Rachel Creager Ireland's Blog

Well, I was sure I had posted a poem a few years ago, but I can’t find it now. I wrote it in a moment of angst the last time I was unemployed. It did make my book, however, which, if you’re reading this, you most likely already have in your possession. (If you don’t, message me and I can send it to you, payment optional.) The poem was called “The Value of a Dreamy Girl.” The very night I wrote it, I asked for a dream to answer the question posed in the poem, which you can infer from the title. I had a dream which I would call brilliant, but there was no light in the dream. It was very gloomy. But . . . impressive.

For whatever reason, I was never moved to write the dream, until today. Maybe it’s because I am again unemployed and revisiting the angsty questions about what I have to offer the world, what anyone wants, what I am called to do with this pile of quirks and desires I call my self. And I’ve written very little since I published that book, so this is kind of a small triumph, worthy of posting here. It makes more sense if you’ve read the other poem first. And this is a first draft. But here it is.

The You Foundation

I never told you the answer
to the question about The Dreamy Girl.
She looked to a dream for the answer,
asked the Divine for wisdom,
and then she slept.

In the dream she (The Dreamy Girl)
and others slogged through black water.
It clung to them, it was a perilous
journey with no beginning or end.
And there were children, up to their chins
in the muck. When one went down,
The Dreamy Girl followed her
into the darkness. She reached out blindly,
feeling for a touch of hand, an elbow or toe,
anything she could grab and pull to the surface.
There wasn’t time, there wasn’t air.
But The Dreamy Girl was okay.
How did that come about?
She remembered making a donation
to the You Foundation, not knowing
who they were, just because
it seemed like a good idea. Perhaps
the You Foundation had taken her
donation and used it to upgrade her own
capacity, to unlock a new level
with the ability to breathe
underwater. And it was possible
(though far from guaranteed)
that this superpower would give her
(The Dreamy Girl) a better chance
of saving that little girl from drowning.

That was the dream. You can make of it
what you will.

Here’s a picture of my birth mom, Barbara McClanahan Walker Johnston. She’s not the mom who raised me, she’s the one who carried me in her body. She passed rather suddenly in September.

At the Celebration of Life, there was much talk about Barbara’s activism. She was willing to go into the streets to fight for justice, freedom, and equity for pretty much all of her life. For several years, she led a team dedicated to social justice at her church. (That’s the kind of thing UUs do.) Though she wasn’t in my life during the years that are said to be formative, I share that passionate desire to stand up to power when the powerful act without regard for those who are less empowered. Is it a trait that is passed through the blood, or DNA? Who knows?

Among the many things I wish I had done with Barb when she was still here is stand beside her in protest. My mother-in-law reminded me that once we were all at a protest, when MIL went with me and the kids to Topeka to demand Medicaid expansion. Well, that’s all I get, mostly by my own small choices, made many times throughout the years, one day at a time.

So I got this button made with her picture. It was taken on a boat between the US and Cuba in 1973 when I was in Kindergarten in a little Kansas town and she was with Venceremos Brigade. I’m going to wear this button whenever I protest. She’s left the physical body, but she’ll be with me whenever I’m out there making my voice heard in the streets.

We’ll be in Wichita next week for No Kings Day. Will you join us?

I don’t remember if I told you this, but I made a deal to get past my internal Saboteur so I could publish my most recent book of poetry, The Would-Be Lightworker. The deal was that I would not promote the book for sale.

I didn’t say I wouldn’t offer it, however. So it’s purportedly available, though I’m not sure exactly what it would take to get a copy. You might have to order via Britain, and I don’t know where it will be printed if you do. I haven’t even tried to find out.

When I published the book, I bought a batch of copies and gave them all away. I pretty much sent off a copy to everyone I thought might have a passing interest in it. Then I moved, and didn’t keep even a single copy because I didn’t want to be carrying them around along with all my other excess stuff.

Now I’m landed and have already missed more than one opportunity to give the book to someone who might have appreciated it.

I just placed an order for 20 copies. I don’t know who they’re for. But if by chance you want one, and I haven’t already given you one, let me know and I’ll get it to you. The cost to me is honestly very low and not really worth the bother of collecting. Just drop a comment and I’ll get back to you.

Meanwhile, here are some pics taken in and near my new home in Wichita.

When we moved to Texas, I never really expected to stay there forever; though I didn’t really expect to come back to Kansas. But things happen the way they do, so here I am now, ensconced in the largest city in Kansas. That would not be Kansas City, Topeka, or even Overland Park.

