Never Giving Up

Nightmares began before the age of four
And never ended
Typically, demons and monsters
Sometimes they come true
An only child
Capable of skipping the first grade
Lost two fathers to divorce
Entire step-family, brothers and sisters, gone
Never seen again
Best friend kidnapped, soon after
Life with a single, low-income parent
Latch-key kid, learned to cook, on that old cast iron skillet

I walked a lot, hid in the comfort of tall oak trees
Shirley Temple Black’s house, just around the corner
Near Stanford University’s tall, green grass
Without Mother, attended my own parent/teacher conference
A gifted-kid, hyper-active, with a tendency to daydream
Saving babysitter funds, to buy my own toiletries and clothes
Red striped Nikes, Grandmother’s
Size six, one size too small, but I made them work
Three pairs of pants, rotated, accessories were luxury

A high school freshman, on the east coast
Bullied and ostracized, called out in the halls
“Slut,” “Idiot,” “Bitch”
Wept to the bearded school counselor, to please listen
As something was wrong, couldn’t read
Stomach pains, can’t comprehend
Can’t spell, can’t remember, please help
In response: smirks and claims ‘she is too pretty’ to have problems

A mid-year high school freshman, on the west coast, elevated in status
Loved for the outside . . . homecoming princess, cheerleader
Countless tears in the front cab of my sweetheart’s truck
He didn’t understand, and neither did I
Hippy-, loving-, free-spirited mother
Her black best friend married to a white man
Taught me how cruel onlookers can be to “different”
Her foreign, Persian boyfriend, in times of hostages and chaos
Came with late-night tire slashing and unspeakable threats

Graduated with honors, scholarships, somehow
Only college freshman in upper-division classes
Victim of multiple predators . . .
First female on both sides of family to earn a degree
Graduated from teaching program, early
Taught in low-income school, 110-degrees outside, windows sealed shut
No air conditioning, needed fumigating
Nominated teacher of year, received highest marks, always

Master’s degree earned, while disabled and
Raising three sons, one on the autism spectrum
Stay-at-home mother, working from home
Home schooling middle son, after the bullies came
My own late-age diagnosis of Aspergers
New remote-job, promoted and promoted
Dyslexia, dyspraxia, generalized anxiety . . .
Divorce, uprooting, finding ‘home’ again
Crying in the front cab of my van, this time, alone
Heartache, heartbreak, reality of world, once more

Published book, took ten years to write
Sharing stories to build community
More stories to build, more living to come
My doggy, and time, passes on
Comforts of home and family
Getting our “Geek” on
Lord of the Rings, Dungeon and Dragons
Showing it’s okay to be

Last count, 8 chronic pain conditions
Most of this spring in bed with a virus
After traveling through LA airport
Covid-19, social unrest, more sadness
Still, 3 sons graduate, all on the same day, the 13th
A happy June, well-adjusted, content, and kind
My sons, loved ones, and me
Still thriving, still speaking, still working
Nightmares began before the age of 4
And never ended
Typically, demons and monsters
Sometimes they come true
Sometimes they don’t

Octopus Garden

This is the fifth painting on this one canvas. I often paint and paint, until the final product appears. There are 6 to 10 layers of paint, and about 20 hours of painting. “Octopus Garden” represents my love for my autistic partner David. He is the bird holding up the nest — of protection/home. I am holding his beak. There are many other symbols that have deep meaning. It also represents ‘as above so below’ and many other complex thoughts.

It was Bird Man’s Dream from a previous post. And before that Layered.

The Observer Watches

Hurt people point fingers at hurt people.
Some pointing is masked as good deeds.
Some pointing is masked as ill-will.
Both remain pointed fingers.

The observer watches in silence. The observer works behind the scenes, building bridges and building peace. The observer does not judge the others who are not like the observer. The observer is naught.

For the observer, there is no end point. There is nothing to point at. Nothing to claim. No one to listen.

The observer knows:

How the logic mind sorts, categorizes, discovers, and declares. Thoughts and grasping of truth . . . want, need, must do.

Judgment, evaluation, and end point.

Limited perception equating to magnified confirmation bias.

Imaginary worlds.

The observer knows:

Nothing in the singular world is in the collective world.
Where WE truly meets is in the in between space. Beyond the finite.

How singular judges and why singular judges and who singular judges is interdependent on the observer and receiver.

