burying

There is still so much I think about in regards to Lucy's death. Like the fact I never had a funeral, and that small non-funeral gesture sent out such enormous messages to friends and family. Perhaps that we didn't want to speak of her, or publicly mourn her, or maybe even that her loss, and further our grief, was only ours, not meant for anyone else. We prescribed how others should grieve with us. We told them not to send flowers, or to wait to call. It was all isolation and silence. We did that. No one else did.

We didn't want to ruin anyone's Christmas.

It sounds ridiculous when I say it now. It was two days before Christmas when we returned home without her. Gifts under the tree for her, new ones, and a nursery set up for no one. Our child just died. We made thousands of heartbreaking decisions while I was in labor and she was dead. The hospital demanded it. And I, cramping under the grief, spoke to funeral directors without any emotion. Did we want to have a funeral for our dead daughter the day after Christmas? The week after? Would it matter to us at all in five years?

Throughout the years, I have created many rituals in her honor and her name. All my work has orbited around her death in one way or another in the first three years. Perhaps because all those rituals for the four of us could never make up for that one ritual for everyone else.

December will be five years since I held my daughter. The weight of her I can no longer remember. The smell of her, the look of her, gone like her. I see her in Thor, constantly. I kiss them both when I kiss him. But I wonder if this is the time to bury her, invite the family for a memorial on the winter solstice, include others in our rituals. Is this the time for a funeral?

I imagine it as a huge bonfire on the solstice, us gathered around, remembering there once was a girl who held our promise and love, and she is missed, not just by us, but by all of our family and friends.

I don't know if I had a religion before she died. My religion was me, I guess. Nothing so holy. It was about my enlightenment. My serenity. My peace of mind. And she taught me compassion for others on a global scale. She taught me what it was like to suffer. And not the suffering I had already done--the suffering of a broken hearts and feeling different and letting go of things. Or the suffering of being a normal adult lady taking care of her father, drug addict friends...she taught me that universal suffering, the suffering of grief. To grieve. To let go. To mourn. To be kind in the face of suffering. (I learned that by not being kind.) She taught me all that. I started writing about her and ended writing about everything else, and finding a religion that had nothing to do with a church, and everything to do with everyone else. Through all that wisdom, I would give it all up to have one more day with her. But that is not a choice I am allowed to make. And besides, I wonder if I truly would, knowing she would be gone again, and I would grieve again without any of the lessons I had learned about grief, life and love that I had before that one day.

I will always ache to be her mother, and I will be comfortable with the way life went. It is one of those paradoxes that I would have cringed at in early grief. She is always in my blood. That little smidge of DNA makes her permanently part of my water,  my blood. And so that is how my baby is the water, and this people ash, the bones that are white and grey and sit in my secretary, that makes her the earth. And the fire that consumed her, that makes you the fire. And the prayers and mantras whispered to the wind, calling her for, that makes her the air. And so she is all things to me. I can't imagine her any other way, but esoteric symbols of the infinite--the directions, the light, the dark, the spiral, the labyrinth, the heart expanding infinitely back and forward until it emcompasses all life. But I can't imagine what she would be. Little sister. Big sister. Middle child. Daughter. Grand daughter. I am sister. I am mother. I am crone and I am maiden. And so are you.

I finally am burying her here too. I have to put my grief writing to rest. Put her spirit to rest. I sometimes wondered if I summoned her each time I write her name on my computer or in my journal. Does she come, all put out and rolling eyes?

Alright, Mama, I know, you miss me. Can I go now?

I burned her. (Her body only housed the Lucy I came to love.) And she went with the wind. And what's more..she became the wind  blowing through my hair, a moment of caress, a lover reaching an intimate place in plain site.

Today, I publish my final post on Glow in the Woods. I will be there editorially for a while as we transition a new editor. My grief writing ceased serving me or anyone else. I didn't mind the lack of comments, they made sense to me. There is nothing to say about her death anymore. It was sad, so sad, and now we are here. I don't know what will become of this space. I hope to revisit and use it as my space to write about grief, her death, but mostly about our family. I have paintings for people. I just haven't sent them out yet. Life seems too fast these days. And I am writing at the moon + stone blog every week. But about crystals and tarot. Love to each of you.

glow

Like everyone, the mass murder of innocent children in a primary school in Connecticut has me questioning everything in which I believe. Reading Dr. Jo's piece on her blog, No Words for Such a Tragedy, I felt compelled to write about it, open a forum for the community to talk about revisiting grief on a public and large scale, and to talk about our personal grief. She wrote, "Be attentive to our own losses and how this type of trauma reignites our sense of vulnerability and grief."