One nice thing is that housing in Wichita, Kansas is much more affordable than Austin, so we were able to rent a pretty Tudor house in an older neighborhood, twice as big as our last place for about the same price. The front garden is an interesting and overgrown mix of old-fashioned perennials like rose of Sharon, hollyhock*, and spyria, and prairie natives such as brown-eyed Susan and honeyvine milkweed. I fancy I can see the hand of more than one previous gardener here, and soon I’ll add my own signature. It will be one of many transitions that have taken place here, and I myself may only be here for one revolution around the sun before I move on.

It’s notable that these flowers still blooming in early September, along with abundant mature trees on this block, support a thriving population of birds and insects. By contrast, while Austin has done much to support their watershed, I suspect it’s their penchant for dumping pesticides widely and frequently on every outdoor surface that keeps the numbers of birds and butterflies much thinner than those in even (what passes for) the city in Kansas. It’s hard to write on my front patio, because I get interrupted so many times to take a picture of yet another lepidopteran.

I don’t even try to take pictures of birds, but today I saw starlings and house sparrows, of course, as well as native blue jays, cardinals, and a dove I had previously mostly only heard, but not seen, the mourning dove. In Strong City we had Eurasian collared doves, and in Austin we had white-winged doves. I haven’t heard the melancholy song of the mourning dove here yet, but I look forward to it. Today I also heard a crow calling, and saw what I think was a downy woodpecker.

The Mississippi kite is a new bird friend. Today they are circling their way south. It is their time of transition, too. The monarch butterfly I saw today will soon follow. The other butterflies will stay here until they perish in the winter freeze.

My own transitions, besides relocating, include reinventing my business as a massage therapist; acquainting myself with a new church family and finding what my place will be there. I’ll be picking up the violin again to play a hymn at a service for a family member who suddenly made her last transition over the weekend. Most importantly, I’ll be finding my community, my people. I don’t know who they are yet, but I know they love the earth and all the creatures, and the flowers that sing their colors to the sun for the short time they are here.

This is why I don’t take pictures of birds. Imagine you can see 5 Mississippi kites circling their way south. Question mark butterfly, Polygonia interrogationis Silver-spotted skipper, Epargyreus clarus

*I understand hollyhock isn’t technically a perennial, but if you’ve ever tried removing it from a bed, you will agree that it might as well be.

Here’s one for the category “Weird Tech Things That Happen In My Life.” I don’t pretend that it’s some electrical anomaly related to my energy field or other Newage (rhymes with sewage), I acknowledge that these things probably happen because of some inadvertent touch by my hand or clothing, with or without my glasses on, but nevertheless tech doesn’t work for me like it does for normal people.

In this case, a poem idea that I had somewhere when I was away from a keyboard got recorded in the Reminders app, not Notes, where I would normally put it. So periodically I receive a reminder that is a surreal list of odd items that I may or may not have found under the living room rug one day, several years ago, when I was on a cleaning binge. It looks like this:

The completed version of the poem was titled “Under the Rug,” and appears in my book of poems, The Would-Be Lightworker, which I released just before Christmas.

It takes 6 weeks for a book to be available online at retailers, no one knows why. (If I had published on Amazon, it would have been live there in 3-5 days, so that might give you a hint.) However two British retailers have it listed at this time, so you get a link to Waterstones. I honestly have no idea where it will be printed if you order from them, possibly in Britain and you’ll have to pay to ship it across an ocean if you are in the US. If you prefer to wait, it’ll be at US retailers one of these days, I’ll let you know.

Some deep cleaning around the house would probably be a good idea today, now that I think about it . . .

My print book is live.

This mockup came with the cover design. The actual book is much thinner and I didn’t like the description on the back so I ditched it.

I’ve had books in electronic format for almost ten years now. I did everything—designed the covers and formatted the interiors, however clumsily—and I found it was pretty easy and inexpensive. But I knew the current collection of poems would have a better chance of success in print, and I knew of at least one person who expressed interest in my previous book of poetry but doesn’t read ebooks. I was originally going to print that one (Flight of Unknown Birds: Poems about the wildness and the weirdness within), but I got flummoxed by the higher level of difficulty of designing and formatting for print.

Then I had written enough new poems for a whole book. I decided to keep moving forward and put the new collection into print instead.

The process has been ridiculously long. I hit setbacks and set it aside for a while, tried again, gave up altogether. Months went by and one day I noticed it had been nearly a year since I had done anything for this project. I thought about whether it was worth picking up again, and why. I decided that I didn’t care about anything except giving this collection of poems to certain people for whom it would mean a lot, most notably my children. So I made a deal with my Shadow, the saboteur, that if I let myself publish this book, I would invest nothing in promoting it. I would order some copies to give away, then forget about it.

