, pagans, and Catholics, not Evangelicals. :) Lori was White Evangelical, and I said she's one of those people who are easier to love from a distance, and she must have caught wind of that somehow and punished me for it with those Last Words....
Or perhaps her feelings for you are too deep for words, and a different communication existed between you two. Or maybe she hadn't finished the sentence, and would have said "carol never does anything hateful". Maybe whoever recounted her words to you didn't remember them clearly, doesn't know how hurt you are. Maybe maybe maybe. Every interaction presents enormous opportunities - what we choose to imagine becomes our reality.
I haven't deleted anything, but that poem may have been quite a while ago. I'll go see if I can find it.
You are very, very kind. Lori's daughter had an audio recording of the conversation. I didn't recount all of it here, and I never will. Suffice to say, she asked Lori (for posterity's sake) to reminisce about the sisters. She had a cute story or fond memory for the other sisters, but for me, she could only say.... that thing she said.
Ah, I didn't think to look at PeakD! I was looking for a comment you'd made to me, reassuring me that to "do nothing" can be a good thing.
She actually said WORSE THINGS after that thing she said, but I'm trying to believe that the weird "I'm sorry" text really was somehow, mystically, generated by Lori, as an actual apology for having said the sh*t she said, but I'm learning that DNA (and even bonemarrow) doth not a sister make.
https://peakd.com/hive-161465/@owasco/dance-fever-a-freewrite-haiku