Carolyn Martin

It happens this way …

My local friends are probably tired hearing about the anxiety I’ve been feeling — not about important issues like the virus or riots — but about the appearance of a feral momma cat and her two kitties in our side yard two weeks ago.

Feral cats are nothing new in our neighborhood. We’ve banded together over the years to have them fixed so they won’t populate the earth. However, the cycle of birth and rebirth has started again. We have three traps in our backyard ready to be set as soon as the kittens have been weaned. How will we know when? I have no idea.

Interestingly, the momma which we call Dahlia — as in Black Dahlia — was a kitten herself a bit more than a year ago. Her momma who lives next door also had kittens recently, so we have all these  generations running around. Our intent is to find homes for the kitties and have the mommas fixed. But to catch them when they’re here one day and gone the next is crazy-making.

I’ve had to practice letting go and giving control back to Mother Nature. Cats will do what cats will do and, while we have their best interest at heart, we’re not in charge.

As for why I don’t own pets, here’s a poem that captures my history with them.

Love’s Labor’s Lost or Why I Don’t Own Pets

 Three chameleons

disappeared 

into our bamboo shades.

The horny lizard’s

soft-curled back

amazed

then,

like goldfish

in their hazy bowl,

flipped

its down side up.

Unamused,

dad booted out                                                                           

the lab who

slurped

his cabbage soup.

The speckled mutt

arrived

one day,

ran

away the next.            

Need more

reasoning?

A droop-face cop

charged

our summer yard

and shot

two frothing pups.

My heart

can’t bear

another crack.

I fall in love

too hard,

too fast.

*****

I applaud all you pet-lovers and -keepers. You have a vocation that requires commitment and love. This vocation is not mine this lifetime. However, I will do my best by the ferals. That’s the least I can offer the critters of the earth.

It happens this way …

Last Sunday at 8:00 a.m. I was standing on a long line of folks waiting to get into Home Depot. Masked and unmasked, we were respecting six-feet of separation, and still managed to chat with each other. The woman behind me was a nurse from a local hospital who complimented me on my homemade mask. When I learned she was a nurse, I asked her how she was doing. She said she had a few days off to recoup from all the stress in the “war zone.” And, she added, the hardest part of her job was watching people die alone.

Last Sunday was Easter Sunday and it was probably one of the most picture-perfect Easters in  memory. Churches streamed their services live, pastors proclaimed “He who was once dead has risen,” and trees and flowers who write their own scriptures reminded us that death is impermanent.

During this past week I’ve thought a lot about what that nurse said and about the aching sadness family and friends must feel not being able to touch or kiss a dying loved one. And I pondered what it might be like for the dying person bereft of human comforters.

Since we’ve all heard stories of people seeing a deceased relative at their bedside as they’re ready to move on, I want to believe that more angels and welcomers than ever are coming to greet them.  I want to believe that they – and we – never die alone because of our connections to those who lived before us. I want to believe that life is not ended but merely changed. True or not, I believe.

 

It happens this way …

In 1970 I was a Sister of Mercy and an English teacher at Camden Catholic High School in Cherry Hill, NJ. When Easter Sunday arrived on a cold, windy day, I roused a group of sisters out of bed (a few were not too happy with me!), and we joined a priest, students, and families under the goal post on the football field to celebrate a sunrise Mass. My best-laid plan for a grand finale was foiled by Mother Nature. Here’s what happened that day. And here’s to feeling “the glory pouring over the earth” today and every day. 

Easter Sunrise Mass

And it was all ground-crunching glory

on the high school football field

where we huddled for the final play.

We knew the drill this frosted dawn.

No surprise. He’d break through grief

and fear and pounce on death again.

 

So to liven up the victory,

I hid balloons inside my car

and planned to set them free the moment

Easter alleluia-ed in. And it would be

all pinks, mint greens and baby blues splashing

Jersey skies with cheers to hang our memories on.

 

But nature sacked my pastel scheme.

Just as the sun broke through,

my impudent balloons refused to fly.  

They rabbited the turf, hopping

over weeds and parking lots, racing

unforgiving winds down unrisen streets.

 

And it was all confusion and dismay

with colors dashing off and students,

parents, nuns and priests giddy with the scene

as if it were a practiced play and I, a brilliant mastermind.

I faked a hero’s bow for unwarranted applause

and heard myself pontificate, Nothing risen stays.

 

My words raced down the near sidelines

with the gravity of ups and downs,

the short-lived glee of crocuses,

the glory pouring over earth.

No surprise, I gathered in my dignity

and headed home to break my fast.

On either side of life, nothing risen lasts.