Perception is interdependent — bouncing molecules.

No endpoint.

As singulars don’t squat on number lines. And aren’t stagnant.
All is temporary truth.

Each singular houses an internal eco-system filled with mysteries of the sea, beyond bone and blood is another bounty-filled treasure.

As good leads to bad and bad leads to good — things aren’t as they seem.

Power can be seized, when We see We as mirrors facing mirrors.

Power can be seized when We recognize ‘life’ as hypocrisy.

All truth creates separation. All words — sound formed by singular — create separation.

Once something becomes truth and separate, all outside that truth is alienated.

As one claims this ‘a box’, then what remains are ‘not-boxes.’

As one claims singular as better than, then what remains are less-than.

All words lead to boxes; all boxes leave singulars outside the box.

Rhythm and motions create knowings without words. Vibrations, sounds without meaning, are healing. Images without borders. Pictures without definers. A Mother’s heartbeat to infant.

Observer cannot claim to know any truth or any reality, without equally claiming another singular does not know the full of truth. For observer’s truth can only be observer’s truth, unless the veil of logic is peeled away.

Billions living in singular painted worlds. Each with a singular view. Which singular creation is the right one?

The observer does not have the capacity to choose and also houses the capacity to choose. The observer is a contradiction. The observer sees a singular world as contradiction. Observer can choose, but chooses not to choose. But in that choosing, he chooses.

Observer walks existence as a collective: an interdependent droplet in the massive sea. He cannot be the water rising, even if willed to be, without the body that remains. Observer can stand as a drop. if he was made to know the drop. But as Observer is the collective, he is the ocean.

Wherever there is division, there is finite. Wherever there is finite, love cannot be. As love is infinite. And one cannot slip infinity into a bottle.

Whoever is not inside a finite bottle, is excluded.

A flag that makes proclamation creates separation. It claims finite. It claims ‘right’ and ‘wrong.’ Right and wrong creates battles, war, destruction. No matter how right, no matter how wrong, it is division.

Love is infinite. It speaks only love. It has not bottle. It has not box. And thusly, all are invited. There is not inside, and therefore there is not outside.

Equality is in infinity.

Singulars cannot see what they are not. When they look at self they see singular. When they look down, or through, or in reflective glass: singular.

Love cannot see what it is not. When love looks, it sees whole. When it looks down, or through, or in reflective glass: union.

Love sees outside boundaries. Singular sees finite.

Love knows only love. Words are foreign. The concept of ‘me’ is foreign. Without me, singular doesn’t have to be as me, look as me, move as me, believe as me.

Love cannot expect others to believe in itself, because it cannot see belief. Love is because love is infinity.

Hate is finite.

Hate is woven from the fiber of boxes and the glass of bottles. Hate is made in a singular world.

Love is everywhere, as it is infinite. Love fills the emptiness. Love pours in where it is invited. Love fills the space about, within, and in between, in the narrow edges between lines and points.

Love is in the creases and cracks and crevices. It is fissured, stamped, emerged, broken. Love is the spaces. Love is the substance that houses the space. Love is the molecular structure within the molecular structure.

Singular knows boundaries, and time, and space. That’s why singular plants flags. That’s why singular makes boxes. That’s why singular paints itself, as it believes there are other singulars watching.

Non-singular is love. It watches the flags. It watches the boxes. It watches the paintings. But Love doesn’t try to do anything with the watching. It doesn’t think to do anything.

Love is not finite. It is outside loves realm of existence.

Love is the observer and the observer is love.

Love says: I have nothing to prove. We are.

Love sees no singular.

Samantha Craft, July 2020

Dancing Home

My heart is full of He,
again.
He rises
ember-shade,
and dances past
the prowling night.
in dusty field,
made hay.

A flower to the fowl,
I see
Him, here,
in touching stone;
A heart so tender, laid,
As river to the throne.

I watch Him pass, the passerby,
the sky, a fading-grey.
I hold Him in the heart of hearts,
just near, where angels sway.

Their voices
chant in unison;
A whisper, “All is near.”

I wander past the tipping stones,
where caverns drip of tear.
A honey dew of
Atmosphere.
Listen, still,
the gatherings,
of cantors bathing wills.

“Harken, here,” they come to be.
Their telling thick, as true.

“Can you see beneath the sea,
where fathers anchored blue?”