And yes, our vulnerability, our grief, our fear. When grief swallows me up whole again, I write my way out of its deep belly. But it's hard to write any way out of this horror. And anyway, we shouldn't. We sit directly in it. We must. We must know what guns do, what sick people do with guns, that these children have families grieving now. They are people. And that our powerlessness can be transformed into effective change, if we want it to. Grieving people are amazingly resilient, strong, compassionate. I wonder what we could do if we tried.

We find a path of compassion anyway we can. May this path of compassion drive us to a furious passion to change the things we can change, and call things by their proper name.

I am over at Glow today. Comfort.

fortune telling

It occurred to me this morning that this day is our fourth child's due date. It seems strange at how much has changed since we miscarried. I have such tenderness there for that missing person. My body woke up bleeding again, another new moon after all. Just noting that the baby was missing, a little blood shed today to honor him. I wouldn't have remembered the day except it is my husband's birthday. Yes, our fourth child was due on his birthday. Lucia was due on my birthday. Both of them died.

A few weekends ago, I had a medium tell me that our miscarried baby was actually a boy, and his name, which was actually the only name we had chosen for the baby, if he was a boy. I am writing about psychics and fortune tellers at Glow today, because I consulted a few (thousand) since Lucia died. Not actually, but more than I admit in mixed company.

photo by an Untrained Eye.

In the past, I have been a farm girl. In the future, I will be silver and bald and eat beer pellets for breakfast.

Go over to Glow now, and talk about your experience with psychics and whatnots.

pomegranate

I am over at Glow in the Woods today writing about Demeter and Persephone and Lucia. And naturally, of  the noble pomegranate.

photo by hurleygurley

forgiveness and remembrance

The shop smells of Japanese incense. There are chakra crystals and handblocked fabric bags made in Tibet by a women's collective. There are angels in resin for a buck, magical rocks, and pyramids, and in the middle of lavender eye pillows, I see a smiling praying jizo statue for their garden. A big jizo. It is reasonably priced, and I imagine the red bib I will sew for him. He looks like one of my paintings. I ask the beautiful woman with long flowing scarves in August, and almost no shoes about the statues around her shop. There are jizos all around this place. I ask her if she has more. I want to see them all, and she leads me around the shop, showing me Buddhas, and jizos, and Hoteis. And the first jizo is the best. He is mine.

As we stop, I reach for him, turning up to heaven, hands in prayer position, smiling. The clerk touches my wrist where her name is written on my body. It is a sensual gesture, one of compassion. The touch of a stranger feels electric. Her finger rests on my pulse. It quickens.

What does that say?

Lucia.

Is that your name?

No, it is my daughter's name.

It's beautiful. How old is she?

Actually, she died.

How old was she when she passed?

At birth. She was just being born.

Our eyes meet. It is kind of true, I am trying to communicate. No, it is true. She didn't have an age. She would have been born soon. She died just before she was born, but she was still a baby. Stillborn sounds like miscarriage to strangers. And miscarriage is also difficult and physical and hard and not to be dismissed, if you don't want it dismissed, but those words, stillbirth, miscarriage, pregnancy loss open dismissal and distance from the fact that I gave birth to my six pound baby. Lucia looked like me, and I had to leave her in the hospital for an autopsy, then cremation. So, I said she died at birth. It's not a lie, really. What I really want to say is that I pushed her out of my vagina. She was limp and gray, and weighed more than my neighbor's living baby. Her eyes were bruised and the skin torn. I kissed her anyway, and had to push her little tongue back in her mouth so she would look more alive, because it was hard to see her dead. After I held her for a few hours, she grew cold. I couldn't bear it. I wanted more blankets to cover her, to warm her.

I'm sorry. 

Thank you.

Do you have other children?

Yes. A two year old and a five year old. But Lucia is why I want the jizo, because jizos protect babies that die, and guide them into the next life. I paint them. Constantly paint them.

Wow, really? 

Yes. I paint them for other people all over the world and for myself. It is a ritual of forgiveness and remembrance.

She stared at me, tears welling. And then she hugged me. The clerk in the metaphysical store in a cluster of other stores held me. She said there was a light in me. And I could feel the darkness bubbling under the light. The dark is so overwhelming, I want to tell her, that all you can do is light stuff or it would consume us all. Even you, even your light, gauzey fabrics.


