It’s The Wonder

Lately it’s been getting harder,
harder to breathe…my chest
is burdened, weighed down,
constricted and heaving
and breath, a woman writhing in labor,
gasps and tears at air so thick
it only gives up in pieces ragged
and jagged and grippy.

The older I get, the harder it is
to breathe.

Doctors call it asthma, they say
I’ve had it all my life
(who knew?  Not I!)
And me none the wiser, I just
worked so hard and suffered harder
and swam straight on thru strife.

But recently, I coughed real hard!
And what I thought was sputum
was really a fresh bud coughed up
and then spit out for good!

That’s when I realized, my lungs
have turned into a flower bed
of Mama’s Blossoms Fragrant
and oh so beautiful.

I Fly Steady On

Past Lady Liberty, looming silent still
thru slant snow, icy, cold,
frozen feet firmly planted
atop the broken chains
of captives loosed, unbound.

Past her seeming sightless eyes
fixed on an end unseen (as yet)
by mortal eye, and unfelt by
frozen human hearts transfixed,
addicted to poisonous demon draughts,
dolorous naughts of racism,
oppression,
of hate.

I fly steady on…I fly.
My breath a billows sucking air
frozen cold in sips so sharp
in hurty breaths  constricted, choked,
and exhalations honk their way
from my leaping, working chest
tugging me on towards Her Light,
into Liberty’s coming sun.

Follow…follow past frozen
Liberty so stark and solitary
standing witness silent
but never mute!

Follow me bravely
and let your frozen breath
be transformed into
HONKS of freedom
to the ones enslaved
still by fear and hatred.

I fly on, true.
I fly on.
NatureEarthflight_NYC_geese_tx800

The Birds of Desire

“She was like a forest,
like the dark interlacing
of the oakwood,
humming inaudibly
with myriad unfolding buds.
Meanwhile
the birds of desire
were asleep
in the vast interlaced
intricacy of her body.”
— D. H. Lawrence, Lady Chatterley’s Lovertumblr_nph40vd8QN1t0lovho1_1280

Save Your Magic

I saw these pictures laid out just now…and oh how I laughed!
Constance, how often have you found yourself
in a situation in life that is basically just uncooked fries?

They are raw, frozen, and must endure some heat
to be transformed into something
edible and delicious.

And yet, you fear the flame, you dread the pain
and thus you look to magic for escape
the magic place inside that we all have.

Magic isn’t free, no!  It involves
a different kind of pain, more permanent,
more costly and more precious in its gift.

Hey, open up your heart and let a smile
consume your face like sun consumes the night!
And get you in the oven…get you in your fight!!

and let your fries be cooked so you can eat
and with such joy your days you’ll rise to greet!!

Source:

He Said…She Said

…I have remained a poet, in the most radical sense of the word.
Friedrich Nietzsche, from a letter to Peter Gast

I am laughing as I read this quote
this poor man sounding like Bill Grogan’s Goat
who swallowed the farmer’s red long underwear
and now has indigestion everywhere!

remain…poet…radical…sense…the word
that sentence is red long underwear
giving me indigestion, and as I bleat
I cough it up down at the rail road tracks
and flag the passing train that hurtles by
rolling towards the trestle out, destroyed!

how can I remain a poetess? I am still “main”
and thus have no access to “re”…just main
and Poetry?  She scoffs at notions, high pretensions
such as “most” and “sense” when grafted
to the context of the Word.

NAY! This heart poetic, precious is defined,
is described, is found and measured
in the shadow cast and context of the Word
*in the beginning was/is/shallbe*

and in the Word “sense” is mere nonsense,
and radical is a sub-atomic particle straining free
and remain is so redundant, oh so boring
and goats munch red underwear and choke

I am a poetess, because the Word
and Poetry my mistress and my Queen
and nonsense is outside sense as dark is light
and I “main” my flow, my creative Delight

I am Charissa Grace and I am free
so sorry for Nietzsche, too fearful to be
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Catacombs and Caverns

I heard caverns deep behind your words of wonder.
I heard water dripping softly from wet ceilings
in those hollow places that you talked
so gingerly around…I heard your words resound,
your words of wonder…

in catacombs within so dark with dying
and dismal longing smothering and sighing,
the death to self and terrible becoming
in places of deep grief and self-discovery
those spaces once full, quick became so hollow…

I hear your hollow places faintly filling
with sorrow bleeding, and thus filled becoming
drained, emptied in the lonely tearful crying
that hallows fearful places looming darkly,
places of slow death so severely emptied,tumblr_nqq99nTys31qccgmso1_1280

bereavement fresh yet ancient,
everlasting and then grief become
dark resurrection hinted at
in every birth brand new,
in every dying….

I found your trails familiar, well worn, hidden
so deep within the kidneys of your words
and yet those trails well known in rising darkness,
(a left at that root ragged there, then quickly
around that rugged rock jutting sharp right here).

I have been walking word roads too, becoming
and finding that my caverns dark and thrumming
catacombs full, then empty, full then empty
more times than I can count or e’en remember
and I wonder in such a holy horror

when my wonder became wander…wander…wander!
Yet I am here!  Alive and breathing! Singing!
I’m here to tell you, it gets better, Darling
But only on this singular condition:
the losing of your everything in dyingtumblr_nqg1jqI8y51tw3geao1_400

and thus it is
you can be born
again and live
so lively new,
again.

Today, as I sit, listening to your heart, Dear
I look back at what I have lost…oh my God!
The stuff of Titans, losses heaped and horded,
my trinkets, treasures tossed, honors awarded
all tumbled in the twilight, gleaming dully

in the hot noon listless sun, laying there lifeless
and in the evening gloaming calling mutely
midst catacomb become my living darkness,
that cavern now my womb filling with wonder
all finally lost…and now?  And now…The finding…tumblr_n1joa8cesG1qm86t3o1_500

truly nothing
can compare
to the all surpassing
wonder of a world
made brand new

and my
Catacombs and Caverns
filled forever,
never failing, filled
and brand new

every morning,
every mourning
every warning
made brand new
and full of wonder
full of wander
full of You.
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But The Thing Is…

…we still will not leave, not until you force us to, with repeated betrayal…

…or with indifference…

We’ll just keep you at arms length, and you not even know the difference, other than the air somehow smells different, the food tastes narrower, and the golden light of the sun is a bit muted…be worried then.
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To The One Who Seeks My Faith’s Tender Throat With Teeth

I will never turn back.

I will never not Love God…why do you keep making that a condition?

When God has chosen (for what reason I know not, certainly not based on any merit I have, being the worst example of a human being that has walked the planet) to reveal Themselves, Their Beauty, well…

…the one to whom the revelation is given is slain forever…wounded forever and will forever bleed

love

and love

and love and love and love.

This is not about me, or about righteousness…it is about adoration.