I’ve come again, to traveling,
with blankets tender, sweet.
Wrapped within the evermore,
Where babes are fast asleep.

Can you see them,
as I do? The willows,
dancing home,
to where the blind man walked,
Ill-temper, tamed in tune,
of flank and staff, immune.

“Come gather, here,”
Day beckons, glee;
the one I know as true.
And step by step,
I enter thee:
The one, becomes the Two.

How fortunate, this rose of thorn,
this breaking bread of mire.
How roads,
turned frail and broken through,
have led, the dire,

Days.
I’m headed now,
to brighter place.
Where angels dance and sing.
Remember thee,
of yesterday,
when I, was slumbering.

The Monster and the Wise Man: Painting through emotions

As Above, So Below. The painting can also be turned around. Above, what is sewn in the alternate plane of subconscious and intention is planted on the earth level. Below, aliens are admiring the universe with wonderment.

The Monster and Wise Man. From a distance the wise man is a woman, up close, you can see his ‘wise’ beard and ancient face. The Wise Man is healing the monster. The monster is also the wise man. There is the earthly plane between them. 99% of the time I do not know what I’m painting. I paint as a type of prayer, meditation, and therapy. I did not paint the face on the wise man or beard — it popped up when I was wiping the canvas with a wet towel. The sapsucker or woodpecker to the far left was also not intentional. The monster appeared on his own.

Bird Man and The Lady. I painted this over an old watercolor that had images of love. Atop the layers, on the left, is my honey, David. The Lady is protection, light, and represents my love and admiration. I was also contacted by a Facebook friend stating a baby bird she found. and tried to save, passed on right before I finished my painting. If you look to the far right, there is a little girl standing sideways facing the left (her sleeve is rose) and pointing to the left at a mushroom. Not intentional.

He Doesn’t Say I’m Beautiful . . .

He doesn’t say I’m beautiful.

He helps me up the stairs with a gentle guiding hand.
He hurries to the room, when I call out his name, whatever room I’m in.
He comes home with surprises from the local bakery.
He wheels me through the airport and museum, even as he is uncomfortable with crowds and it hurts his arms.
He doesn’t complain.
When I say I am thinking about growing my hair out grey, he encourages it, and says he likes grey hair. When I say my hair is actually more white than grey, he says he prefers white.
When I put on a bit of makeup, he says I look nice but also look fine without it.
When I look down at my growing tummy, he says, “I like it.”
When we have a spat, he gives me space and then asks to come in, and then apologizes for his part–sometimes with handwritten letters.
He rubs my back and kisses my toes. He holds me close when I cry and have trouble falling asleep — from anxiety, pain, or fear.
He listens to my frequent nightmares, the ones from dreams and the ones from the past. He asks if I am drinking enough water, and then brings me water, in my preferred mug (the clean one that doesn’t smell bad), with water he has collected from the artesian well downtown.
He leaves his office room for ‘object permanence checks,’ as he knows if I can’t see it (him), sometimes I question if it (he) exists.
He never comments on my messy, unbrushed hair or mismatched clothes. He doesn’t readily point out when I’ve made a mistake or error . . . in words or judgment.
He finds my oddities and antics and misuse of words to be charming.
He doesn’t laugh at my ways or mock me, or shake his head in disapproval.
He gives me the space and freedom to be me.
He is proud of my efforts at home and beyond, and tells me so. He stops to look at me, I mean really look at me, and offers a kind, gentle smile.
He makes a point to tell me this is the happiest he has ever been in his life.
He doesn’t objectify me or compare me to other people.
He doesn’t offer ways I can improve myself.
He rides the waves of my hormonal outbursts.
He prays for patience and to love me the best way possible.
And he does.
He tells silly, off the wall jokes and riddles.
He dances with me in the bedroom to ‘Brown Eyed Girl,’ and sings out the lyrics in a bashful voice.
He takes me to doctor appointments.
He helps shop for groceries.
He stocks the car and attic with emergency supplies.
He lends his dress shoes to my eldest son for that important interview.
He is silent and full of grace in harder times.
He is resilient and full of spunk in lighter moments.
He has introduced a genre of movies and shows that add spice to our collection. We bird watch together from balcony chairs, the ones he bought cushions for.
He refills the birdbath and worries for our feathered friends, scolding the neighbor’s cat . . . to go some other place. He says he will do something, and then he does it. He speaks the truth.
Means what he says. Says what he means. He says he’d die for me.
His hugs are tight and warm. He is a gentle giant, and my steadfast cheerleader and protector.
He doesn’t say I’m beautiful. He shows me.

