Sliding Doors

clipped from www.questia.com

by Vicki Graham

"We belong to the moon," says Mary Oliver, and "the most/thoughtful among us dreams/of hurrying down...into the body of another" (49-50). We dream, we long, and some of us believe that we can step outside of ourselves and enter the body of another. But Western culture discourages these yearnings and demands individualism and the formation of strong ego boundaries and stable identities. Unlike the traveller of Leslie Marmon Silko's "Story from Bear Country," we do not hear the bear's call; we do not see our "footprints/in the sand" become bear prints, nor do we see fur cover our bodies, "dark shaggy and thick" (204-05). Yet we are conscious, too, of our potential not just to cross the boundaries between ourselves and others, but to be divided within ourselves. We encounter a variety of theories--feminist, psychoanalytic, cultural--that tell us identity is multiple and the boundaries of the self are unstable.
"Pull yourself together," my mother used to say, and I would groupe wildly, hoping to catch even one of the selves that spun around me. But I have never been able to pull myself together, and works of art that tempt me to drop the fiction of singularity and invite me to enter the body of another fascinate me. Mary Oliver's American Primitive is one such work. The poems in this collection offer many bodies for us to inhabit; we can become, by turns, bear, fish, whale, swamp, and Pan. We can run with the fox, fly with the owl, dig with the mole, and finally, losing all outward form, dissolve into the totality of nature.

Oliver's celebration of dissolution into the natural world troubles some critics: her poems flirt dangerously with romantic assumptions about the close association of women with nature that many theorists...

clipped from en.wikipedia.org

Chapel Street was named after the first church in Prahran, an Independent (or Congregational) Church, built 100 metres north of Malvern Road on the east side, between 1850 and 1852. The first minister of “The Chapel”, as it was known locally, was Rev William Moss. In an address to the Collins Street Independent Church in 1888 the Rev. Moss said, "I may mention that our chapel at Prahran was the only place of worship in the district for over two years, and ultimately gave to the business street of that flourishing city its name Chapel Street". The Chapel was closed in 1859, used as a school building until about 1883, when it was demolished. The only surviving church in the commercial part of Chapel Street, the Baptist Church, which was built in the 1850’s on the corner of Wilson Street, is now the Irish theme pub Bridie O'Reilly’s.

clipped from flnatashapoems.blogspot.com

The Awakening

A time comes in your life when you finally get it. When in the midst of all your fears and insanity you stop dead in your tracks and somewhere the voice inside your head cries out -- ENOUGH!! Enough fighting and crying or struggling to hold on. And, like a child quieting down after a blind tantrum, your sobs begin to subside, you shudder once or twice, you blink back your tears and through a mantle of wet lashes you begin to look at the world through new eyes.

This is your awakening. You realize that it's time to stop hoping and waiting for something to change, or for hapiness, safety and security to come galloping over the next horizon. You come to terms with the fact that he is not Prince Charming, and you are not Cinderella and that in the real world there aren't always fairytale endings (or beginnings for that matter), and that any guarantee of "happily ever after" must begin with you, and in the process a sense of serenity is born out of acceptance. You awaken to the fact that you are not perfect, and that not everyone will always love, appreciate or approve of who or what you are and it's OK. They are entitled to their own views and opinions. And you learn the importance of loving and championing yourself, and in the process a sense of newly found confidence is born of self-approval. You stop bitching and blaming other people for the things they did to you (or didn't do for you) and you learn that the only thing you can really count on is the unexpected.

You learn that not everyone will always be there for you, and that it's not always about you. So, you learn to stand on your own and to take care of yourself and in the process a sense of safety and security is born of self-reliance. You stop judging and pointing fingers, and you begin to accept people as they are, and to overlook their shortcomings and human frailties and in the process a sense of peace and contentment is born of forgiveness. You realize that much of the way you view yourself, and the world around you, is a result of all the messages and opinions that have been ingrained into your psyche. And you begin to sift through all the crap you've been fed about how you should behave, how you should look, how much you shouldn't weigh, what you should wear, where you should shop, what you should drive, how and where you should live, what you should do for a living, who you should sleep with, who you should marry, what you should expect of a marriage, the importance of having and raising children, or what you owe your parents.

