Radio Interview tomorrow!!!

  


My interview with Todd Moe on NCPR will air tomorrow (Thursday) at about 8:45 AM--right after The Writers' Almanac.
Please tune in!

Radio Interview and Book Signing

 On Friday October 14th, my interview with Todd Moe on NCPR will be aired on his morning program at 8:30 AM. In this segment, we will be discussing the book, "Jairus' Daughter".  There will be a link on the NCPR website to an audiofile of me reading a passage!


 The following day, Saturday, October 15th I will be doing a book signing at the Brewer Bookstore on the campus of St. Lawrence University at 3:00 PM.
Please join me at the fireplace to talk about the book!

The Day You Cried -- remembering the anniversary of your death

                                                     The Day You Cried



I remember the day you cried
It was the only time I saw
You shed a tear. You spoke about
Life without your Dad, how raw
You felt and how sad.

"I was fifteen" you said "when
Daddy died and Aunt Lillian
(your sister) was only eleven."
So you had to be the man
And take care of Mom.

Grandmother was forty-seven.
You helped her in the candy store.
She worked at night as a seamstress.
I do not remember much more
Of what you told me.

Except I remember you cried,
Looked at me. What was on your mind?
Did you know your time was so short?
Did you know the future I would find
Like you, an orphan?

When people die, the others cry
We sit apart and mourn.
It's not a new idea at all
That one should cry when we are born
To be left alone.

The Thaw

The Thaw

 My period of silence is at end
The poetry within me can be heard
Millenia of stillness are undone
By the persistent power of the word.

The words I'd kept inside were still as ice
Fully formed yet impossible to hear
Until some melting started them to flow
And tiny rivulets of words appeared.

The stream swelled slowly, growing, flowing
As gradually it warmed in light of day
Gently it formed a serious river
Where lazy birds may dream and fish can play.

Stand back! The flood of words is coming down.
An unsuspecting audience might drown.

a link to August Goforth's web page

therisenbooks.com

I have just listened to August Goforth's interview on Eldon Taylor's radio program "Provocative Enlightenment" aired on July 5th. Please take a look at the webpage for a link to the interview as well as the scientific paper that was discussed.
And if you haven't yet read his magnificent book "The Risen" please grab a copy and settle in for hours of enlightenment, enjoyment and a moving love story!

Many Thanks to Eldon Taylor!

Many thanks to Eldon Taylor for our interview yesterday on Provocative Enlightenment on Hay House Radio!
Thanks to all who listened or will listen via the archives and to all who participated in the live chat!
Eldon's questions were deep, insightful and a joy to answer.
Thank you so much for this opportunity!!!

Summer Morning

                                                      Summer Morning


                There is a time of summer morning
                When the city is not quite awake
                The sidewalks still a little chafed
                From the sanitation brushes.
                Night workers have returned home
               Their shades drawn so they might sleep
                Lights go on as other people greet the day.
                The air is warm and breezy
                Bringing smells of coffee and fresh baking
                To the few people on the street.
                The storefronts remain dark
                The soda shops and newsstands are open
                For the morning working crowd.
                I am standing at the bus stop
                Waiting for a friend
                We are going to the beach.
                Until she comes I am alone
                Recording this memory for the page.

Upcoming Radio Broadcast June 28th!

I will be talking about my book on Eldon Taylor's radio program "Provocative Enlightenment" on Hay House Radio on Tuesday, June 28th ! The show airs at 2:00 PM EDT live!
Please listen in, call in or chat via the live chat room.

Review on Amazon.com

Here is a review of "Jairus' Daughter" from a good friend, Aliceann Carlton !

By 

Woodenshoe - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)

This review is from: Jairus' Daughter (Paperback)

Jairus' Daughter is a book that, from beginning to end, reflects a vibrant tapestry of life and culture. I did not read this work to get to the end, but to savor the intricacies and the interweaving of lives as the storyteller, Sarah, comes to reflect upon them through her family members' eyes. While the journey for Sarah is the awakening of belief in Christ and the promise of hope and Christ within her heart, it is equally a portrait of her family's daily life and beliefs. She is able to portray the small matters of daily living that eloquently shape the beliefs and attitudes of Sarah's family members. Jairus' Daughter is also the chalice of a child trying to make sense of her father's long illness and death, experienced throughout the book through her eyes, heart, and as a physician, her intellect. In this sense the book serves as powerful testimony to the emotional and ancestral eternity of life. I thoroughly enjoyed Jairus' Daughter as a very readable and meaningful reflection of the mosaic of family, culture and beliefs that are a part of every person's history.