I shall always always love Them, for They are Good and Kind, Clean and Pure, and have no shadow or smell of evil in Them.

If me renouncing Them is a condition for you, then you might as well go rave at Kilauea, go worship Krakatoa (if you can find him, blown apart in his own powerous pouty poofery)!  Go lay hands on gouts of liquid rock, let them run through your fingers and clench down their flow and see what happens…

your flesh will not burn nor melt neath their heat…for you are ice and icy, austere in your inviolate Olympus of self, and I find myself cast out of your heaven and consigned to your outer darkness midst the sound of your gnashing teeth…tumblr_noypg7Py1z1s5u2cno1_500But you have thrust me deeper into that side pierced and bleeding…you have pushed my face into His Heart Bloody with Boundless Love…you have cast me on my Mama’s Breast (the one for me, contained in Her deeps, She:  El Shaddai, the Many Breasted One with place for whosoever will…even you, dearest, even you…no…especially you).

I am my Beloveds’ and They are mine…it is by Their Hand and Word and what can I do?

To even renounce is to affirm for I use the Voice They gift to utter forth a word and thus it turns and leads me home again…

I will never

EVER

turn from Them, for with Them have I trusted my soul and I shall seek Them all the days of my life.

And the rest of you…who think that I have fallen into “sin”, into “sexual perversion”, into (you don’t even know, you just “know” it’s bad and tragic)…to the rest of you?

I cannot convey to you how truly irrelevant to life and love your gossip and gibbering is.  It is as consequential to me and my fate in the Hands of the Lord God Almighty as a flea is to the ocean.

I love Jesus and follow Him, for He has accepted me and declared me His own and worthy.
I love Holy Spirit, blessed Holy Spirit, my Mama who calls me Her own and instructs me in Her way.
I love Father…who is good and kind and generous and forgiving and always always smiling on me in the darkness.

I care not if you read this and judge me…don’t you get it yet?  My faith is not about you, and it never will be.  It just isn’t.  I no longer live to try and impress you, or please you, or deserve you.

I do not require you to say or do or believe or be like me in order to connect and laugh and love and live…why do you lay such requirement on me?  Because you will never get it.

I will never leave Them.  Never.

Found, at last, and in Them I shall dwell forever.

*All others, forgive this lil soliloquy…it is not for you unless you know it is…nothing to see here, move along quick*
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Sometimes

sometimes i run out of words
(yeah, me, speaker of torrents
dropper of waterfalls
fountains of rivers
of words and more words)

how can i talk this feeling away
when i feel so ugly in every way?
how to describe that gulf so vast
laying between the me i feel
and the me i see?

looking out from inside this place
and seeing with heart-eyes
beauty where others recoil
and horror that others call beauty
and me always out of step?tumblr_no9tweWPhv1sqba70o1_1280out of my time, out of my place
in my own rhyme but dissonant chime
to the swan song of youth
and its foolish pronouncements
so expertly made with no history?

and words fail me,
no…i fail them, words.
and i am lost in seas of ugliness
and i am stuck in swamps of clumsiness
and i am doomed in deserts of desire

and no words
no words
no words

sometimes i run out of words
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Here’s What’s Okay (And Not Okay) to Say to a Trans Person – Once and For All — Everyday Feminism

Here’s What’s Okay (And Not Okay) to Say to a Trans Person – Once and For All — Everyday Feminism. Dear Constance, this article will be good review for some, and a great beginning for those who are interested but don’t know protocol.

The one that is most crucial to me?  The one that says my story is mine and not yours…and you have no right to out me to anyone…even though people have done this to me. It’s sorta weird to meet someone I knew then and hear that there is all kinds of gossip about me happening…that means that the paragons of virtue who told me I was beyond a river they refused to cross and that I was demonized?

They started the rumors and passed them along…and likely think they served Jesus in doing it. The trouble they caused me…I weep still at times over things that I could have shared in my own way and time that got shared and soo distorted… …but that’s the way it goes when you deal with the privileged…whatever they say is God’s will becomes God’s will…

because they say so (which makes them God, I guess).
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TransWhat? • Allyship: first steps

TransWhat? • Allyship: first steps.

Fabulous aggregation of basic information!
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Thoughts of Connection

I love thought that runs in this fashion…not on “eros” as a topic…but the way in which it is discussed.

This is Signifier and Signified Thinking and a good example of it.

Eros is an issue of boundaries. He exists because certain boundaries do. In the interval between reach and grasp, between glance and counterglance, between ‘I love you’ and ‘I love you too,’ the absent presence of desire comes alive.
“But the boundaries of time and glance and I love you are only aftershocks of the main, inevitable boundary that creates Eros: the boundary of flesh and self between you and me.
“And it is only, suddenly, at the moment when I would dissolve that boundary, I realize I never can.
Anne Carson, Eros the Bittersweet

butterfly

Is Your Trans Allyship Half-Baked? Here Are 6 Mistakes That Trans Allies Are Still Making — Everyday Feminism

Constance…you are all so kind to me, supportive and for me.  And sometimes, you just put your feet right in it, and not even know it!

Because your comments are not intended to harm or other or police me, I nearly always do not give a clue as to how they have hurt me…but they do.

Like when you say “Oh wow, you’re looking so great today girl, and you’re gonna look even better when you get that 5 o’clock shadow” lasered off”

*OOooffff!*  That hurts…especially because there are many cis-females that have more naturally occurring facial hair than I do!

Or this one was particularly cutting:  “Why don’t you consider getting your Adam’s Apple shaved?  It will make you look more feminine”…

…so I went home and cried after that one…cus lots of reasons, but one of the biggest is that there are many drag queens and transvestites who look 100% feminine and completely identify as gay males and in no way consider themselves female…while here I am, female thru and thru and yet told that I need a shave of my Adam’s Apple to look (read “be”) more feminine.

Or “you sound like a boy so you are a boy”…wow, don’t know where to go with that one because here is the fact:  any human being whose vocal cords are exposed to testosterone is going to have those cords damaged by that exposure and it will be permanent, irreversible damage.  The result is that person’s voice will then deepen, coarsen, and sound like what we have been socialized to believe that men sound like and not women.

I would add one that the author leaves out:  we trans-folk are not your personal research assistants!  “Why Charissa, whatever do you mean?”  Here is what I mean:  many of you have taken baby steps out into the jungle, and trans-misogynist tigers have roared loud at you, eyes glaring…and you scurry to me and say “CHARISSA!!!  There’s beasties out there!  Give me some bullets PDQ!!!  What do I say???!!”

Umm…so here is what I want you to know:  we are not born the “Golden Child of all knowledge trans!” We were born inside these skins, as tabula rasa as you…what we learned was from hard work, investment of time, research, learning Google-Fu and using it, and then more of the same!  The information is out there…the same things I found and tested and tried and learned.

I cannot be an ally for you!  You either are or you aren’t.

