Blog Prompt #4: The “Squashing Years”

Few things inspire fear in me like spiders. I don’t think it’s uncommon for most of us, or at least anyone who has seen Arachnophobia. Honestly, I mean for a 10 year old to see that extremely large, eight legged puppet of death that springs on Jeff Daniels is absolutely horrifying. 

Specifically, I have an especial paranoia toward wolf spiders. They do not spin webs to capture their prey (although the thought of being caught in a spider web is equally terrifying; just watch Peter Jackson’s The Return of the King) they are hunters. They are dark or brownish with hairy bristles on their legs and body. I always thought it was the “hairy factor” that gave them their name, but it’s not. Originally, it was thought that these “hunting” spiders hounded their victims in packs. However, this is just a myth. These bad boys always hunt alone; they are in a constant state of…rogue.

It is amazing to me how fear is always something that is projected onto us and then accepted. You see wolf spiders and I go way back. Every year, in the farmhouse, we would be invaded by these furry guys. This was quite a point of frustration to my mother. I think she felt under attack, like the spiders had a personal vendetta against her. This wasn’t true; wolf spiders often enter homes during the fall simply because it’s getting too damn cold outside. Anyway, we had a bunch of them in our home every year. They especially liked to hang out underneath the bathtub (I assume they wanted to share the warmth of our bathwater), and every now and then they would come out from under the tub and scamper across the floor.

I was at a point of my life that I like to call the “squashing years”. Between the age of 3 and 4 I loved to squish, splat, and squash everything I could. Apparently, the wolf spiders in the bathroom were some of my favorite targets. My dad tells me stories of grandeur still, about how I had no fear towards them. He always said, “Get’em  Cory, those are the bad guys!” and I would pancake them, laughing at the smeared evidence on my hands.

The ironic part about this is that wolf spiders are actually quite timid creatures. Their size (generally between 1 ½ to 2 ½ inches, but they have been known to grow up to 4 inches) is often extremely intimidating to humans, but if one (the spider) is disturbed it will quickly just run away from you, not unlike unfamiliar cats. People have reported accounts of wolf spiders climbing onto desktops, and then quickly darting toward their fingers. This is not necessarily from the spider’s want to attack humans. But, although having good eyesight, wolf spiders cannot really differentiate between a human finger and an insect. So, if you put your finger in front of a wolf spider it may try to bite you, thinking your finger is something else (but hey, who hasn’t made that mistake before?).

Whether they mean to be or not, personally I find them to be one of the most unnerving creatures on the face of this earth. I will most likely always be haunted by these furry predators, and that might just be nature’s punishment for my “squashing years”.  

Place Entry #4: Who You Gonna Call?

I have never been overly preoccupied by the supernatural/ghostly qualities of cemeteries. I think this is primarily because the majority of times I have needed to go to cemeteries, have been in the daylight. Everyone knows that light and ghosts do not go hand-in-hand. This is evident; every ghost story you ever heard as a child takes place under the mysterious cover of night. Darkness is ambiguity and so is the supernatural.

It is 10pm, dark, and I am going to the cemetery. I know that the cemetery is closed, and that the gate is locked. But tonight I have visions of grand espionage. Tonight I will live in the shadows of the cemetery.

…our so I thought.

I trailed the fence to find a spot that seemed most climbable and the least conspicuous. It was down the hill from the gate, on the west end of the cemetery. The road bent on both ends of the fence, and I began to time the seconds between: when I would first see the headlights of oncoming cars, and when they would be upon my climbing spot.  It was close to a standard “five one-thousand” count, so I needed to be quick. Quick and nimble, like a cat I thought. Although I have never seen a cat climb a fence, I assume it would be quick and nimble.

I had an opening. I jumped up, grabbed the top rail of the fence, and pulled. Looking over the rail I swung my left leg up, and then a cold wind howled toward my face. It was unnerving. Actually, unnerving is to say the least. I dropped back down, still outside of the cemetery.

It is amazing how your depth perception goes to shit in the darkness, along with the lens of your eye’s ability to focus.

Looking through the bars, the trees and stones seemed to bleed together. The lines of the cemetery also rack-focused in and out. The branches, and trunks, and stones became the blurred imitations of the bodies under the ground.

The wind sang through the cemetery, and to a less trained ear the song may have sounded like an invitation…come in. But I know of the Sirens that Odysseus was warned against. Do they live in the cemeteries too? Well they are not fooling this guy. There’s no wax in these ears.

