I am working on a one woman show called O MY GOD for my 50th birthday, and so much more. I’ve been wading through moving images from my childhood for days and this one keeps comes back to me over and over. As I pulled it up I realized I don’t remember moving. At all. But I do remember wrapping the ruby glasses my mom used to collect carefully in newsprint and placing them in boxes.
Ruby Glasses
It’s cinema to me
dust on light becomes mist,
dissolve
evening sundown
to dusk
to twilight,
lighting
my knees on the linoleum
a tint of pale not yellow
but not green
and cool
with grooves that form map lines on my skin
from sitting for so long
It’s okay
I’ll trace them later
under a summer sheet
her picture tucked under my pillow
and a faded window curtain
breathing sleep over me,
set deck
We are moving
and I’m wrapping ruby glasses
with my dad,
I
am
quiet
I am never quiet
I am a tiger
a magician
a trapeze artist
a clown in long blue chiffon
trailing the ocean at my feet
I burble
I giggle
I wonder
out loud
always out loud
I am the maestro of this
this
circus of music
of black cherries and red poppies,
of blue bells
of white sheet wonder
and of mystery,
sound design
I tilt here,
so full
my throat
and the sky I see through my window
has wrapped me
and my shoulders
in a shawl to forget
all the things I will miss
when we leave this place
it slips
and I shiver
the depression glass, the broken porch, the pears
the plums and the cherries
the blossoms
so messy
so pink
and always in my hair,
the sound of my feet
running
tripping
twisting my ankle
falling down the stairs
again
dipping my fingers into the chocolate paint
that smothered
everything in the 70s,
editing
everything you built with your hands
for her
will be gone
like her
from both of us
I won’t remember my last sleep in this house
I won’t even think of it until
now
like cinema
but I will remember
wrapping
ruby
glasses
at seven years old
my hands, your hands, her glasses
in newsprint
like moving pictures
This poem was originally published on Medium.
TinaO is a storyteller, performer, and a professional listener who works with narrative and story structure as a vehicle for human connection. Her work is rooted in Myth, Mysticism, and the practice of personal faith. She is the founder of Live Your Best Story, a weekend retreat of deep listening held on Bowen Island, BC, Canada and is the voice and story behind TinaOLife. Tina is a proud associate of PowHERhouse Impact Media Group where she listens and supports the ‘stories’ of whole and integrated leaders of tomorrow.
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