You can’t just show up when it’s convenient, and expect me to carry the ball the rest of the time, give you your lines, take all the arrows so you won’t be harmed…I am already taking arrows and dealing with that.

It’s the nature of being an ally…get some skin in the game.

It makes me heartsick when “allies” come around because they need something, but they aren’t around when I am under assault and feel like I am fighting the Battle of Bastogne all by myself.

Oh…and please, PLEASE:  don’t get all hurt and go away pouty when you ask me to give you all the answers and I reply with “It’s out there…go dig!”

Allies…by now, you could be eating meat…why do you content yourself with milk?

Awwright…lecture over…go read the article if you still are here LOL!!

When we talk about biological sex being “what’s between your legs,” we’re forgetting that sex is actually much more complicated than that. Genitalia, chromosomes, hormones, and secondary sex characteristics all contribute to our assigned sex at birth, but ultimately, sex is just that: assigned.

Biological sex is a social construction, meaning it’s something we as a culture have created. That’s not to say it isn’t relevant to our health or that it doesn’t influence our personal realities, but the categories of “female” and “male” must be recognized for what they really are.

via Is Your Trans Allyship Half-Baked? Here Are 6 Mistakes That Trans Allies Are Still Making — Everyday Feminism.

Silences and Storms

…and as these moments roll along
across the mountains, over hills
and I listen to soft windsong
because your voice has grown so still

and time passes, by waterfalls
while clouds grow black and threatening
and sulfurous gouts of thunder roll
and lightning graphs your fearsome name

it’s silences and storms these days
my heart is torn in these two ways
the words I need, you fail to speak
the words that kill…they slice my cheek

and also cheek I turn to you
and that one, that one, then…adieu
i find myself alone, just me
winds, waterfalls have set me free

to see you in your silent tower
and you in thorny violent bower
and you who will not talk at all…
it’s you who’s deaf to Love’s pure call

I’ll sit me here in peace, just so
and breathe the earth’s exhales, and know
I’m fine in Jesus’ nail scarred hand
And marked forever with Grace’s Brand

One More Old One

This was very early on…I had internally chosen transition, but I was waiting.  I wanted to interact with family members and discover what response if any may result from the news of my gender journey.

At the end of that year those discussions occurred and support/affirmation was given, so I embarked on the journey.

Since then much has changed…

I doubt that I would have gone forward had I known then what I know now.

But then again, that’s why God set up time the way it is.  Because the truth?  In spite of the horror words spoken and the ineffable sadness of those words that used to be spoken not being spoken now, I am better off for the transition.

Fascist Architecture and all that.

It’s hard to know if all the things presented in evidence against me now were there all along and just hidden…or if they are the after-the-fact distortions of individuals who are deep in major cognitive dissonance now…certainly I feel like the email/artifact record presents a dramatically different story…I lived a dramatically different story!

No matter…it is what it is now, and those things are held as axiomatic and reality.

Anyway…this poem was at the very beginning…such naivety, such anticipation!

Present In The Vanishing

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I Prefer Cats

long letters, diatribes, litanies…
…i prefer cats.

short notes/band aids for skin deep cover…
…i prefer cats.
tumblr_nq9qodpgPR1qat5pio1_400silences/absences or being on to-do lists…
…i prefer cats.tumblr_nq0mniFO1C1qfzzyto2_1280decisions made/enforced and handed down hard…
…i prefer cats.tumblr_npsmhdYGiK1qefrmxo1_1280soft.
silky.
minds of their own.
love hidden in kitty paws
and Mama purrs
and rough comfort tongues.

I prefer cats

Link To Last Year’s Father’s Day Poem

Oh Constance…it boggles my mind how much has changed.

How much has changed…

It’s good that I knew not what would happen…and yet, no way I would go back.

Back to the bondage of those days, back to discontents concealed and blame laid up yet hidden and at the ready to be doled out…back to that skin, that servitude to a virus that has infected this entire planet and its mammon-serving economic blood.

Bruce Cockburn said this…in his amazing song “Fascist Architecture”

“you tore me outta myself alive”.

Here is the link to last year’s poem written on Father’s Day…it makes me laugh ruefully…I was so proud of it.

The Footprints of Ghosts

I was so proud of us…thinking we would be different than…better than.

Pride was my downfall, as it is for every person prideful.

Praise our God of Grace and Humility, for Their Mighty Deliverance and Salvation from the Hell of ourselves!

Why don’t you click Play on Bruce below…listen to him tell the truth, and read of my naive optimism?
Thank God that though optimism fade in the heat, Faith remains unconquerable!

Beside This Ring Of Ashes One Year Later

One year later,
in this year of grace
I sit in stillness
ringside once again
but only with dead ashes,
no flame.

Instead, I warm myself within
with thoughts of fires long ago,
long gone out but flickering
strongly in this quiet night
of lonely memories.tumblr_nq9ngm71fg1qat5pio1_500

I know it has to happen, yes
this death of me, this death
of who I was, no…
what I was, or rather
what you thought I was
and what I wasn’t too.

You thought me as a god,
and just a little lower than a god.
Your “glorious glorious father”
shining strong and tall,
quick and certain, no one knew
that was but wooly curtains drawn
over a stage making the ready
for a play to become real-life…
finally…at last…
But…what’s a child to do when god betrays?

tumblr_nm8fo9zWD51tkr81jo1_1280When god is thus unfaithful and capricious…
that god must become monster,
and vicious harsh taskmaster,
when god must be recast as sick pretender
(your words, love, not mine, those are your words)
as just the “other”, empty, just a mask?tumblr_nd6tstqbwz1sckob0o1_1280

Well, Nietzsche showed the way, now dint he?
He sussed the death of God and birth of crisis…
He understood the very underpinnings
of everything are quivering like liquid,
all foundations kicked asunder
and this hollow edifice
left floating in the shell-pink air.

Nietzsche called for total transformation,
he demanded blood, the death of God,
and also everything He stood for.

I get it…I do…the death of god
No really, I know it’s me, not you…
Problematic in my breathing
and offensive in my joy, well
this aggression will not stand, man!

And so it is that I must die…well,
he must die and be defamed
for every single gripe,
complaint or wound or sling
he must be destroyed
because he wasn’t He
and now it’s clear
that he would never be…
but I will be…me.tumblr_nneoshc0PX1sq00azo1_1280

Go ahead, beloveds,
it’s true that I must die
so you can be set free
and God at last can finally BE
that God of Wonder
far beyond the Galaxy,
high above and right beside us
bringing life again to you and me.