A dog walked past with its human companion. I nodded to the young man. The dog looked through the bars into the cemetery and then back at me. Dogs can talk, and that dog said, “Yep, I don’t blame you buddy. I wouldn’t chase a stick in that place tonight.”

I stood haunted, outside the cemetery for five minutes or so. I shook my head no, and started to walk home. I’ve got enough to write about. I’m not going in there with all that madness.

Blog Prompt #3: My Great Love

In endeavoring to write a blog that captured a palpable sense of intimacy with a landscape I struggled. Everything that I wrote began to become a prose poem, and (I think like most of the prose work I do) the work then begged to be more lyrical.

So I wrote a poem. And a love poem at that! I cannot remember the last piece that I have done that I would consider a “love” poem.

Love is one of those words I have always shied away from. In a lot of my poems I seek to concretely define the subject. Similarly to the divine, I think that love struggles to be defined by the poet (if it can be at all). This indefinable quality is also apparent to me when I look out into nature. All three; the divine, love, and nature feel intimidating and slightly off putting for me to write poetry about.

Why do I hide in my poetry from what I fail do define? Are they really too big for the voice, my poem?

Apparently, I decided it would be a good idea to try and tackle two of my “big three” tonight. Not sure how it will work out, but this is a short love poem to the landscape I grew up in, central PA.

My Great Love

Love, you are Central Pennsylvania.

I need rest,

so I am driving to you.

There is no sleep

without love,

No love without spectacle.

You, with your roads

                exhaling through the rolling hills

                like long breaths.

You, with your railway,

                curved and arched,

                the back of my ballerina.

You, with your shallow rivers

                that ride your hips, low

                like gray sweatpants.

Central Pennsylvania, you

are Juliet,

Cleopatra, and Isolde.

In the morning,

here, now,

I lay in your bed.

The sun,

breaking behind

felt February clouds.

You consider me

as yours, you beg

that my eyes stay closed,

that I stay in bed.

You say, Please, and pull the blinds,

rest with me a little longer.

Dry Lacrimal Glands

It’s the first of February, and going to the cemetery today I had certain expectations. Let me provide a context for these expectations.

Last night when I went to bed I was told by only the most trustworthy of Pittsburgh weathermen, and a very friendly Giant Eagle cashier that we were going to have an ice storm. And not just any ice storm, in the words of my Giant Eagle friend, “It’s going to be a big ol’ storm. Gonna be icy. Yeah, icy boy.”

Even if I have learned to at times doubt the competence of TV weathermen, the level of his assuredness from the cashier was convincing enough for me. With the excitement of an eighth grader, thoughts panicked through my brain: What if I get stuck without a car for a couple of days? I love snow days! I will need provisions.

I did not hesitate. I went straight to the beer distributer, and $18.40 something later I had a 30 pack of miller highlife light (only the champagne of beers). I was ready for the incoming inclement weather.

I woke up, and walked out onto the porch ready to see the wintery carnage. It felt warm (37 degrees according to my iphone) and everything was wet. Not frozen at all, just wet. Cars drove freely and bikes cruised with carelessness.

Damned expectation! My hopes overthrown again by nature’s whim.

Walking up the hill to the cemetery gate I can feel grumpiness growing on my travel. Noticing the puddles forming in the uneven sidewalk I am getting pissed. I explode one underneath my feet, and want to yell at the liquid, “You were supposed to be ice! I wanted to slide and slip while walking to the cemetery! You were supposed to me fun!” I don’t yell at the puddle, but I do exhale in disapproval.

In the cemetery everything is dripping: the fence posts, the branches, the mausoleums, the stones, the brim of my hat, everything. My bitterness over the lack of wintery conditions is still prevailing in my thought. I do not care that everything looks to be crying. My observation is simply that, everything but my lacrimal glands are dripping in this place.

The lacrimal glands are where our tears are formed. I know this because the ever creditable free encyclopedia, Wikipedia describes, Lacrimation (from L. Lacrima meaning Tear) can be used in a medical or literary sense to refer to crying. Strong emotions, such as sorrow or elation, may lead to crying.

 I don’t know if I have ever been able to cry at a funeral, or in a cemetery. It is a fact that worries me. Today it seems like everything, even the stones can, but I’m too pissed to be emotional.