I highly recommend Jairus' Daughter as a thoroughly enjoyable and insightful book and commend Evelyn Weissman on her ability to weave a family tapestry that enlightens the reader's heart.

                                                  At Dinner


                        She washed the Master's feet
                        With her own tears
                        And dried them with her hair.
                        She kissed his feet,
                        Anointed them with oil.
                        He told her, "Your faith has saved you,
                        Go in peace."
                        Just as this sinner washed his feet
                        He washed the feet of sinners.
                        As above, so below.
                        We are to do this for each other
                        Not to know the other's sins
                        But that the Master died for all.
                        She who could not look upon his face
                        Stayed at his feet.
                        By anointing him
                        She was herself anointed
                        As the water and the precious oil
                        Fell upon her head
                        Bowing low before him.

To You Alone

                                                                To You Alone


                Who are they?
                Those whose faith is known
                To you alone?
                When we pray
                We intercede for everyone
                We recognize as one
                Within the church today
                And for those whose faith is known
                To You alone.
                Are they strangers in a strange land
                Keeping faith under the hand
                Of a godless police state
                Who would have them erased
                For speaking outwardly of their devotion?
                Or is there some other notion
                Of where these sheep are placed?
                I propose
                All believers' faith is known
                To You alone.
          

The Fabric Of Our Lives

The fabric of our lives

Is woven of strands of DNA

Double spirals

Twisted together for strength

And resilience

Like the Emperor's new clothes

Invisible to the naked eye

Determining our destiny.

When first the strands unraveled

I became afraid.

This is its nature

I need not have feared

This is how it replicates

Repairing errors as it goes along

Making stronger what was already strong.

Great news!!!
I have been invited to be a guest on Eldon Taylor's radio program "Provocative Enlightenment" to talk about my book !!!!!!
I am scheduled for August 9th. The program airs on Hay House Radio on Tuesdays at 11:00 AM Pacific, 2:00 PM Eastern time.
I have been a listener of this truly enlightening program for quite some time and would recommend it to any interested seeker. In addition, there is a real-time chat at the time of the program that has become an uplifting community in itself.

The Mouton Coat

Soft and brown like a big mama bear

Was Aunt Lil's mouton coat.

She would wrap me in it with her.

It smelled like camphor from her closet.

Her whole house smelled like that.

She had a clock that ticked loudly

In the living room.

I would sit on the couch

Smell the camphor

Listen to the ticking

As I waited

For her to offer a candy

From the candy dish

A Hershey's kiss.

Heaven is made of big mama bears

Offering Hershey kisses.

                                                         A Walk In The Park


Octagons of stones paved the way
Through the park beyond the carousel.
I carried a new rubber ball
A big one, striped red, white and blue
To bounce along the pavers to the zoo.
We passed a toy stand.
Something caught my eye
A crepe paper bird with a long paper tail
Perched on a stick.
It chirped
If you moved it in the wind.
There was nothing else to do that day
But skip along the path and play.
It was the time before time
When each day was an eternity
A never-ending festival of joy
In discovering I was alive.
I could feel
The summer sun upon my skin
And smell the roasting peanuts in the stalls.
You bought me peanuts to feed to the pigeons
Whose feathers contained all the colors
Of the universe,
Whose little bright eyes
Told secrets of their journeys in the skies.

                                


                                                          Spring

 
                          Spring is coming soon
                          To the second grade classroom
                          We are making hyacinths
                          Out of crepe paper
                           Blue, pink, purple.
                          The papers are wet with
                          Library paste
                          The heavy flowers left to dry
                          On the classroom radiators.
                          Has anyone in the class
                          Ever seen a hyacinth?
                          No, Miss Ryan
                          I don't think so
                          I saw a flower once, but
                          I think it was a tulip.

                                                      Deer Are So Polite

Deer are gathered at a meeting
The first meeting of the spring
In the thawing cornfield.
Little ones are bored
They play and leap while
Adults discuss basic things.
Deer are so polite
No voices are raised
As they calmly chew the herbage
As they sniff the warming air.
Geese are flying overhead
"We're back" they call
To all below.
"We're back" because
The winter is past.
Robins are on the lawn
Picking at the turning worms.

The Seat Of The Soul

A long time ago, a lifetime ago

I began a search for the seat of the soul

I was not alone. My soul guided me.

Observing the open chest, the open skull, the pulsating heart and brain

I was awed by the glorious work of the Creator

But I did not find the seat of the soul.

Elbow deep in viscera. Hands on the beating heart.