Use what silver knives you have
(I placed them in your hands so long ago,
carefully planned, bequeathed to you your
weapons of words, of music and of comprehension).
Use the ropes you find inside your packs,
laid lovingly from Lorien in wonder
and in sober long anticipation yes,
that someday your blood be required
of me and on my head as well
(but it’s in my heart forever).54606def315a3No crucifix for me, how gauche,
how gothic and old fashioned!
No…a shiny scaffold glittery
erected stainless steel there, gleaming
austere, so implacable
and one thin razor wire noose
with my neck’s name writ there

*Charissa Grace* tumblr_npuhk5h8PG1uru6h4o1_1280

(except it’s not so plain as all that)
no…the old name that speaks of

blood     and
the price     and all things made
white as snow again.tumblr_nq5pgxrQWz1qllucco2_1280

I have confidence in you
(this is not stupid or myopic,
this is love, Lovelies).
I see this execution
is but you living out
what I have taught you
that there is no god but God
(not even glorious father)

and all things that you love
descend from His Great Goodness
and Mama’s bag of richestumblr_nm27mtsR1i1qkevp7o1_1280

*beauty of the Leaves of Grass
haunting grace of purity ring
simple joy in eyes of beloved boys
furious flow of men and balls and love*

I wish you all good always
and hope that someday your mouth won’t be cursed
with this burnt aftertaste of death,
and me just acrid curse to you…
if my death expiate your soul
and bring release and freedom to you all
then quick, oh Hangman, let the black bell toll
and pull your lever that I may hard fall

and snap…snuff…pooftumblr_na3un4PrG41r1arpmo1_1280

and on you live, free
building brave new worlds
but I will still be like those flickering fires
that linger in my mind while I sit here
beside this ring of ashes never warm
and those seats empty in this quiet storm

of memory, of love, of sorrow held so dear
God knows I gladly die and wish you near
and trust that I will rise and know no fear
forever, just Love’s Fires always here.tumblr_nq3ucoBZSl1qat5pio1_400

“The madman jumped into their midst and pierced them with his eyes. ‘Whither is God,’ he cried; ‘I will tell you. We have killed him—you and I! All of us are his murderers…Do we not feel the breath of empty space? Has it not become colder?…Do we smell nothing as yet of the divine decomposition? Gods, too, decompose. God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him.'”
Friedrich Nietzsche 
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The Blossom of Memories of You (Father’s Day 2015)

There’s a stone in your body
where heart used to be
there’s a hurt in my heart
where your smile ran so free
there’s an echo of you
deep within, here in me
but your voice trails off
and disappears.

You have wandered so far afield
into the satin night
while I am touching
the circle of golden light
shed by the memories
of what we shared,
what we might share again,
if you’d stayed within sight
and let love be our shield,
let love be our shield…

But I wear your flowers in my tresses, braided
in my hair the scent of your laughter, it lingers
longing for you to return and to claim
those words that you uttered then, sitting so empty,
forlorn, blurred and muttered without clarity
and without true commitment
to something beyond the grave,
waiting to rise again,
new…rise again, new…

I wear
the blossom
of memories
of you…tumblr_nq5mvr5QL21qllucco2_1280

That Small Distance Gaping

It’s not that far, really,
when you consider
the arm’s reach
of Andromeda
or the stride
of Cassiopeia.

But that distance
between you there
and me here
confounds me
confuses me
in its elasticity

in its plasticity
it grows and shrinks
with the mood
of the moon
and the shades
of your heart

rolling up sunny
pulling down flinty
and all laid just so
at the feet of that
lead based busy god
pretending at time.

I wish I could
escape the shell
of time and dance
across galaxies
in a twinkle
and a dash

and swing
all day
with you
dear friend
all day
with you

Our Us

It’s not a game, my dear,
to see who keeps their cards more near
and shunts examination clear
behind them and well, to the rear.

You win, okay?  I freely share
I put my bleeding heart out there,
and if I’m foolish, I don’t care
cus holding back is just no where.

Please share your heart, it feeds my soul
and when you open up, I’m whole
cus your friendship is just like coal
becoming diamonds in the toll.

You win…I give you victory
Control, access to all of me
I do not fear, do not dread thee
because in our Us I am free.
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What I Wish Every Person Knew

…this would transform the world.

It is the hardest thing for me…ever…to not hear from loved ones, and then get a dashed off note with the word “sorry” (not even “I am sorry”), and a line of sandwich filler, and a conclusion of “love you” (writing “I love you” takes too long).

Saving time and all…for what?  Where is all that time saved?  In a bank somewhere drawing interest?

No…it is spent…everyday.

Every.  Last.  Red.  Cent.  Second.

Ticks and tricks…tickles and trickles thru your will and then your heart…

…and finally your fingers to lay there at your feet as the record of what you did and what you did not do.

Charissa is regularly labeled wordy…of generating too much content…of putting too much out there to be dealt with or responded to…

but I guess that’s just how I roll…cus time.  Fading.  Flowing…flying away and done too soon. And I want to give everything I have to give…especially my time.

Do Justice.  Love Mercy.  Walk Humbly

To The Ones Twisting In Agony

Dearest Hearts:

As time passes it becomes increasingly clear to me that you are incredibly shocked and perhaps even traumatized by recent events.  What started as a journey rooted in solidarity and a narrative of history held in common, stitched together by memories of holidays, traditions, and countless days in the sun has been blown apart by a story describing a life experience so different and distinct as to seem like the most crazed and addled of fictions.

Except it is far more complicated than that…both your experiences of it and ours.tumblr_npmvryFJ0N1unf033o1_1280

And trying to put the spotlight of truth on “what really happened” is as fruitful as running on the beach to try and catch a seagull…memory and our past flies up and away when we run hard at it.

Certainly there is a plethora of artifacts that buttress my own experience…but here is the rub for me:

So much of those days is fuzzy to me, blurred by time and by the assumption that we were pretty fortunate to have one another…but most of all so much of it was swallowed whole and robbed from me by a Leviathan called Dysphoria.  In the bone-frying terror of trying to survive the assaults of despair, a lot of my memory is reduced to memories of just hanging on.528483-Depression-1364630455-842-640x480

As you all have been processing things, you have gone silent, gone angry, but mostly, just…gone.  Nothing.  And what reports do trickle back have been shocking in their vehement accusations and recollections, have been utterly astonishing in the gaping holes where context tells a radically differing tale…and completely and totally devastating to read and encounter.

It has been like a pogrom on my history…and what is worst of all is that whatever or however it happened, you have come to this time and this place where you have these driving needs to tell your story and write your history thus.

And thus the heart of this post:  I want you to know that it is okay.large (4)

I want you to be and do and say whatever it is that will bring you expiation and freedom.
I want for you liberty and fruitfulness.
I want for you life and wholeness.

I want for you what I have always wanted for you and sought to provide you.

And I love you…regardless of what you might think or not think, say or not say, remember or forget.
I will never not love you.

Never.

