St. Teresa Slips Through Time

Pope Gregory XIII declared
A new calendar in 1582
To bring Easter into alignment
With nature's own sense of timings
To begin October 4th of that year
Eleven days would disappear
At least in Catholic countries
The Protestants crying foul
Until another route brought
Them into planetary position
The Orthodox remaining
Behind in Julian fashion.

It was late on Oct 4th 1582
Or early the next morning
St. Teresa said to her Beloved
"it is time to move on"
And bidding farewell she
Went forth to meet Him
Whom she had always sought
Time now leaps forth with her passage
October 15th having just begun.

Ingenious she was to slip between
These calendar changes we have now
In the twinkling of the old into new
The fourth followed by the fifteenth
Henceforth to be known as her feastday
As I kick through the leaves
This October 5th, golden now
The season releasing its leafy garments
Strewn in almost reckless abandon
On the street as my footsteps
Loud in the dryness of the leaves
To the church as darkness gently falls
The red and blue sanctuary lamps
Flicker in the solemn time spent

I follow Teresa in my thoughts, she
My mentor from beginning times
Guiding my steps along the way
That has often been perilous and steep
I cheer her passage between time's reckoning
Looking up into the clear night sky
In the silent homeward walk
A shooting star across my horizon
Heading west bright and swift
I sense her spirit waving in the glimpse
From beyond this vale of time.

The Neighbourhood for Tea

The highway was not so busy then
In my little world of very young
Perhaps a mile long of neighbourhood
On the northern slope running
The water's western arm
Flowing down from the big lake
In search of the Columbia River's
Private entrance to the sea.

Our little farm of sixteen acres
Soon dotted with flowers made
My mother's preference for color
Fade the market garden that was there
It did not suit her sensibilities with
Three teen age sons
And my small self
The cow and the chickens too.
There was always time to walk
Along that highway stretch
Clinging tightly to her hand
Buffeted by the wind from the big trucks
As we went to visit the inhabitants
Some elderly with no family by
Retired and always ready
To serve a cup of tea.

In a tiny cabin lived an elderly couple
Where we sat together next
To the big grandfather clock
Dominating the tiny abode with pompous gongs
The husband I did not then understand
Nursing a wife whose mind
Had wandered far away
His tenderness toward her
And us when my father was away
Working in the bush
He would visit and chat
While my mother ironed and I
Who sometimes could be rude
Would be corrected by him
Much to my chagrin.

It was he who was central
To a little drama when I was four or so
I could not resist
The candy in the Safeway store in town
Eye level and available in such
Colors and pretty wrappings
I lied when we got home
Saying our elderly friend
Had made a gift
After all, it fit my expectations
The fib was badly told
I was in trouble on several fronts
My mother for stealing
Our friend for the lying implication
My penance being to return
The stolen loot to the big store
A checkout lady who gravely received
Candy and apology in return
For my tearful humiliation and remorse.


The house to the east
The Anglican vicarage
Warmly welcomed by the
Elderly pair with an unhappy son
Whose gentle kindness
Puzzled and widened my
View of the religious world.

To the west the little family
On one acre of green
Their teen-age daughter
Fan of the fifties hit parade
Introduced music with social attitudes
Made me want to sing
If only You are My Sunshine.

Across the highway from the acre
A beautiful sandy point
Whose cabins were summer busy
Empty in winter
Then there would be time for tea
I would watch the ducks out on the lake
Savor the sweets as adult
Conversation drifted outside my thoughts
And I pondered the mystery of how
Our hostess managed to have blue hair.

At the farthest west along
The road of my little world
A family of boys, interesting
But only from a safe distance
They too in service of summer folk
The beaches busy
The waterway filled with boats
While my mother and I
Many Sunday afternoons
Would visit for tea and cakes
A lady who with her brother
Lived in a quaint little house
Filled with beautiful furniture from
A past big prairie city life
The ticking of the mantle clock
And the easy chair near the picture window
Filled with a big tree just outside
Where she sat and watched
The bluejay and squirrel dodge and weave
For the peanuts to be fought over
And the scoldings that took place each time.