Part of the deal was that it would be available to purchase if someone wanted to. I’m just not going to ask them to buy it. As it happens, certain aspects of the format and cover are not conducive to store sales, for example, the spine is too narrow for the title to be printed on it. It will not be on the shelves of your favorite brick-and-mortar bookshop. However they should be able to order it for you, if you ask them to. A real book, that you can hold in your hands and flip the pages.

Amazon is notably slow in listing books that they didn’t publish. It’s not there as of today. But Waterstones has it in their catalog now, I suppose because the publisher that I went with, BookVault, is British. (American sales are to be printed in the US. But if you buy from Waterstones, where will it be printed? I have no idea.)

So there it is. My real book is available. I’m not asking you to buy it. But you can if you want to.

Are you sensitive to TMI? I’ll put a gallery of butterflies at the end of this post to cleanse your mental palate after you read this.

I once submitted to a magazine a poem about pelvic floor therapy and bladder control. The editor rejected my poem but complimented me on my bravery in choosing the subject matter. It’s probably yet another symptom of what my kids tell me is a wee bit of autism, but I just don’t have a lot of discomfort with bodily exposures. Here I am, look, think about, whatever, who cares. I cross my legs when I sneeze, though the therapy did help a lot. The poem doesn’t apologize, it simply is.

But it was a good poem, and I eventually published it here on my blog, since nobody else wanted it.

The body and the world are inextricably intertwined. When I have something to say about the world, my body inserts itself into the conversation, or is it the other way around? I was a body first, I am a body first. So when nobody asked me what I think about this week’s presidential election and I’m going to tell y’all anyway (ahem autism), this poem about a failed attempt at a cervical biopsy came to mind. I was saving it for publication, but instead I’m giving it to you for free now. You can thank the man who so loves his golden toilet.

Biopsy

Humans have this way of destruction
unlike the bison whose tread makes
the earth ready for grass to grow
for next year’s bison to eat
and birds spread seeds of the plants
they eat which grow more food
for birds, yet we are different.
We burn down the world. We fight
each other and whole ecosystems
must be unraveled.
Like the time I left the stage
when my scene was over, tripped
on the support that held up the set
and took it down with me. I’m driving
and I know the way, and the mistakes,
but I make them again, exactly same as last time.
I have ripened my last egg, and didn’t
even notice, but the pituitary is kicking out
the hormone, cheering, pleading,
come on guys, ovaries, I’m talking to you,
let’s go one more time. The doctor
wants to know, why all this bleeding.
I want to know, why are giraffes
disappearing. Why does the creek
smell like petroleum. Why are
sperm counts falling. I’m trying to open
through the pain but it doesn’t work.
She can’t get the tube in—stenotic, she says
—but even a failed attempt
causes a little more bleeding.

As usual, I started NaPoWriMo with a firm conviction that I would write a poem daily in the month of April. I believed that there was nothing standing between myself and success. As usual, I did pretty well in the first half of the month, then crashed in the third week. I tried to get back on track, made a decent effort, then was asked to speak for the local chapter of Extinction Rebellion to a group who would be gathering in advance of Earth Day. Surely I was not the best person to speak, as I have a long history of saying the wrong thing at the wrong time, or not saying the important thing at the right time. But XR is a very small group here, and nobody wanted to do it any more than I did, or was particularly better positioned for it, so I said yes. Kyle Gray’s Shapeshifter card told me to transform and unveil my previously unknown gifts. It would take me some time to hone my message and practice it so that I could deliver it in the short time allotted without mucking it up. As I wrote and rewrote, I thought about how I could have been writing poetry instead, but decided that speaking for the Earth is more important. Or rather, that there is no poetry without the Earth. The Earth is poetry, just as I am, and I am the Earth. So (compared to that) it is not audacious to say that this little thing I wrote counts as my poem for a day.

I’m Rachel Creager Ireland, with Extinction Rebellion Austin. You can find us at xraustin.org. I want to thank everyone for being here, because I know there are so many forces both internal and external telling us just stay home, don’t speak up, don’t speak out, go to school, take care of your family, get a job (I have 2)—but if you’re an activist for the earth, get used to people telling you to get a job. It’s like people can’t conceive that a person could work for the earth and be gainfully employed at the same time. 