Joy’s Pain

Joy’s Pain

Here I stand, abandoned.
Abandoned by fear, by doubt, by destitute.
Here I stand, embraced.
Encapsulated by love, by love, by love.
Her shadow emerged from light’s bowing down.
And I kiss her, my merry dancing bride brought to life.
The stellar glance of knowing.
The chisel of breath, against buried skin.
The emerging one, formed two.
Lightening shadow sparks in victorious rapture.
Stillness undone into solitude.
Envy bowing down to grace.
Laughing sticks, peering out over the valley of vines.
Inchworms soiling the ground in which they bleed.
Enough, enough, enough, the wise woman calls from the bounty.
Enough, my undone love.
Burry me with the masses.
Cast me aside.
Stomp on my chained heart.
Carve me with the pieces of him.
Just make the river dance stop.
Bring this ache to the caverned regions and rectify the cross in the making of my sacrifice.
Take what is yours, and feed me to the lion heart.
Take what is here, and lance the eyes I am from the corners of my logic.
Eradicate, separate, designate.
Do what is must, to remove the burden I carry.
Some ladened cauldron frothing with joy.
For I am not made to hold such passion.
I am not made to know this endless ribboned peace.
How it crosses the line.
How it marks me with swelling.
The light abiding within a fire set free.
Moving through skin as butter to sizzling pan.
Oozing its way through bubbling deliciousness.
I can taste me in your wanting.
Taste every aspect of humanity.
Feel my way through the scattered wilderness–thought upon thought, whirling in the twilight of dawn.
I am awoken twice-more.
Until morning dove sings me to sleep.
To the woven wolf centered in the start of me.
Formed before I breathed name.
Reformed before sound.
Can you not hear him?
My distant angel returned home.
Wrapped in the solitude no more.
Set free at the doorstep in which I laid my cherub gifts. Balanced at the opening.
Brought down from the starry sky to shatter this earthly maiden.
Crafted in the makings.
His hand, my hand.
His heart, my heart.
His coming, my spear-crested awakening.

Samantha Craft, 7.19.19

heart’s song

In the break of slumber
Thine eyes open
To black-feathered beauty
Sunray’s preamble
Trickling through ebony dark

The first call
Before first call
Silence sings
And dawn song echoes
Treasured daylight
Brought forth

Ribbons waving
From etched beak
Melodic fragrance uplifts
The chasms of nature breathes
The prelude before note
Adrift in honeysuckle
Boundless sky

Floats
A gentle gratitude
A gracious yearning
A blossom heart blossomed
A surrender sweetly surrendered
The last step brought back
Slipped between sheets

Heart song bumping in the overlap
Broken and re-broken
To bring forth deepest yoke
Nibbling its way in drippings
Forging a path of glitter-gold

All shattered weeping wrung dry
Longing’s longing
Announced in the rising
His platter of lickings, good

Lapped up
With hungry eyes
With starved gratitude
Of last crow awoken
Carry forth the new dawn

Samantha Craft, 6.30.19

The Tip

will you write
on me
on my skin
felt-tipped words
of adoration
‘I love you’
around belly
‘I need you’
around hips
‘My one’
inching
down sides
of neck
‘My everything’
at the tip
of lips

Samantha Craft, 6.30.19

ONE

One

Loneliness
Enchanted
She rises
Moving to his calling
Summoned: The cave
Of beginning
She rests there
In twilight of ages
Singing song
Her sunlight unmarred
A brilliant star
Set out for the multitude
Risen as morning
Dove to dawn

Victory
Summoned
He cradles
Swaying to her chasms
Soothing: The child
Of heavens
He comforts there
In folds of lace
Pronouncing name
His mane undone
A bold stallion
Cast out in the quietude
Bent as blue
Bird to morning

Dancers
Birthed
They enter
Pulsating to rhythm
Surrendered: The one
Of peace
All opens free
In belly of time
Eradicating emptiness
Their names erased
A united flame
Set out in holiness
Marked as blushed
Bride to groom

6.21.19, Samantha Craft