Echo Heart

[mousey1]

My heart speaks

Echo heart
loud and soft
reverberations constant all around
sorrow for sorrow if
the sweetest life
is lost

Echo heart
emotions overturned
the hopeless wreck lays
wasted
imaginings Prayer-bound
Echo heart
nightly cries

Eleanor
my heart's smile

gazes out across
time and space

words uncomfortable on her tongue
thoughts lost in passage

always laughs but inside
Echo Heart cries

Eleanor Eleanor
fighting battles won before
Eleanor Eleanor
fighter bundled in gentlest form
Eleanor Eleanor
the tears pound
beat our spirits down
unrecognizable in defeat

The hope I sometimes count upon
fails me now
when shallow breaths
assisted by unnatural means
heave in the chest
of Eleanor

And I
I clamor at a faith that is not
often strong
I clamor, rage, and cry
at bitter thieves
who steal what's dear
and leave untouched
unscathed that bitter flesh
that no one needs

Memories gather
lost
searching for
the familiar form
that travels nightly
hallways of neglect

Ring true this once
this once
do
what you say
for desperation mounts
stands out upon the wretched peaks
of death

Time spent on knees
gather dust
grow weary of
coming up empty

Fulfill
this heart trusts
clings nakedly

Fulfill
this once
and leave my soul intact

Fulfill
return to me
that bit of hope that's left

Fulfill
I beg
return to me
my Eleanor
or risk the death
of faith
forever lost

we cling

[joel]

mousey,

i sob and i smile and i read and i read again.

and i don't understand, but unfortunately relate.

my 'eleonor' spelled her name with an 'e' on the end.

[mousey1]

ah yes, joel...

I sob as well...

It appears that Eleanors are special beings. Mine is a bright spark of life, a little bundle of energy and delight. And she has often been the sunshine of my day. I visited her in intensive care yesterday and it wrenched me to the core. She struggles for life and I...I with her. She is no blood relation to me but I love the stuffing right out of her...she is a dear, sweet friend.

Seeing her in her present condition shatters my composure and so my heart utters it's despair.

Thank-you joel, very very much.

[joel]

thank you. i have very few people with whom i can share my eleanore memories-- even fewer from whom i can sense an empathy. in some ways, you need an eleanor to understand an eleanore. that's why they're special people...softer to touch than most others, sweeter to hear, gentler to handle, more painful to leave....

[stilltrucking]

Eleanore Rosevelt

She was the first person to cross my mind on reading this. My mother's hero. A symbol of possibility for her when women were still almost chattel.

[mousey1]

Thank-you both.

I am quite sick at heart right now.

I hope for the best and have to fight not to think the worst.

Dammit it all anyway.

I think it's true what you say joel...

softer to touch than most others, sweeter to hear, gentler to handle, more painful to leave....

Every time I think of her impish playfulness, the way we used to scrunch up our faces at each other, how I'd place my forehead against hers and squint-smile into her eyes, the studied concentration with which she'd throw herself into any task, the way she'd sit by the window and gaze out into the day wagging her right foot absently with a faraway, wistful expression I am hit by how sorely she will be missed should she slip away. And things will never be the same.

Well, I won't give up on her until she does. She has my best thoughts always.

And it feels good to talk. Thanks for listening.

[joel]

I won't give up on her until she does. She has my best thoughts always.

i recall it being one of the hardest things..while my eleanore was alive, but dying: i had to stop myself talking about my still-living love in the past tense prematurely.

holding on to life and hope when they are so fleeting...when every moment counts as forever, but are obviously so few.

my prayers are with you both.

[mousey1]

Oh God joel, that's so sad.

That's even harder for me to fathom, more deeply saddening than anything else I can imagine.

Ah, the miseries life can sometimes hold, would that we could escape such things.

They say, "that which does not kill us makes us strong". Don't know about that...I have a tendency moreso to think that it whittles us down piece by tiny piece.

But this too shall pass, and tomorrow, perhaps tomorrow, shall my positivity return.

Please do share your memories of Eleanore. I am sure we have been touched more than once by shades of her in your poems.

And thanks ever so much for your prayers...strong energy that.

[Ann Bingham]

I will say only that I found the poem very beautiful and touching. A very touching tribute to your Eleanor. May the sorrow be lifted from you my friend.


love lots

[mousey1]

Thank-you Ann.

I go to see her today...
shall she open her eyes...

[mousey1]

shall she open her eyes...

Yes.

and attempted a smile...albeit clamped around hoses and gizmos.

and in three days, all going well...

she shall return home!

I am ecstatic beyond all compare!

She is still much worse for wear but God willing she shall resume to at least her former level of normalcy.

WOOT WOOT!

Life is so fragile. Suck up all the juices, every last drop of goodness because you never know, you just never know what can befall.