In those early years in life
Only one other girl lived close by
A year older and looked up to
We would visit her grandparents farm
Just up the hillside where
The pig smell dominated
The corner that took the turn towards home
The rabbits that nibbled constantly
Gazing out from their cages with their big eyes
Which made me incapable of enjoying
Them on a dinner plate.

It was her aunt
Small and bent over
Who babysat my time
When parental absence needed help
She lived up on the hill above
In an orchard of apple trees
Tiny house, silent husband
Soon to be gone into time
When only the tall grass would
Wave in the wind colored with sunlight
Where I would go and sit in the fragrant field
Serenaded by the grasshoppers
In sudden happiness overwhelmed
By this small world that was mine.

When Thoughts Turn Around

These are the days when I feel
My life a prison sentence
With bars across the windows
Looking up unto gray walls
Cold stones blackened by wind
Beaten by the rain's harsh lashes
Within my cell confined
The loneliness of existence for
So many souls I sense near by
Burdened by the whims of fortune
Their happiness under lock and key
Despair the weapon of the prison guards
That mock at hope or delight
Pin down with constant attack
This exile life of man. 

It is only a tiny breeze
A small fire burning
Endurance unto another time
When the gray sky has passed
The burdens slipping from all
Wounded shoulders
The torture of this frail human race
No longer within reach
As I grow thin and transparent
Enough to pass between
The stones of  prison walls.

In Colors Unfaded

Oh, best Beloved
I would a white flower be
Its purity gathering
The full spectrum of light
Reflecting all.

I would be the redness
Found in a rose
The passion of Your love
Flowing blood red in
Every vein.

I would be one with the sky
Blue with endless depth
A Lady's mantle
Over this sad world
Where mankind often blots
Creation's landscape.

And green I would turn
Hope my watchword
That the stench of death
Would spring with tender new life
Always.

'Tis the yellow of the sun's
Warmth
I would cast not shadow
To dim its healing rays.

To thus the plain brown wood
Where Love lay dying
Death banished from these hills
Oh, best Beloved.

The Heart of a Child

An old photograph
Black and white
A six year old stands
Just higher than the dahlias
Lunch box in hand
Hair washed and curled
The plaid flock style
Early sixties looks back through
That camera lens.

I don't remember my brothers
Waiting with me for the bus
I do remember my loud cry
Great alarm as we drove past my school
Not versed in bus stop ways
The laughter from the older students
The annoyance of the driver
All brushed off as I gained
The freedom of the ground
Running back along the road
To my first day of school.

Was it that day I relished
Making my first ever friend
Only she and I to negotiate
Our common interest and goals
No parental playmate decided for me
Or fate of neighbourhood arrangement
How delicious this new adventure
It's freshness such a delight.

A small two room country school
Grades one to three my classroom
An older English woman
Whose warmth and humour
Would accompany my first three years
A good British citizen I became
A culture taught not inherited
The triumph of reading
A thrill still remembered
As quietly the first year passed
Blending into the second and third
With grass and woods to play in
We smelt the changing of the seasons
It dictated our games
Held us in its wonder
Embraced us with its space.

I made good friends in
Those three happy years
Looked forward to becoming
A member of the other classroom
But that was not to be
The school was closed for a new one
Long in the building which sent
The students all to town in the autumn
I parted ways with my companions as
I alone made the trek
To the big wooden Catholic school
I did not return to the modern country school
Staying on my solitary road the next four years.

Fifteen students were now forty plus
How far away home seemed
I would gaze through the eastern windows
With an aching heart and
The distance was an exile
I had to endure
Learning to cope with
The small confines of pavement
Called a playground
The flights up the long narrow staircases
Behind a black robed figure
Whose long rosary clattered
Followed by my classmates
Who resisted me as a friend
For most of that year being
The loneliness of new.