I kneel in front of the jizo I placed under her tree, next to the stepping stones we made for our two babies.

I'm sorry you died in me,I say.

There is no answer.

I'm sorry you died in me, I say again.

I chose to die like that, Mama. 
You did?
You chose it too.
I'm sorry.
Don't apologize to me, Mama. I had a good life.

I light another stick of incense and jam it into the ground.

I'm sorry your baby died in you, Angie.
It's not okay, Angie. I'm not sure I forgive you.
I know, Angie.
But keep apologizing, Ang, I think it might be working.

I perform a ritual of forgiveness. It involves nothing selfless. It is all about me being forgiven. It is empty and dark and sad, and as I walk through it, I am come out the other side full and light and contented.

I think about the life I made out of her death. It involves writing and painting and going to metaphysical stores and letting go. I let go of friends. I let go of expectation. I let go of the future. I let go of my tears. I let go of naiveté. I let go of my baby. I let go of the darkness to embrace something dark in me. I let go of anger. I let go.

+++

Today, I was over at Glow in the Woods writing about this thing that happened to me a few years ago. It was something I never talked about, or if I did, only privately to Jess or my husband, I think. I was embarrassed about it, actually, which sounds weird considering the emo shit I have owned on this blog, but still, you know, there once was a girl on the train and I loved her for a few minutes.

glow and etsy

Yesterday, I was up to post over at Glow in the Woods. I wrote finding lost things and losing things I thought I found. I talked about cleaning out my basement, getting rid of all my maternity and baby clothes. I admit, I kept one wee box of super cute clothes for my "grandchildren." Yeah. And I talk about the Fibonacci sequence and finding a little broken snail shell that reminded me of my insides. It made sense at the time. Go over and join the conversation.

Also, I decided to begin creating and selling art again. My sister and I closed our shop the Kenna Twins earlier this year. We both found it difficult to maintain our custom orders in the midst of every day life. Mainly, I stopped so I could write a novel, except I never did quite get to the novel, yet I continued to fill my time with other shit that was not as spiritually fulfilling. Art is my passion, my spirituality, my touch of the Divine. I meditate and create, so I lost a bit of meditation on a day to day basis. So, after talking to my twin, thinking it over, consulting psychic and spiritual advisors, and then meditating a great deal, I decided to open my shop with the focus on sacred symbols, images, and meditation paintings. Everything in that shop is spiritual in one way or another. I have been focused in the last few months on linocut block printing, and I did a series on the elements--air, fire, water, and earth. Anyway, I am selling a ton of greeting cards, prints, original paintings of mizuko jizo and meditating mamas still. And in the next few months, I will be adding saint paintings, ex-votos, Day of the Dead altar paintings...slowly they will be added. ANYWAY, here is the link to my shop. 

angie yingst studios on Etsy.

You can like me at angie yingst studios on Facebook.

For my opening days, I am offering free shipping to all my blog readers. Use the code: stilllife. 

Love you all. xo

nevermore

Yesterday, after a week of tests and ultrasounds, hospitals and bleeding, our doctor confirmed that our little baby died in my womb. I was twelve weeks, but she never grew. I just announced my pregnancy on this blog last week. I'm so sorry to deliver the news in this way.

Today, I am over at Glow in the Woods, talking about our miscarriage and Lucia's death, in a piece called the raven.

questions

I'm over at Glow in the Woods today answering questions and questioning answers.

I always find it interesting when writers talk about their pieces, and in this one, you may recognize a line or two. My daughter's insight about what happens after we die keeps bouncing around in my head. It felt like God was speaking through her in that answer. She asks me these questions, randomly, like "What is Lucy made of?" and "How old is Lucy?" To be clear, my answers to Beezus are usually succinct and not morbid. Something like, "Oh, she is made of grapefruit, like you and Thor." But in this piece, I just had these questions floating around and thought I would riff on them.

about my father

This month on Glow, the regular contributors have been writing about family. I have written about my father's illness a few times on this blog. I decided it might be a good time to revisit how I felt about Lucia's death, grief, expectations, and my father. So, today, I am over at Glow in the Woods writing about my father, unconditional love, forgiveness, and compassion. Whew.

