Connected

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WISE BLOOD
In March of this year I began "Only Connect" with the unstated purpose of finding someone who was very close to me, but whom I had not yet met. It was a kind of "Hail Mary Pass".

Also a stated purpose, and also true: the blog is a lifeline for me on the road, to stay in touch with friends and family, new and old.

The connection was successful beyond my wildest dreams.

Last week, my last trip of the year, I was in Milledgeville, Georgia, visiting the house and grounds of Andalusia, where the wonderful and wonderous Flannery O'Connor lived for the last 13 years of her very short life; and where she wrote the novel, WISE BLOOD.

Flannery could mix the sacred, the grotesque, the mundane and the transcendent in a way that is rarely matched. Within two sentences you were laughing on the way up, and gasping on the way down. It makes for hiccups in your mind, and a river eddie in your consciousness, where the incoming and the outgoing tides collide, and nail the movement dead flat.

Have you had moments in your life like that? This year?

Just now, around the corner, a chubby roan donkey, wild of mane, spattered and spotted with good southern mud, made a noise that sounded like a cross between a loud "ahem" and an imperative winny, demanding our attention. He turned his head sideways and struck a noble pose, proud of his aquiline features. Master of the House, Lord of the Flies.

Andalusia. I was walking with a wonderful poet, we'll call her M.E. At least one of her poems is a prayer. All of them are precious.

I hope to hear the poem/prayer below when and if I am at that moment of transition, hovering between two consciousnesses, continuing the passage from this world to the next, trekking to Infinity (but infinity, I'm learning, isn't some future "forever": it's being NOW. Real hard to do).

Christmas is a time to ponder birth and transitions. By seconds at first, the Solstice marks the moment when more light returns to the earth. Winter's nights, although it doesn't know this yet, are numbered. Below is comfort for long, cold nights and wandering angels.




DELTA LULLABY
by M.E.

Let me hide you in the country
away from the mosquito whine
of work and want. I will replace
traffic tide with cricket song.
Let me wrap you in a blanket of
kudzu and trumpet vine,
swaddle you in pulled bolls of cotton.

I know the names and shapes
of poison plants, and will distill
their breath into a lethal perfume
for your monsters. I will rock and croon.
No harm will come. Gaze with me
into a waterfall of fading light.

You see how distance fades,
how everything is close and vanished,
near and away? Let the blueing light
lie like moth dust on your eyes.

The dusk is a quilt of bluebird wings.

There is no need to hide. Hush, now.

From a hollow I will watch
you crack your carapace and walk
into the safe and sober day.

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MORE RAFFLE Q's: (some are tougher than others). You might need to call or email someone to get the answer. If you email the request to me, I will send you the appropriate email.
I'm still trying to encourage connections, here.


1) What was the name of the street where Dick Gaudio and I lived in 1969?

2) Where will Tara and Brian be married?

3) What did my brother Tom get his Doctorate in?

4) What form of martial arts/dance did Chrissy do?

5) What are the names of Jeff and Mary's dogs?

6) What is the name of Sandi's favorite horse?

7) Who moved into the Flying Y ranch after Scott, Sandi, Linda and I moved out? (Hint: he won a Pulitzer Prize, and is also an actor)

8) What household item most fascinated Lama Kunga when he stayed at Casa Bella this summer?

9) What fowl did Flannery O'Connor raise?

10) Name an Italian equivalent of the food item "grits".

11) What is Sara S's favorite sport?

12) What country does Ashley want to visit?

13) What did the doctor say in the delivery room when John was born??

14) What is Scott and Lucy's favorite seafood restaurant?

15) Name a musical duo that has a home in Macon Georgia, and was one of Rick M's favorite bands.

16) What year was Lifeguard Kate named "California Teacher of the Year?

17) My old goat Mocha: what breed?

OK Good luck. The drawing will be sometime the first week in January.
(note: for those of you too busy or lazy to email me so that I can put you in touch with the proper responders, I'll post the answers on this blog late on on Dec 31, so youll have (very little) time to still get raffle entries.

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