Family Stories @joantaber-blog - Tumblr Blog

Posts

Going Gray. #whynot #itsabouttime

#itsabouttime #whynot

Six Loves #dogsofinstagram #anythingforacookie

#anythingforacookie #dogsofinstagram

11 & 37 #change #notugly #dontlisten #dontlistentothem #32yearsago #moi

#dontlistentothem #32yearsago #moi #change #notugly #dontlisten

Saki and Magregor: Good morning, world. #rescuedog #dogs #dogsrule #dogsofinstagram

#dogsofinstagram #dogs #rescuedog #dogsrule

The wonder of being four #Belmont Lake

#belmont

I wrapped them in basil leaves and ate them all three. #tomatoes #veganseatbetter #patiogarden

#patiogarden #veganseatbetter #tomatoes

Some Bailey love.

Heading home #longisland #huntington aka the sound of peace

#huntington #longisland

Good night, green; good night, red. #huntingtonbay

#huntingtonbay

To algae or not to algae--there's the turtle. #turtles #turtle #hecksherpark #huntington #huntingtonny #longisland

#turtle #hecksherpark #turtles #huntingtonny #longisland #huntington

Walking the High Line

Happy Birthday, George Harrison

What I hate is the way people say,

George Harrison’s in a better place;

so many places in this world

could have done as well—

if not Liverpool, then London;

if not London, then Delhi;

if not Delhi, then what about Rome?

We could have adorned his house with gold,

laid magic carpeting all across his floors,

hung pictures of sunshine on his every wall,

had flowers flown in from around the world.

And he could have stayed in that spruced-up place

writing songs and playing his guitar

for a good long weeping while.

It would have been that better place—

brighter, cheerier, less sprinkled with dust,

and not so far from us

and not so deep away

and not so covered with earth.

#George Harrison

My Last Grownup: for Eileen

I still go to the phone and reach for you—

eight-four-seven before I remember you’re gone;

three-five-eight before I’m sure of it;

seven-zero-five-five just for the comfort

of pretend—my last grownup,

my last big sister, my last voice of reason,

still alive in a glance, a word, a triangle

of spring across winter sky or memory

—old letters and photographs

of times we knew and didn’t;

your words would form lakes in the middle

of a desert or an answer to some riddle of the ages,

or a cup of tea with a slice of toast or history

or light at the end of the proverbial tunnel.

Your silence, weighted and dark like wool,

drapes over the end of day,

and still the empty of years, only three,

but still the empty of years;

you believed in angels and goodness

within the pale and beyond all vanity

of our short time here,

the hope of something like ever-after

within the light of darkness.

The phone line gone, your words frozen

and hallowed on the lips of the choir—

so all that’s left are these numbers

that used to lead to you—

eight-four-seven before the song is over,

three-five-eight before the music stops forever,

seven-zero-five-five just for the comfort

of pretend—

Political Cartoons : The New Yorker

ariphoto-blog

The birthday boy (Taken with instagram)

Bananas & Pears

My grandfather forgot to kill one painting;

it's hanging here on my wall

—Bananas and Pears—a still life

a life still, but no more.

Before he died, he made many trips

between his upstairs studio

and the garbage bin on the street,

each time carrying one of his paintings

each time depositing his hours,

his life, his work, his remembering

into the garbage on its way to the dump.

And I wonder if there was method to it: did he line his work up in some sort of order and choose the first painting to die? How about the second or third? How about the fiftieth or the one that made him lose count?

And what of his brain? Did it know what he was doing?

What’s left now is his banana painting hanging at the end of my sofa—cast in green, like his eyebrows, they are bananas and pears and more.

Freud often pounds on my windows and doors begging to come in for a look at all these erectile cylinders, at these hard-green pears and rounded hips and waistlines slender and firm, at the sloping shoulders and searching stems, at stiff anticipation holding its breath, at the pale green apples drenched in light, and the single gray lemon ready to squirt its juice into the foreground night.

But the painting is still—not like life, like death—and my grandfather, undressed and angry still, paints in the green-gray dominance that dulls the light and dries the paint before it has a chance to live—his bananas, his pears, his apples counted among his fruits,

his children, gone too, among his truths.

Hope, Robert, Julian, Scott, James—don’t think there is forgetting in shadows that hang on walls or even in light that tries to blind, that wrings all color from the deadman's eyes.

Shoes of Fine Green Velvet

For 30 years her shoes of fine green velvet have been waiting for me to make a decision regarding their fate. Occasionally, and always by chance, I find them in a drawer or at the back of a closet, always when I've been looking for something quite else. I take them out of their stiff plastic bag and wonder what to do with them.

These shoes of fine green velvet belonged to my mother. Her fancy dress-up shoes, she wore them when she went down to the edge of town; she wore them to all her parties; she wore them to our school events, to visit the bank loan officer or dying friends or the post office. She wore them until she had no reason to wear shoes anymore. They matched not every outfit, and yet they matched everyone of them—every year, and every fashion season of her life, I’m still not sure how or why. No matching bag or belt or buckle in her blond hair.

She used to sing a line from “I Know Where I’m Going” when she slipped into those fancy shoes of fine green velvet:

“I have stockings of silk and shoes of fine green leather, a buckle for my hair, and rings on every finger.”

When I was small, I wondered why she didn’t wear a buckle in her hair or a ring on any finger. I also wondered why the shoes in the song were of fine green leather instead of fine green velvet, since the song had obviously been written for her. And now that I’m all grown up and almost older than she ever was, I still don’t know for sure what sort of buckle would be worn in anyone’s hair.

The shoes are now about 70 years old, and according to eBay, they’re worth about ten dollars. The heels are worn down just a little, and the soles show some scratches and other evidence of having once been worn. And the fine green velvet is not as fine as it once was, or ever was, for that matter. I can’t wear them as they’re about a size too small for me. I’ve never offered them to any of her five granddaughters because I just assume they wouldn’t be interested in using them for anything other than a fanciful accessory for a Halloween or Christmas outfit. But selling them is out of the question.

So, back they go into their stiff plastic see-through bag, and away they go on the shelf or into the drawer. I can’t throw them away, give them to a charitable cause, or wear them myself; so there they sit waiting to click, once again, their heels along a sidewalk or dance across a crowded room or go down to the edge of town. I figure they've waited this long, what's another 70 years in such a life?

Trending Blogs

Recently Viewed Blogs

Family Stories