HALLOWEEN (SONG-IN-PROGRESS)

 

Walking along the road one Samhain night
Saw something odd, gave me a weak-legs fright
Hot pink dragon glowing in moonlight
Stretched over its hoard, man, what a sight

 

Now I don’t drink alcohol or smoke weed
Although decades in the past I partook of the seed
True, tonight I celebrated my control freed
Caffeine and chocolate imbibed with speed

 

Dragon snored away so I crept near
Have to confess, did feel fear
But wow! Her hoard was oh so clear
Mounds of candy corn celebrating the solar year

 

Orange and yellow and white sugar treat
My parents used to call it “chicken feet”
In prep for Thanksgiving I’d gobble it neat
I confess sugar and dye is my favorite eat

 

Shoveled the hoard into my backpack
Pausing to eat a midnight snack
Until the sugar high made me slack
And I must’ve passed out on the dragon’s back

 

Woke up feeling a pretty hot fire
The dragon yelling, thought I’d expire
“I didn’t do it!” I screamed like a liar
She wrapped her tail around me, I was lifted higher

 

“How shall I punish you, my thief?”
“I’m so sorry, but I’m addicted,” I said with grief
“Well it is Halloween so we’ll stay in the motif”
“Yes, I will!” I cried in relief

 

“Play me a song with your ukulele
Sing something sad and achingly lonely”
“I will,” said I gladly, “although I’m crappy”
Kindly she said, “Music is soothing even from a wannabe”

 

So I played and sang and swore I saw
A few tears wiped away with her claw
I sang and played til my fingers were raw
And then she thanked me, the sugar outlaw

 

I hurried home grateful to be unharmed
Swore I’d never steal, especially when unarmed
Sugar is my downfall but now I’m disarmed
And thankful that for once, I was charmed…

 

(c) 2018, 2024 Clarissa Simmens (ViataMaja)

IMAGE: My Halloween Effigy

 

 

 

 

WOMEN, JUST VOTE (PLEASE)

 

By the power of

Blue, Red and White

I swear to ignite

The passions of we women

Asking you to vote

In memory of our mothers

Force-fed, beaten, jailed

So we can be

The antidote

For apathy

Repeat after me

The names of

Those heroic women

Who suffered for us:

Susan B. Anthony

Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Carrie Chapman Catt

And the lesser-remembered

Sojourner Truth

Ida B. Wells

Mary Church Terrell

Stay strong

Like the roots of the swamps

The steel of the cities

The raging waves of the oceans

Stay strong and

Vote…

 

© 2020, 2024 Clarissa Simmens (ViataMaja)

IMAGE: Records of the National Woman’s Party

 

 

AUDITORY MOTOR SYNESTHESIA (A Bit Of Blogetry)

 

I hear music when I hear motors from fans, lawn mowers, air conditioners, etc.  Sometimes it is what I call “Angel Music” or Biblical movie music. Sometimes it is classical, sometimes rock-folk-blues. Ultimate playlist, never knowing what I’ll tune in.

 

I never told anyone because I was afraid they would Baker Act me into an asylum, but tonight I was in the kitchen and thought the next door neighbor was playing an organ or keyboard and it was terrible (not that I’m a good musician when I play my ukulele, but still).  Anyway, I opened the front door to see why he or she would be sitting on the front steps playing and it turned out to be a lawn mower.  So I  Googled “I hear music from motors” and wow! It is called Auditory Motor Synesthesia and lots of people hear as I do.  In fact, Synesthesia is 3 times higher in people like me with Autism Spectrum Disorder than the general population.

 

Confusingly, the word “motor” can refer to motors/engines but also there are people who hear music and start walking—or dancing--in strange ways, meaning their motor skills (no relation to motors in fans) are forcing them to react physically in a different way. This includes hand movements that may be what is behind the childhood hand-flapping some of us exhibit.

 

Quite a few successful musicians have synesthesia (seeing notes in colors) but for me, I guess the music wasn’t quite loud enough to compose that number 1 hit…

 

Seems it’s time to Google hypnagogia again, in the hope that recent research will not accuse us of being whacko, just being, what I always suspected, creatively diverse with a fun superpower of auditory/visual entertainment. 

 

(c) 2024 Clarissa Simmens (ViataMaja)

IMAGE: From my Paul Simon songbook

 

 

ORGANZA

 

Was I ever this happy again?

If so, why do all the decades of regrets

Haunt me in old age?

 

May not be famous or rich but

I still try to pull myself away

From sadness, anger, and even some rage

 

I need more pictures to remind me

That life has been okay

Perhaps this is merely an elder-person’s stage

 

Happy child sparkling in organza

My one-word magic spell

To help me disengage

 

This calls for a haiku for me and you:

 

A fairy tale dress

Once made my life so perfect

Key to happiness

 

(at any age)

 

© 2024 Clarissa Simmens (ViataMaja)

IMAGE: CS as flower girl, age 3

 

 

 

 

WOMEN’S BATHROOM WAITING LINE

(Hurricane Milton shelter: social media at its best)

 

{Scroll down for a YouTube video of Bob Dylan’s Shelter From the Storm}

 

Hurricane shelter trauma

Especially for one with autism

Is real

Yet there is something

So Social Media-like

And in the long hours of

Day and night

Waiting for the hurricane to

Make landfall

And possibly wreck our lives

Forever

I looked forward to standing

In that line

And talking to the women

Old and young

As we tried to ignore

That basic urge to pee

The waiting line a newsbreak

From hours of sitting on concrete floors

And a source of connection

 

Someone said there were 1800

Shelter seekers here at River Ridge HS

Hurricane Milton chasing after

Hurricane Helene

Who had wrecked lives

Merely two weeks earlier

Someone said there would be

No dinner that night, only snacks

Someone said the storm would miss us

I met someone who, like me, was

Born and raised in Philly

Someone asked if I had worked in

Financial Aid at PHCC

And we talked because

I recognized her as a student

Even though it had been 14 years ago

Most of all, our dogs were sheltered

In the school gym

And we got to visit and feed and play

With our beloved family members

Yet all agreed there should be

More bathrooms for women

More staff* for all the evacuees

More food and my vote, more coffee

I’d even volunteer to brew it all day!

 

But no question,

The staff was wonderful

Patient, polite, overworked

In the middle of the night

A Pasco sheriff’s deputy

Saw me limping to the bathroom

And returned with a cane

To lessen my pain

Other deputies tirelessly

Helped me navigate the campus

In pouring rain

And yes, Bob Dylan’s song

Shelter from the storm

Played in my head

Like a psalm of hope

Thank you to all I met

And may this be the

Last cyclone of the season…

*Staff includes the wonderful students who dragged our belongings and pets on wagons to our assigned rooms

 

© 2024 Clarissa Simmens (ViataMaja)

IMAGE: Hurricane Milton from Int. Space Station 10-8-24

 

https://youtu.be/IzaXlq1Pdmk  Bob Dylan, Shelter From the Storm

 

 

 

 

 

YELLOW HOUSEPLANT MUSHROOM

(Leucocoprinus birnbaumii)

 

Well, the Impatiens never grew

And then the neighborhood

Regentrified

With lovely yellow toadstools

Taking over after a wild hurricane

Wiser gardeners than I

Assure me that toadstools

Are a sign of healthy soil

So maybe someday

So they say

The Impatiens will

Reappear…

 

© 2024 Clarissa Simmens (ViataMaja)

IMAGE: Yellow Toadstools