I, a quiet student
Bent over my desk
Studied my new social world
Enjoyed the wild antics and tension
Caused by twin boys
Practicing for the future Balkan war
Taxing the poor teacher beyond
Her already difficult task
This American nun who
Told us stories of a different empire
Wept at the death of JFK
Pronounced him a saint
Still ascends the narrow staircase
Like a ghostly memory above me.

Grade five under a no nonsense
Canadian Polish nun of formidable girth
Passed quietly as I slowly made friends
By grade six I was
Accepted. sort of, adapted and
Somewhat casual to learning skills
Relying on a memory that came in handy
To keep academia at bay
Concerned with social interests instead
Until one day a new teacher
Sped into our classroom
A male invader, energetic
Discerning a taste for grade seven
Unhappily swallowed
I announced to my mother
I would not be attending his class
She announced I would
As thus I met the road whose
Direction has led me deeper
Into the heart that was mine as a child.

Talking Tonquin Valley

In a valley behind Mt. Edith Cavell
Stretches the Tonquin pass
A wide and very long valley
Home to many fishing camps and bears
Filled with trails for the pack horses
The Alpine Club of Canada in 1970
Their annual summer climbing camp
My sister Yvonne made me her guest
The club having lowered the age
To sixteen for membership.

At last a sport in common
Between the elder and myself
Swimming and skiing a big no go
The love of the mountains
United our interests at last
With a stop in Banff for
Helmet, harness and ice-axe
We headed to the trail head
Oh, happiness the pack horses would
Carry all our belongings for the week
While we walked the
Fourteen miles into camp.

I remember the concern that
Fourteen miles loomed long in my mind
But the day passed pleasantly
The trail not steep, the forest friendly
Halfway we met a little white-haired lady
Her younger companion sat resting with her
I didn't know then as we paused to greet
She was a mountaineering legend
Phil Munday now in her eighties
Wrecked her knees in the coastal range
Carrying heavy loads in pioneering
And legendary climbs.

The memories that filter
Through my present mind
Are sparse and fleeting
I found the mountain air
Cold at either end of the day
Lived in a borrowed down jacket
My biggest use of time spent
Talking to Walter, a climber
Businessman from Toronto
Older and happy to engage in lively manner
The optimistic mind of sixteen years
I don't remember the subjects but
We kept in touch by letter long afterward
He found my optimistic mind
Ready to tackle the world
I found him kind in reply and manner
And the hours sped by with
A few mountain climbs
Between conversations.

Every day the stories of exploits
From the expert climbers in high camp
Would filter down to be reviewed
Mulled or added to
While we in the main valley camp
Strolled through our adventures
With no such tales to boast
One day we climbed a local peak
Imposing in its height
My memory of it being
A four a.m. rise before the sun
The day's length the greatest challenge
We played hide and seek as we climbed
The Rockies filled with loose rocks
The greatest danger being
The climber above and the rocks dislodged.
I wore my helmet.

One day we went to a glacier
To practice ice and snow drills
The crevasse hidden dangers
To the unwary with snow covered fissures
A trap hidden from view
Being the youngest person there
I was lowered into a modest
Crevasse not too wide
Hanging on the end of a rope
After an imaginary fall
The climbers working above
Setting up a definite rescue
While I waited in my ice palace
Writing the names of those I loved
Onto the icy wall that resisted
Any of my intentions.

Mid-point a small group of us
Dawned packs and set off to
Another valley with a cabin by a lake
The trail through the Tonquin
Meandered in alpine meadows
Beside small smiling creeks and marsh
Past fishing camps with horses in corral
To a small lake with
Alpine Club cabin of unimaginable
Luxury for its location
That night a thunderstorm
Shook me awake as I slept in the loft
Loud and menacing as I lay there
Deciding if I should be afraid
But fell to sleep before I could decide.