Perhaps someday there will be enough said or done that you might begin to feel those relentless scales within entering into a sort of equilibrium…the doors of my heart are flung wide open.tumblr_ngu7ex2a631t5zt91o1_1280

Perhaps someday you might be handling the artifacts that my fingertips and heart tendrils trace daily, and you might find the tracks of my tears and the perfume of my love…in letters, in cards and emails…in memories other than the ones who swell and swarm our landscape like Red Tides…

…and if that ever happens, please do not waste one moment of your lives in regret or remorse…while it is evident to me that it is highly unlikely that this will ever happen, there is a chance that you might feel as if you have in some fashion or way done wrong in the process of this becoming of ours, and if this is ever the case I say to you

I love you
I forgive you
I have no record of wrong
I believe everyday in who I know you are
I want the best for you as you are able to discover it and access it
It is my honor to have had a part in your coming to be and it is my doom to be accountable for the innumerable ways that I failed you and caused you pain and horror.
I hope everyday that you are finding the sort of strength in becoming that I am experiencing.

Should you ever glance my direction, I am here at the end of the lane of home, everyday standing on tippietoes and my eyes combing the horizon and my heart listening to the wind and my nose sniffing the air for your presence…

…hoping to see you, praying for your safety and shalom…and never ever failing to hold you in my heart precious.

I also want you to know this:  whatsoever you need to write, need to shout, need to throw, need to yell, need to think or tell or believe…whatever you need to do or be in order to be whole, it is okay with me.tumblr_msjrksOnZh1rkjw3bo1_1280

I refuse to ever be “a betrayed one”
I refuse to ever be “a wronged one”
I refuse to ever be “offended”

I choose you and your wholeness.
I choose you and your horror that you lay at my feet and at my accountability.  Let it be on me, to make things lighter and easier and more fruitful for you it is my glad and sacred honor.

If the narrative is now that I was the worst abuser, a victimizer, a (fill in the blank)…whatever it is…as long as it is an assignation of responsibility that enables you to be delivered and put in a place where you can choose life and choose wholeness and becoming, then it is a sentence that I want to have over me that I shall do my absolute best to carry in the way that creates the freedom and deliverance and cleansing within that brings you the very best that can be brought.

May it be my meals for the rest of my days if in eating it there is even a modicum of relief and wholeness for you.

Everyday without you is like Kafka’s world with no exit…unless in the absence I have the assurances it is resulting in your liberty and gladness and joy…

…and in that case it is the greatest of honors to be in this place.

I think I know who I was…and who I wasn’t too, finally.  I think I acted in good faith, but who really knows?  When one is dysphoria’s ball of yarn it gets a bit discombobulating to be batted around for 5o years.

But now?  I know I know who I am, and who I am not…and while I can do nothing about what has happened, the future is mine to write, each and everyday that is left in God’s coffers for me to walk out.tumblr_npxzck3PTr1rav43uo1_1280

I love you with all my heart, and I am honored by each of you in your strength of voice, your commitment to one another, your loyalty to truth and your heart for justice.

There are many who could have loved you more perfectly.

There are none who could have loved you more.

I loved you utterly, totally…I still do.

And I always will.  Love you.

Say on…it’s okay, let it rip…do what you must and need and want…be…become.

Cus I am here now:  Charissa Grace, and I am finally free and not a helpless bystander any longer, and nothing can ever lock me up ever again.11094852_690388207737694_2806437274797532527_n

Written in my blood and tears and sweat…and the tattoo ink of forever love,

Me…the one who was there and now is here…the one who engendered you…

Your loving parenttumblr_noiz30RJh51tpdjt7o1_1280

In Arpeggio Miles

Prelude:
There is an indigo bunting
outside my window singing
in the moonlight streaming by
a million miles an hour.
But it is not the window
on my mind tonight…
I keep returning to that door,
the one between you and me.

Fumes of light stream from my soul
and ribbons of sound rise from my heart.
I glow with purpose and echo with meaning
and love descends so soft upon my shoulders

and kisses my brow
with lips of apple red
that grace the inmost curve
of the coming sun arising.tumblr_npj2lfAzvL1qz62xqo1_1280One:
Some people drown in the darkness of the night,
some people drown in the waters of the lake,
some people drown in the creamy golden moonlight…

*sob*

I drown in you, your heart my anchor
pulling me down to the depths of you,
to the bottom of you but never finding it,
the bottom

in this
ecstasy of sinking
into you.

You…you…
Luminescent and Limerent and I know
in my depths the outside is temporary.

Your fatal gift, the fatal gift of beauty
was revealed when the Redwing Blackbird
stopped by our house tonite,

and perched on her throne there
in the blue spruce tree grey in the night
at the center of the grey green wood all around.

She dignified
our proceedings with her song,
and all was well.tumblr_nm25jtSBHh1szbceio1_1280Two:
Beyond, on your side of that door
the moon tickles the lake
with her golden liquid fingertips
languid in the soft night
and sounding of rivers of song
that soar between stars,
that pour between galaxies

*in arpeggio miles*

that take not light years
but move in sound centuries
that stop time and make the past
and the future stand off
and stand still in awe
of these fabled musical moments
that fold time in deep space.
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The moon is loyal always,
but only to herself.
She comes and goes…
She is always there,
watching, steadfast
and knowing us in
our light and dark moments,
She wavers with us as we wax
and wane…
She knows what it means
to be on display and assaulted
by meteors in the night.

Three:
I buried her nose
(the nose of the moon)
in my hair,

(my hair, rampant and unpinned, on the loose,
set free from the usual noose of clippie or headband,
untamed and untameable but always laying back
and down for you, your palms, your fingertips
in those tresses thick and fine, golden-shine
and dusky red overlaying and singing
of my inner pulsing red wet passion)

she drinking in/thirsting for me here
and my perfumes in dim rose-tinged light,
and there we danced upon the air,
hanging in the space between there and here,
and I felt the tips of my breasts swell and tighten,
come to focus and awareness, the smoothness of my belly
and my thighs clenching on hers and meshing tight,
an intricate creation of vaporous mist and lightning
of rain and dust, of desire and aching, groaning must.

And we two, in our separate skins
but sharing those common vital organs of us,
face to face and flying in freedom
to discover each other’s universe
and thus enter in and live this love adventure
full of risk and promise.

We lay together, in my mind, we lay together
in the full of night while others drowse unawares
in the halfway darkness of night’s deep sable, washed out
with screaming electric light.tumblr_npdx52lbec1tw8mtoo2_r3_500

Four:
The moon pries at the ripples and the lake stirs into waves
under her touch and inhales swift in desire and exhales
in winds of want, and her lakey answering song of delight
rises from those moundy wet humps of her body
against the rocks, and onto sandy beaches

It’s the song of lovers lost and longing.
It’s the song heard only by hearts that listen.
It’s the music of the stars writ in the moment
in dancing waters by calligraphic moonlight rays
extending from forever and into never ending
and never ceasing until those waters answer
with sweet frothy songs and foamy longing harmonies
sweet and sibilant whispers against the dry and thirsty sands…

and then at last, in gurgly gasps,
her answer of longing for the moon
rising and falling and caught
by the moon’s grip,
mesmerized by her gravity.
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Five:
The wind’s soft palms caress my face tonight,
her tender tendrils pluck my tresses,
kiss my cheeks rosy and peachy-soft and me here,
beside the stirring lake and beneath
the ministrations of the moon
inside the heart of the naked night
and lost in starry reaches over galaxy beaches
strewn over the vast expanse of nothing.