But I think that’s because we compartmentalize so much. We build these walls in our minds, in our lives, to keep some part safe. Because climate change is terrifying. The problems are so much bigger than we can even imagine. We don’t know how to live without fossil fuels. How can we be human in the face of this crisis? Sometimes we need to compartmentalize just so we can function from day to day. But, similar to an addiction, there’s a point at which the coping mechanism becomes the disease. All this compartmentalization allows us to forget how inseparably connected we are with the earth, with each other, and that what we do to the earth, we do to ourselves. Every strip mine, toxic waste dump, clear cut forest, and oil spill is a wound that we all suffer deeply, whether we allow ourselves to be aware of it or not. 

We begin to heal when we recognize our oneness with the earth and every living creature.

You might be wondering why I’m saying these things here at the Texas capitol, now. The reason is that those people who spend their days in that building are suffering from the same wound, the same disease of compartmentalization. And all the lies they will tell us about the immutable laws of economics, and “human nature,” were told to them once, too. And don’t get me wrong, as a healer myself I know full well that you can’t heal a person who doesn’t want it. We can only meet the wound with presence and compassion and empathy. So our job is simply to ask them to recognize their connection with us and the earth. Stop pretending that they don’t know that the climate is changing, stop trying to suck a little more profit out of the current system as it collapses. Stop making excuses for continuing to prop up, fund, and profit from the fossil fuel industry. Some of those people are very committed to building and maintaining walls. But I think you and I know that on this unsustainable path we are on, the walls are going to come down sooner or later, one way or another. It might not be too late to do it the difficult and painful way now, or we can do it the devastating, catastrophic, heartbreaking way later. 

So that is why I’m so grateful for all of you who are here, facing the truth, bucking the tendency to go on about our personal lives as if we’re not in the middle of the biggest die-off since the dinosaurs. Thank you for staying present, for showing up, even though we don’t know all the answers. 

Thank you.

Last, I’d like us all to affirm our connection to the earth by kneeling down and touching the ground. Concrete is fine, energy can move through it, but touch it with your hand, your skin. Take a couple deep breaths and feel the energy flowing through you. This is our source. Every minute of our lives we are bathed in the earth’s giant electromagnetic field. We don’t actually know that we can live (for more than a few months) apart from the earth. Let us be in that truth in gratitude. I’ll start a chant, from Peace Poets, and when you’re ready to rise up, join in.

The people gonna rise like water, gonna face this crisis down.I hear the voice of my great granddaughter, saying keep it in the ground.

Screenshot

Missed a couple days and went off-theme, that’s the way art is, you can’t control it.

Face Time

The ceiling fan is like a dangerous halo
behind him and the sounds echo and shift phase
between the living room and the dining room
as he bangs on the piano and sings
about looking for the eldest, who finally answers
from Budapest which is the most beautiful city
they’ve ever seen. City of caves and hot springs
and ancient edifices unlike any in Texas.
He moves to the car with the younger,
we lose connection but the eldest calls back.
I say, don’t go to any private parties. He says
he has a particular set of skills, but none
that could save a young person in Europe.
He could preach a sermon to the kidnappers,
the younger pipes in, her bottle-blonde hair
blowing in the sunroof and we laugh
and they’re gone and I’m alone
with the roses and poetry, the laptop
and books and phone, and my thoughts.

I’m still keeping up with National/Global Poetry Writing Month, though I haven’t taken the time to post a poem every day. Here’s today’s installment of my series on the fantasy world of par-King Laat.

In the lore of the herders, this story is told:

In another world, much like par-King Laat,
but known as Heob, there was a herder
who was strong and worked hard. It was
the time before the Law of Eight Beasts.
Herders were free to lead as many beasts
as they wished. And this herder, whose name
has been lost to history, pulled many beasts
all at once. They stretched the lead to its full length,
and pulled it behind their back, to get more length
through the arm. Sometimes they even used
the forbidden double lead, to pull two lines of beasts
at once. And this was how herders worked,
and there was no conflict for many years.
But one day, while pulling a long line, maybe twenty,
maybe fifty beasts at once, the Unknown Herder
lost control of the beasts, and they broke free
from the lead, scattering in all directions.
Several of the panicked beasts ran right into a veehgal,
causing grave injuries. It had unsightly bruises,
deep scratches, broken teeth . . .
How badly can a beast hurt a veehgal? Well, it was
of the Tasliah breed, which we all know
are among the most proud and annoying, so
it wouldn’t take much to infuriate the veehgal,
and in turn alarm all the High Mages. And after that,
the High Mages and the Lords of Ensrance,
who rule even the High Mages of every land,
all decided that there would never again be
a line of beasts longer than eight.
And that is how we work, to this day.