The next day we climbed
The large glacier that led
To a high peak whose name
Unremembered but the snow
Laden valley was the beginning
Headwaters of the mighty Fraser
With many miles to travel
In seaward direction
My imagination finding delight
That such humble and mysterious
Source of greatness  beneath our feet.

On the last day
We arrived back at the car park
To find the horses had bolted
Frightened by a bear
With our belongings held hostage.
My sister and I found our cousin
Who hosted us for the night
In the morning's light the horses
And our packs were recovered
Leaving only the drive home
Our final task together
With three mountain peaks I was
A new Alpine club member
If only for a year.

August Valhalla

In the cool mornings of youth
The finding of virtues call out like
A town crier in one's soul
In urgent tones to follow the journey upwards
Unto the mountains of wisdom from past ages
First taught in youth with images
Sometimes with experience of those lofty peaks
Expressed for me in a week spent happily in
Slocan's Valhalla range named from
Norse legends of the halls of
Slain heroes and home of the gods.

It was a surprise gift from Helen Butling
Defender of our alpine world
First woman on Gladsheim for me to second
I was just past my fourteenth birthday
For that early morning that began with meeting new people
The long drive to the trail head to begin
A nine mile walk in the heat of day
The early August foliage of devil's club
Looming over my head with stifling presence
Stealing the oxygen air until the halfway point
A forest glade with creek water, and rest
To banish my fatigue, cool my veins
Renew hope of the final ascent
Into the Mulvey basin
Surrounded by rugged mountain peaks
Crowned by Gladsheim
Home of the gods brooding over
The pristine valleys.

There among the alpine flowers
We pitched our tents in the
Fragrance of alpine trees
Stunted and misshapen from long
Winter's grasp with perfume breeze
Unique and intoxicating
Heaven's own garden beneath its dome.
But then there were the endless horseflys
Terror of my younger days
As I quickly learned to hit them hard
Learned it was best to punch them
Before they could take their morsel of flesh.


The art of rock climbing with the use of ropes
And in my case, elbows and knees
I was invited to ascend Gladsheim
In the care of a mountain guide
Both kind and sure footed
We started out through the midst of boulders
To the ridge razor backed with
Another valley whose mountain we could see
Aptly called the Devil's couch always watching
Never benign to those who would
Journey upwards to speak with things of heaven.

I can still see the sheer rock wall
Falling it seemed for miles
As I slipped yet safely roped
Scrambled with only a quick downward
Glance that etched itself in my memory
The vast possibilities of harm not
To be dwelt upon or given second thought
But only to venture onwards in relief
Gain the summit where at the top of Gladsheim
A cairn with names written to be added to
And survey mountain range upon range
Unknown by name to me reaching
Into endless horizon and mystery.
We ate our lunch in the wonder of
Creation's form and rested to begin
The long descent with me relying
On the soon to be worn out
Seat of my jeans.

I gained an unearned reputation
From my fellow mountaineers that day
For being a talented climber, fearless
Thus nvited to scramble the Batwing I ran
Into fear from not being roped into
Safe passage along small edges
Wavering dangerously in my own mind
Did my discomfort manifest itself I wonder.

And then midweek it snowed
All hiking ceased as large white flakes
Descended on the alpine flowers
The reds, blues and yellows
The purple and greens mixed with
Falling white that melted
Upon the ground as I
Walked through the small meadows
Amazed by the mystery of this beauty
Filled with joy in the whispers
The silent happiness in this lonely place.

The final mountain ascent of Asgard
Through swirling mists we
Carefully climbed into the clouds
Hurrying past us on urgent business
Perhaps the souls swirling from earth
Were passing by and then were left behind
As above the clouds we stood
Their thick cotton wool texture hiding the valley
With only the mountain peaks dark and pointed
Piercing this eiry stillness like lone sentinels
Guarding the movement of all time
As the clouds slowly rose to engulf us
Flowing into the vast unknown to
Treasure as memory.