*and yet it is
never really nothing,
is it? nothing
doesn’t really exist…
because something!

Something!
And all else
is not that
and thus is
Something else,
and nothing is
dispelled…
and this is
why this song,
why this light
and the water
and the sound…
why the you
and the me
is a something,
an us, and
not a nothing,
not loss.*tumblr_mksatpyfwr1r5fwoio1_540

Six:
I stir and shift, as the waters in the bathtub
lose heat and their ardor is dampened
in the thirsty soft night air sneaking in
thru the cracked window, brushing against
the curtains you made me in
the 7th winter of our vast contents.

I run my hands over my hills (yours)
and they dive into valleys (yours)
like fog banks rolling in for the week,
beneath the surface of my bath (this lake)
and you so far away

I am still yours and yours alone love…
well, and the moon and the lake
and the stars in the night…
I am theirs too, but as they lead to you,
what’s that really matter?

My fingers dance lightly into my lake, across my folds,
they pry like moonlight into my depths,
probe like starlight into my galaxy cores that stand,
eternity’s target for time’s arrows of light
shot from the bows of longing…3513680_orig

longing for you, always
you across the sands of time
vast like beaches,
small ‘neath reaches
of stars and space
and become as nothing
when I summon to my mind
your face…your face…
your curve and swell
and moans escape my lips,
and such tales those moans do tell
but they speak only in tongues
not of men but angels
and sound bells sweetly
between the lips of time
and there again,
I gush like rivers
I am yours,
I am thine…
OH…

thine alone
thine alone
thine alone
thine alone
thine alone…

and all the symphony
of us escapes my lips
in sighs and whispers
of your sacred name
and in the air above
my parted lips
and just outside
my lowered fluttering lids.

Our song hangs there
over my yearning face
as sung by me
in solo sotto voce
so softly in
the slick and velvet night
and tender touch
of golden glad moonlight.

It swims above
my longing heart so red
across the distance
indigo that stretches
until it finds you, there,
until it touches
you in just the same
way it just took me
and you enter into
our Holy Us,
our Glory Be…

Seven:
But now the winds subside and waters have cooled
and night recedes, sucked back into the stars
from which it oozed in hungry sweet washes

and time looks on, time resumes, time takes back
its rightful place around me, in huffy shrugs and jerky yanks
of garments back in place…and jeans just so

and nothing is what remains of moments long unceasing
except the footprints of the moon across the surface of the lake
and brushes of their dance on sands

in footprints keeping time locked firmly in its place
and held in check between the stars, behind the shining moments
of the galaxies showing off, immune

*to time’s inoculations.*

But water graces my bare shoulders,
drops of starlight linger in my hair
and our song dances in my eyes and lives

in my heart and you
always, always always
are only here

and questions are at peace now,
and answers? They are known,
like long locked rooms in an old familiar house

where each creak and groan
is recognized in darkness
as the sighs of a familiar

faithful friend and lover
in a language that the heart alone
comprehends.
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Eight:
The mind lacks understanding and I am standing,
under, under moon and stars in something, here.
I spin on my axis and show you my other face
for we all like the moon, we have 2 faces,
and we also like the moon keep our best side facing out…

but is that side the one most real, or even best?
And so I turn and hear the creaking of the turning on my axis
to face you with my other face, the dark side of my moon me
and the light has come to set me free and time is there
and is of no meaning, not anymore, not ever.

(It’s become
nothing which exists
not, never, no more.)tumblr_np6lnxVe2O1sg9acoo1_1280

Finale:
Wallace Stevens said
“sometimes the truth depends upon a walk around the lake.”
but I know different, I know the sojourn that I take
to walk on waters is to know the place
where truth is held, in love’s own heart of grace.

So let’s not hurry home tonight, let’s linger, here,
in hammocks under diamond slick black sky.
The stars they are on fire tonight so high
above us, I think someone could go check,
see how they shine, how they shine, OH.

And the miles are present too, they are
like an overly unctuous waiter eager for a tip,
hovering between us, connecting your there with my here
and taking the lone from the a,
we are connected in what is called

the distance, but there is a shortcut, dear
it’s my heart, feel right there
see it shine (like stars) for all it’s worth
and more, so close, so near
and travelling forever in arpeggio miles.tumblr_njqb6a8kks1r3fkjno1_1280

 

This Nebula Crumbling

The birth of stars
begins with death,
begins with dark
collapse in depths,
and destructions mark
a beginning, the birth
of a star from collapse
and crumble.69609b394ebaa0261bba09213613c643They came with
star-killing words
and struck light from
space and didn’t even
give the dignity of
a blazing trail of glory
as this star augers in
to gravity.tumblr_npxxyrZeCO1r38hk2o1_1280I collapsed in
on myself tonight,
crumbled from nebula
to white dwarf.
And while their
words whirled round
my head in stardust clouds,
I wondered
if there would be
the birth of a star…
at last.

Holy Woman Icon

Love Like Breakfast

I want
someone to hug me,
walk up behind me
on kitty paws padding
quiet and pouncy,
put their head next
to mine and talk
to me in sleepy singsong
while I make them
breakfast.
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The Gates of Departure

I feel odd, dislocated
for no reason visible
or known, when I am
about to enter thru
the gates of departure…tumblr_nptr07xEoF1risr9ko1_1280
connections of time and place
and meaning, these I shall miss
though they are not yet gone
they tremble on the cusp
of the convergence of now and thentumblr_npvcrhO0Gq1qat5pio1_500
I imagine the person I will be
and start to miss the person that
I am before I am
even gone but somehow I am
in that when then right now.
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It’s because I know it
in my bones deep
that I will never be
this way, ever again
and that is such a mystery.
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In Consolation’s Loving Arms

Consolation…
such a beautiful word.
con-     “to be”
solus-   “with the lonely one”
Offering consolation is caring
like that early summer mist
cares for the thirsty ground
dreading the coming sunny heat.
It does not take away
the coming pain
but rather covers over
and assuages that fierce dread
and says I’m with you
you are not alone
together we can face the sun
though I dissipate
I shall return
always I shall return
to bear the burden with you
a gift of union joyful.
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Just Lies

I find something reprehensible, and cheesy…cheap.  Tawdry.

It is the scrabbling fingertips on the true heart of friendship but the turned face to its commitment lived out.

I am gaining confidence to say that I am worth more than lip service.