La Llorona

See, I really do dress like a calavera and/or Frida Kahlo whenever I am feeling lonely or strangely unpresent in my skin.  Sometimes it coincides with Dia de los Muertos, other times it is a random day in July. I transform when I paint my face white, not just externally, but I feel stronger, more beautiful. I cannot tell you why. It feels more me than me. Today is Halloween, and tomorrow and the next day Dia de los Muertos celebrations. I have been writing a bit about my Day of the Dead preparations on my blog still life everyday. And today, I am over at Glow in the Woods where I am talking about the holidays and La Llorona. You know, I really considered reading this piece in face paint for the camera. There is a lot of Spanish words in the piece. I think it might give it that oomph, but perhaps you can tell me if that would be cool.


This year, I thought I might just dress like La Llorona, but knowing probably no one really knows who she is here, I thought it might ruin the whole dressing up thing. I am just a ghost to them. I'm going to share the background of how I became acquainted with La Llorona, hoping my ex-husband doesn't mind me sharing about his family a little. (I adore and adored them like they were my own. Just like I adore his wife, just like she were my wife. Wait, that came out wrong.)

I didn't grow up with La Llorona. She came to me one night over some almond tequila on the border town of Nogales, Arizona. I was nineteen. My ex-husband's abuelo told us the story as we sat around the table after dinner. My Spanish was strong then, but I struggled with unexpected words, particularly when his tia told a story that heavily featured a mono. I couldn't figure out what she was talking about.

I whispered to my husband, "Is she talking about monkeys?"

"Yes."

"Okay. I thought I was missing something."

His grandfather had a thick white mustache and thick white hair. I met him only a few times in my life, but I loved him with that deep soul respect you get when you meet a kindred spirit. He created artists and thinkers and writers. My ex-husband's aunt dressed like Frida Kahlo on random days when the spirit of the great artist moved her. My ex-mother-in-law created vibrant, large paintings of Navajo medicine men and rituals of the desert. When she created sculpture, she hiked to the mountain to dig her own clay out of a earth. She told me you can only create from your soul when you include your sweat. The old man, El Viejo, worked for the Southern Pacific Railroad as they carved its path through Arizona.

We had dinner with his grandparents this night. As the candles flickered, everyone began telling ghost stories. I sipped my tequila and translated in my head. El Viejo talked with his whole face, his hands gesturing as he told his stories. His story was about La Llorona, the Wailing Woman. He left his house in Nogales to drive to work in the back of a truck with four other guys. It was before dawn, and the trip took hours. In those days, the arroyos ran with water, and even small ponds were around Southern Arizona. Cattle farming has eradicated most of the water in the area now, but here and there, you would find veins of water, as precious now as the gold that once drew people there. El Viejo saw something on the small pond they passed. He told the driver to stop, and they all gaped. It was La Llorona, the Wailing Woman, walking along the edge of the pond. Though walk, perhaps, is misleading, she hovered and  wailed. She stared right into the Old Man's eyes. She was so beautiful, so white. She cried, "Dios mio, mi hijos! Mi Hijos!" She screamed, and the men shook in their boots. Tore off in the truck. La Llorona.

My ex-husband told me that every viejito has a story of seeing or hearing La Llorona. La Llorona means the Wailing Woman, the Crying Woman. The old people hear someone wailing, "Oh God, my babies, my babies" somewhere in the night. It is a ghost story, a nightmare, to lose your children. La Llorona is a warning told to children. Do not venture out at night or La Llorona will snatch you. (Us, babylost mamas, want any child to take as our own. We are so grief-stricken we will mistake you for the one gone too soon.) It is a warning to mothers--do not foresake your children. See, La Llorona was a woman named Maria. And she had many children. The father left, and Maria fell in love with another man, who grew jealous of the children, so she drowned her children to be with the man. She is punished for eternity by having to search the arroyos and lakes, swamps and ponds of the world searching for her children. I never believed that version. The other version of that story is that all her children were washed away in a flash flood in the arroyo. And she wanders the Earth grieving, screaming. Now that is a legend I get. La Llorona mourns, walks along banks and cries for her babies. Mis hijos. Mis hijos.

Anyway, hope you enjoyed a ghost story today. 

A toast to communing with ancestors!

short story

Today, I am over at Glow in the Woods rewriting my long story into a short story. Pop over for a read.

wild is the wind.

Today I am over at Glow in the Woods. I felt inspired by Nina Simone's song Wild is the Wind, and feeling wild and windy and sad and loving and everything in between. Maybe it is like grief jazz.

Here is the song if you are interested.