Guiding the newborn into the air for the first time.

I searched. My soul stood by silently.

The path is a zig-zag path. The life is the path.

The path is alive, my soul said, look and learn.

Buried in books I searched for the answer.

In prayer, in ritual I searched for the answer.

Working, teaching, singing, touching, healing I searched for meaning.

My soul stood by me and prodded me along the path.

Where in the body is the seat of the soul?

The soul is not in the body, my soul whispered softly, keep searching

When you have found it, you have found it.

A Day In October

                  A Day In October

It was autumn, a shiny day like today
It was not the last day, but the last day I remember you clearly.
We were walking to the Parade Grounds
I had on a new jacket.
My hands, like yours were in the pockets,
Thumbs looped over the edges.
You told me not to do that, that Mommy didn't like it when I did
Things that weren't ladylike.
I took my hands out of the pockets.
I still looked like you.
We walked alike. We had the same gait
A funny half-step, step.
When I would get new shoes with leather soles
I would love to hear that sound on the pavement
Clippety-clop, clippety-clop
I'm a big girl.

Early in the morning at home while I was still in bed

I'd hear you.

Your slippers, clippety-clop in the hall.

I felt safe.

When you died, I could still hear them.

I waited to see you turn the corner, to see

If it was some mistake, that you

Weren't really gone.

Now that I am older than you were

When you died, I catch myself listening

For your footsteps in the hall

But they are my own.

                                              The Odd-Fellows Cemetery

We are a civilized people
We bury our dead
And lay stones upon them
To keep down their heads.

In the sealed apartments
The sleepers move through time
Losing their integrity
And turning into lime.

The angels sit upon the stones
To keep them in their places
Some are very heavy
But some have many graces.

Some have built great monuments
So they may move about
Within hermetic chambers
Which prevent their getting out.

In the sealed apartments
The sleepers move through time
Losing their integrity
And turning into lime.

The earth keeps spinning, silently
We fear the things we cannot see
We try to keep them bound and yet
The tighter they're bound, the freer they get.

                                                        

                                                                  Daydreams


Day dreaming in History
The dullest of classes,
I watch the little gargoyle
Who sits atop the window
Stare down at the avenue below.
It is twilight, five PM
The street is lighted
By store signs and street lamps.
And we are again in Paris,
The gargoyle and I.

                                                Fathers In Heaven

Sunbeams breaking through the clouds
Remind me that I have Fathers in heaven.
When I see that ray of light
I know they both gave me life.
My human father was taken from me
When I was a young child.
So I told my friends my father was in heaven
As theirs were on Earth.
I knew he wasn't underground
Although a plaque with his name
Marked his grave in that spot.
When the sun shines through the clouds
In that special way,
Or the light bounces off the snow
At night to make diamonds
I know their love.
Fathers in heaven.
Fathers of light.

                                                       The Accordion Folder


Daddy Played the accordion
He kept his lunch in an accordion folder.
When his heart got too weak to hold it up
He put the accordion down.
Each day he took the folder to work.
When it started to wear out
He reinforced it with tape
Until he had a tape folder.
In the wide part, he put his thermos
Filled with coffee for the day
Each morning he made the same sandwich
Cream cheese on rye.
When he came home from work
He placed the folder at one end of the couch
So I knew he was back.
The day he died was Labor Day
We came home without him
And put the folder away.

                                                    Let's Pretend

Let's play "Let's Pretend".
The fire escape is a balcony
And I am Juliet.
You are Romeo calling to me
Or, maybe you can sing to me like Tony
In West Side Story.
Poor Tony.
What ever happened to him?
Did he go to prison for murder?
What about Maria?
Did she find another Guy?
One of her own kind?
Where's Leonard Bernstein when you need him?
Did you say he died?
What happened to the years in between
When we grew up and lived our lives?
Is it time to play "Let's Pretend
We had it to do over again"?

For Alex

                                                       Facing Front

        A young man seated  at the piano
        You are looking out at me in a photograph
        It is me looking at me. We never really see
        Ourselves, except in photographs where the
        Mirror's reversal is absent.
        Then we see ourselves as others do.
        You were very young when the picture was taken
        So was the piano. You said you were old
        When you started lessone. Sixteen.
        You'd laugh if you knew I was still taking lessons.
        You do know. You're not laughing.

        I've been looking at this face in the mirror
        For a long time. I know all about it, though reversed.
        All the imperfections, assymetry and
        Funny little mounds and creases it has
        As part of its topography.
        Your older grandson missed a spot
        Shaving one day. He said he had this little
        Place under his lower lip
        The razor couldn't negotiate.
        I told him I, too shared that place
        Although I didn't shave my face.