So I say it…I am worth more than lip service.

just lies

A Plea To You

Constance…

A while back I posted a page called “Help Charissa Transition”.  I have not pushed it whatsoever, but wanted to have it there.  I have been blessed by a couple of contributions, and they mean so much to me that someone believes in me that much.

But I wanted to bring it up…as I have recently passed 500 followers, and the issue of being a trans-ally is a hot one right now, what with Qs about what can be done that demonstrates being an ally.

Well…here is sumfin to think about:  if each of you contributed $100.00 (which is about 10 hours of work at minimum wage), the fund would swell to $50,000.00…and just like that all the othering and obstacle of gate-keeping insurance companies is overcome and I would be able to get my Gender Confirmation surgery.

If each of you contributed 10.00…well, I could begin some of the FFS surgeries that I would greatly benefit from.

And if you gave more, the balance that I did not need for my own surgeries would be donated to a few trans-women that I am connected to.

I think things like this will be the future, ways to do and to be what is needed in spite of the way that the system seeks to other us.

Just think about it…perhaps it is foregoing Starbies for a month…or skipping dinner out 2x, or…fill in the blank.

And thanks for even thinking about it, btw…it is exciting to contemplate and dream about.

Much Love,
Charissa
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Living as a transgender woman who doesn’t yet ‘pass’

This…everyday.  This is the life we walk.

As the recent Human Rights Commission’s ‘Resilient Individuals: Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity & Intersex Rights’ report shows, transgender people are at a highly elevated risk of being physically and verbally harassed, made unemployed, homeless, denied healthcare or access to other services, than most other demographics within Australia. Having experienced every one of the aforementioned situations at one time or another during my transition, I wish being transgender was unremarkable enough that I didn’t have to ‘pass’ and that I could safely participate in activities like sport and work without my identity being constantly under scrutiny.

via Living as a transgender woman who doesn’t yet ‘pass’.tumblr_no7l4ikNi01thfeewo1_1280

Extremely Powerful Thinking: On Femininity and the Patriarchy

Constance…please read thru the sections I am sharing below.  Read it slow and let it sink in.

This is my life.  I am living these sentences (word chosen to echo and double back on itself, those with eyes let them see).

Consider the way that my sentences being served also impact you…and the way that yours can set me free, if you will but begin to speak them.

Just read up on the Bell Hooks-Laverne Cox talk, thought it was really uncool (and unfemininist) of Hooks to chide Cox for her presentation.

I mean yeah, I get that for (feminist) cis women, femininity can start to feel constricting after a while, but trans women have a very different relationship with it. Patriarchy wants AFAB (Assigned Female At Birth) people to be feminine, it does not want AMAB (Assigned Male At Birth) people to be feminine.

For a person that was assigned male at birth, it absolutely can be revolutionary to embrace femininity. It is anathema to patriarchy for AMAB people to embrace femininity, why else do you think trans women get any and all femininity beaten out of them for the first part of their lives?

Besides, cis women had all their lives to try it out and grow tired of it. How many cis women haven’t smeared their mum’s lipstick all over their face as a little girl? At least have a heart and give us some time to experiment with femininity, you were given that time while you were growing up and I don’t see you high-n-mighty feminists going after teenage cis girls for it.

I would like to expand on this, and say that the patriarchy derides and punishes femininity in general. That’s why men who like female-coded activities are mocked. that’s why “girly-girls” are derided as shallow or high-maintenance.

But with trans women, expressing femininity is particularly revolutionary because it isn’t just about social conditioning–it’s a complete rejection of masculinity as the “valuable option.”

Many women–trans and cis–find value in femininity, but when cis women embrace it, everyone assumes it’s because it is expected and because that’s how they were trained. It isn’t considered unusual, because society insists that’s the punishment you get for being a woman, and if you’re very good you’ll reject that and try to act more like your “betters.”

But trans women are offered masculinity on a platter–it’s assumed to be our birthright–and we reject it. More accurately, like most people we reject parts of it. We’re proof that masculinity isn’t inherently valuable or precious–it’s just another thing.

And of course, patriarchal ideals double down on us for that. Our punishment for embracing the feminine and not being “rightly” ashamed of it is to be chained by it, and punished for any infraction. Male-coded interests are “proof” that we’re faking it.

Not appearing feminine enough is grounds for firing or banning us from homes (or from the lives of our own relatives). Expressing anger or standing up for ourselves is interpreted–even by self-proclaimed feminists–as our being aggressive and “really” men.

And revealing anything about our genitals is literally grounds for execution.

People hunt down the tiniest nuances–our shoulders, our voices, or hobbies, or age–and use the smallest infraction against gender norms to completely invalidate our statement that masculinity isn’t precious at all. This despite the fact that trans women, like everyone, aren’t inherantly “pure women” or “pure men” any more than any cis person–we’re mixes of social messages and biological impulses, some accepted some rejected, that go into forming a complex human being.

Trans women highlight that there’s no superior gender or gendered form of expression, and that pisses people off.

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To All Trans-allies:

Remember, the steps you take so effortlessly are nearly impossible for us sometimes to even think about, let alone get over.  While you are busy “ally-ing”, be mindful to look down and let your eyes rest on us…

…and if we are scrabbling at the curb you stride over without thinking, just a lil hand on our bottom to skootch us up and over is so appreciated!

Oh…and that curb can be anything btw…from using the bathroom, to applying makeup, to obtaining healthcare…to getting a fair shake on a job application without having to hide gender status to merely walking down the street in peace without dodging globules of spit.

Thanks to you, Ally…you are appreciated greatly…just be mindful of us lil kittens!

In Humility’s Scale

there ain’t much ground to stand on
there’s not a lot of space
for all my lil toesies
for my skert lil face

to go before me in the world
and represent my heart
it takes balance and grace unfurled
my banner and my part

it looks like I must tiptoe
on post and on the wire
but actually I walk in joy
aflame with Mercy Fire

so disregard what you see
and look beneath the veil
see mercy balance justice
in Humility’s scale

Burnt Offerings

These words are my offerings burnt
singed in fires of pain and hurt
written as gouts of bright blood spurt
from my contrite soul.

I take treasure from my heart
pleasures, pains, my every dart
burn them for a brand new start
the incense of my spirit.tumblr_nph40vd8QN1t0lovho1_1280

I will rise, all clothed in red
from my tear-stained sodden bed
walk into dark woods instead
and scatter these lost dreams

to leave a path of grace behind
and light remaining there to find
a way thru hurt to Your Home kind
I sing a new song now.tumblr_nppw79eGMA1rmdrr8o1_1280

From The Writings of King David

This.

Gives me hope.

Always.

You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it;
you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.
The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart,
O God, you will not despise.barbara-bargiggia

Some Older Poems

Constance, I am working on a poem right now that is soo luscious and really just sorta pouring outta me…I am not trying to stopper the flow or even shape it right now.  It is just the gushing and bubbling up of deep things, layered in verigation and heavy with inference.