You learn to open up to new worlds and different points of view. And you begin reassessing and redefining who you are and what you really stand for. You learn the difference between wanting and needing, and you begin to discard the doctrines and values you've outgrown, or should never have bought into to begin with, and in the process you learn to go with your instincts. You learn to distinguish between guilt and responsibility, and the importance of setting boundaries and learning to say NO. You learn that the only cross to bear is the one you choose to carry, and that martyrs get burned at the stake.

Then you learn about love. Romantic love and familial love. How to love, how much to give in love, when to stop giving, and when to walk away. You learn not to project your needs or your feelings onto a relationship. You learn that you will not be more beautiful, not intelligent, more lovable, or important because of the man or woman on your arm or the child that bears your name. You learn to look at relationships as they really are and not as you would have them be. You stop trying to control people, situations, and outcomes. You learn that just as people grow and change, so it is with love and you learn that you don't have the right to demand love on your terms. Just to make you happy. And, you learn that "alone" does not mean lonely.

And you look in the mirror and come to terms with the fact that you will never be a size 5 or a perfect 10 and you stop trying to compete with the image inside your head and agonizing over how you "stack up." You also stop working so hard at putting feelings aside, smoothing things over, and ignoring your needs. You learn that feelings of entitlement are perfectly OK...and that it is you right to want the things that you want. And that sometimes it is necessary to make demands. You come to the realization that you deserve to be treated with love, kindness, sensitivity and respect, and that you will not settle for less. And you allow only the hands of a lover who cherishes you, to glorify you with his or her touch, and in the process you internalize the meaning of self-respect.

And you learn that your body is really your temple. You begin eating a balanced diet, drinking more water, and taking more time to exercise. You learn that fatigue diminishes the spirit and can create doubt and fear, so you take more time to rest. And, just as food fuels the body, laughter fuels the soul, so you take more time to laugh and to play. You learn that, for the most part, in life you get what you believe you deserve, and that much of life is a self-fulfilling prophecy. You learn that anything worth acheiving is worth working for, and that wishing for something to happen is different for working toward making it happen. More importantly, you learn that in order to achieve success, you need direction, discipline, and perseverence. You also learn that not one can do it all alone and it's OK to risk asking for help.

You learn that the only thing you must really fear is the great robber barron of all time: FEAR itself. You learn to step right into and through your fears, because you know that whatever happens you can handle it, and to give into fear is to give away the right to live life on your terms. You learn to fight for your life and not to squander it living under a cloud of impending doom. You learn that life isn't always fair, you don't always get what you think you deserve and that sometimes bad things happen to unsuspecting, good people. On those occasions you learn not to personalize things. You learn that God is not always punishing you or failing to answer your prayers. It's just life happening. And you learn to deal with evil in its most primal state - the ego. You learn that negative feelings such as anger, envy, and resentment must be understood and redirected, or they will suffocate the life out of you and poison the universe that surrounds you.

You learn to admit when you are wrong and to build bridges instead of walls. You learn to be thankful and to take comfort in many of the simple things we take for granted, things that millions of people upon the earth can only dream about: a full refrigerator, clean running water, a soft warm bed, a long hot shower. Slowly you begin to take responsibility for yourself, by yourself, and you try to make yourself a promise to never betray yourself and to never, ever settle for less than your heart's desire. And you hang a windchime outside your window so you can listen to the wind. And you make it a point to keep smiling, to keep trusting, and to stay open to every wonderful possibility.

Finally, with courage in your heart and with God by your side, you take a stand, you take a deep breath, and you begin to design the life you want to live as best you can.