   


                                Memories

Memories well up like the bubbles
On the bottom of a pot of water
That is just about to boil.
They rise up to the surface
And pop
As they release a moment
From the deep recesses of mind.
Sometimes it is a picture
A sound,
A smell,
An emotion.
One word alone may release one
Recalling when that word first was
Understood.
A crossword puzzle can start a rolling boil
Suitable for cooking pasta.
When each bubble breaks
Another memory escapes
Until the pot is empty
And the memories are in the world.

                At The Gate

Standing at the gate of the Kingdom Water Park
Somber people wait on line for admission.
Inside, the little children frolic and play
In the light of never-ending day.

The children have cast off their garments
Stomping them under their feet
Jumping and dancing and singing they dive
Into pools of water that is alive.

"Unless you become as one of these",
Points the gatekeeper to the children
"You cannot enter the Kingdom Water Park."
He counsels the people in the dark.

          The Science Lesson

The earth revolves around the sun in one year.
The earth makes one revolution on its axis in one day.

We are spinning, spinning
Each day the dancers turn
Around the imaginary maypole
Bow and face the sun
Bow and turn away.
The planets and their orbiters
Spinning, turning, dancing
As they make their yearly tours.
The sun stands solidly motionless
Sending benevolent rays of light
To all her solar system children
Watching the dances of seasons, days and years.
Each day artists paint it
Writers write it
Singers sing it
We measure our days
Sunrise to sunset to sunrise.
The sun doesn't rise
It is we who are spinning.
It is we who rise to greet her.

A poem from Pescha through Sarah
Pescha insists that the original title is maintained.

The Ocean Is Our Mother

The ocean is our source
From her we gain our lives
We carry her in our bodies
In the blood's pulsating force.

The unborn child is confined
By the oceanic fluid
Safe within the holder
Evolution has designed.

Take me to the seashore now
To smell her salty scent
To hear her peaceful song
To watch her ebb and flow.

In this landlocked location
I miss my mother's voice
Her soothing, rhythmic lullaby
Her tidal variation.

And yet she can be violent
You say, I've seen a storm
Over the ocean, it was fierce
And virulent.

The ocean is our mother
A woman like myself
She longs for peace eternally
She responds to the wishes of others.

The ocean doesn't cause the tempest
She doesn't make the tides
She is a fluid entity
That would remain at rest.

Except when eager fluctuations
Of gravity and winds
And shifting masses of the earth
Disturb her placid contemplations.

An image and a poem from my childhood

                           Blue Tango


Slipping away under the boardwalk
Away from the burning white sand
I found a patch of twilight
Lit by stripes of sun that leaked
Between the boards above
And by a blue neon light.

A radio was blaring a haunting tune
From behind the neon sign.
The bar was open
I could smell the beer
Mixed with the salt in the air.

Slipping away, I found
A patch of twilight
An adult world of mystery
That re-assembles whenever I hear
Blue Tango

A Poem about Pescha, Leah and Sarah

For those who have read the book, I thought you might enjoy  a photograph of Pescha and Leah taken on their front stoop in the early 1930's.
Here, too is a poem (which didn't make it into the book ) which predates the prose and directed it:

Patterns

A box arrived one day with things you made
An embroidered tablecloth, some dresser scarves, a bedspread.
The bedspread was part of your trousseau
Crocheted in filet with strange birds in the design.
Later on, I learned there were such birds in the forests
In Europe where you lived as a girl.
Packed within the needlework were photographs
Of that girl. A girl who looked just like me
A girl, who, like myself sewed her own clothes.
Making her own designs was her artistic expression.

I remember seeing you only once in the nursing home
Mother thought you would frighten me, being old and ill
But when you held me, I felt a certain kinship and kindness.
I was scarcely two years old when you died.
Years passed, I grew up. Your son, my father, died
Your daughter grew old and sent those things to me.
I set the photographs on a table and when my children came in
They asked, "When did you dress up in those old clothes
To take those pictures?"

There are some patterns that transcend time
My needlework and yours are one.
Although I never knew you, we had parallel lives.
It's in the genes, they say, the way
I like to lay out the colored threads and plan a pattern
The way the stitches are even on the backside of the cloth
The way we rip it out and redo it until it is perfect
Because only we know there is one wrong stitch.
The way we bury the knots and break the threads
The way our girlhood dreams were buried and broken
By the realities of life.
The way we learned to accept
Even to delight in
Things that aren't perfect.