It will be in the future sometime when I am in the right space to begin sculpting, shaping, nudging things here and there…

So here are some poems from the past, in the meantime.

Ghosts
This poem is about a ton of things, and finds particular application to those who cast away on a foolish journey of thought and belief, or lack thereof…those who follow the siren calls of narcissism and nihilism so rampant in our world.

The Golden End
The irony (kind irony:  is that “kirony?”)…the Kind Irony of this poem is that the Golden End is just the beginning…

Sail With Me?
What are your boats?  “Empty yet not abandoned”?

Mama’s Clothes
The very cry of my heart, my soul, my all.

So…I am learning to dance on waves, walk on water.  I have discovered my wings, and they are large…

Will you join me?  The surface is as solid as what you look at…tumblr_nplgkyR1TG1t7chr3o1_1280

Mama With Me, Near Today

Constance…

How I wish that you could know…know…the Love of God…the Presence of Them in your core essence.

God has been so polluted and trashed by the low things that oppose Them.  God has been so misrepresented by complete morons who spin out of their corrupted souls a god made in their own image, and it is ugly, it is gross, it is cruel and it is crude…and most of all it is blind, dumb, and deaf, just like them.

God is Humble.  They pounce thru every single crack in human perception that shows the least openness to Them, and They shine…oh how They shine.

They have loved me.

And that is a wonder that breaks me open again and again and again and again and…

Holy Spirit of God…Holy Spirit is Their Presence here in this creation.  Jesus has ascended and is in heaven in this time and making all things ready.  So Their presence is Holy Spirit…and oh the honor of Her drawing me near Her, opening the Word to me to see Her…

She is like one of my poems…layers, hints, indirection, inference, and sometimes subtle in its baldfaced straightforwardness…this is Her.

And She is altogether good, and I love Her.

*****     *****     *****     *****     *****

Reader:  I will never not love Her.

Never.

Your statements and judgments of Her are dust and lower than irrelevance.

Why do you fulminate and foam at the mouth because I love Her?  If indeed She was just a myth, why would you even care? I love Her, and it is to Her that I have surrendered, and willingly laid down control.

Does It Matter?


So I used to wonder about this…will I be missed.  Does what I do make a difference in the world.  Do I matter.

But Purposive Grace…remember that?

Now, when I read things like this graphic above, I know that it really doesn’t matter if I am missed or not, if what I do makes a difference in the world.

I am living with my purpose for being…and that makes every difference in the world!

This world doesn’t happen to me.  No…I happen to it!

If you are reading this, struggling with depression and despair, consider the things I write of in Purposive Grace…

…and join the ‘Rissa Roo Party!  Woo HOO!!tumblr_npe04ityyl1qat5pio1_500

Thank you!

Dear Cassandra…

Your kindness and acceptance has been Eternal Gold to me.

You wear your heart on your sleeve…definitely a Woman after my own heart, and I have learned so much from you as I watch how you negotiate the space of being an older child with so many young ones, the eldest sister of three pretty powerful girls, and your own seething yearning heart that longs so for that…beyond.

May you ever be blessed with clear vision, and the courage to let your muse sing at the top of her ever-livin’ lungs!

Much Love!!!
Ms Charissa

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“Your Best Friend”

I rolled into work early, comme toujours, and bustled down to the kitchbah to get things prepared for the day.  There were ranges to light, ovens to turn on, dishwashers to prep, and food to coax.

*You realize that…don’t you?  You must coax food to “join the party”…usually with letting it warm a bit, and then liberal application of olive oil if it is something that must come together.*tumblr_muo6bsyfhO1qzleu4o1_500

What do you know, when I got there, and spied on the counter an 8 1/2 x 11 sized package, wrapped in light yellow tissue paper and green yarn holding it together.  On top of it was a folded piece of paper…

“Only for Mrs. Charissa
🙂
Your Best Friend”

The paper had been drawn on to make it appear as if it were an envelope…it was soo touching and adorable, and from the handwriting, I was certain it was from one of the children that I help care for.

Have you ever had the experience of finding out unexpectedly that someone considers them self “your best friend”?  I have not…until that day.  (No…DDH, when I discovered that you considered yourself my bestie, it was delightful beyond belief but not unexpected! lol)tumblr_mug8bcrC3A1qkjpslo1_1280

Inside the folded paper (special stationary type paper) it was laid out like an email with a “to” section and a “from” section.

It was from “Cassandra” (name changed to protect my angel lil friend’s privacy)…this young lady is one of the most amazing people I have ever had the good fortune to encounter in my entire life…and she has 2 sisters who are equally amazing, accepting, friendly and loving.  Her youngest sister was the bold child on my first day at the center when I was doing my “try-out” classroom test…she walked straight up to me, her dark eyes like limitless pools, and so solemnly asked me if I was a boy or a girl…I told her I was like an oreo cookie:  one thing on the outside, something different on the inside, and all together I was me, and sweet.  She thought about it, smiled, and nodded.  I then simply explained to her what happened to me as I was created, and the insight and look of knowing that happened in those eyes was an eternal gift.

Since then she has been one of my biggest fans.tumblr_mt637dVtd31r4hhzeo2_500

But Cassandra…well, she also was kind, caught on right away, but she hung around a bit, listening, watching, feeling the experiences I have everyday in living.  She paid attention to my true heart, and not the things I spin outta my kitchbah to feed the kids.  She is the one who was walking beside me, talking, on the way into the center from the bus parking lot…and these people who live across the street decided to verbally and loudly tell me what I was, in the lowest and most crude slang imaginable.

I ignored it, like always…sigh…and just kept talking with Cassandra, but her face went white, and still.  Her eyes widened in shock, horror, and then…something else:  she realized that this was my life.  Every day.  Just because I am…and she began to cry.  She was horrified at what was said, and I think even mildly traumatized, so we of course talked a bit about it.

It was a true teachable moment on the meaning of forgiveness and a lifestyle of Grace.tumblr_mukhaaFXSI1qd0knjo2_1280

So anyway, Cassandra had written this:

I now you will
like this.  I Made
some Pritty Good
ones for you
I was Thinking of You at
school

🙂

Can you say *Instant melty heart exiting eyes PDQ*???

Okay, first of all…she knew.  She knew I would like it, a priori.  Let that sink in.
Secondly, she judged her own work, and decided it was pretty good (it is, btw), and that it was for me.
And then…the killer love words:  I was thinking of you at school.

When it was time to create, her thoughts turned to me…

Rapture.  Pure.  Rapture.

The next several poems are hers…I am placing them here on Grace Notes as my own weak ineffectual attempt to show I am thankful and grateful for her love and affection…and her friendship. cropped-tumblr_m4t7m7roid1r743s1o1_12801.jpg