!

! No Regrets Journal

!

! ! Summer 2011 ! ! Issue 6

! ! No Regrets Journal! ! www.noregretsjournal.com! ! claymedeiros@aol.com

!

! No Regrets Journal

!

! ! Summer 2011 ! ! Issue 6

!! No Regrets

! No Regrets is a journal of poetry, ! prosing, images about the twists and! turns in being human and the search ! for love, meaning and community.

! Editor

! Clayton Medeiros is a poet and collage! artist. ! Neil McKay (Johnny Trash) is technical ! consultant to the web site

! Submissions

! Submissions are by invitation of the Editor!! Copyright August 2011

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! Marie Artemis Bernadette Carignan Outwater, 89 ! a vivacious and generous spirit in the world, died ! July 22, 2011 in New Bedford, Massachusetts ! where we were both born. An artist, a lover of ! ! life and my mother. I will miss her.

All poems and prose in this issue! are by Clayton Medeiros and ! dedicated to my mother.

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The Carignan Sisters

I love the women from my childhood, my mother, favorite aunts. I can still hear my Aunt Charlotteʼs uproarious laugh cascade out of her kitchen, my motherʼs laugh not far behind. They would sit at the small, rectangular, oil cloth covered table having before dinner or after dinner drinks. Charlotte in one of her frumpy flowered dresses, indistinguishable from her night gowns, matching the yellow flowers of the equally well used oil cloth. My motherʼs seamstress skills celebrating her lanky elegance.

At funerals and holidays, my Aunt Franʼs raucous chortle would join the cacophony of stories punctuated by shrieks of cheery laughter from the Carignan sisters as they cracked up over some story from their childhood or mine. I can see them now sitting in those worn kitchen chairs in that kitchen so often filled with the buttery smell of baked fish and clam chowder.

Kitchens were at the heart of this family filled with great cooks. There was no such thing as a bad meal at home or visiting relatives. We lived with my Aunt Fran and her husband, Eddie Lubera. My mother worked, Aunt Fran was at home. Most days when I came home from school, there would be fresh baked cookies, often chocolate chip with lots of walnuts or brownies with lots of walnuts or some new experiment of Franʼs as she pushed out from our working class neighborhood to other cuisines.

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My transcendental nature knows that we continue in this universe after we die, but I have no insight as to what that means. Nonetheless, I believe my favorite women from boyhood, the Carignan sisters, are all once again together, chortling and keeping an eye on their favorite son and nephew.

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Hands in the gardenAccompany my heart songYellow crocuses

Spring flowered gardenGetting along without meA new weed puller

The gulls come at lastFloat by old mill windowsPreserved for my stay

My transcendental nature knows that we continue in this universe after we die, but I have no insight as to what that means. Nonetheless, I believe my favorite women from boyhood, the Carignan sisters, are all once again together, chortling and keeping an eye on their favorite son and nephew.

Artistʼs Hands

Hands that once held the artistʼs brushCannot bring the fork to her mouthSo I feed my mother her dinnerMashed potatoes ground beefCarrots catch her painterʼs eyeI ask her what she wants nextShe diligently works a hand across the tableTrying mightily to reach the plate as I Place the bread between fingers and thumbSo she can carefully chew the edges

Useless legs so used to beachesAccompanied by neighborhood dogsWho one by one joined her walksTo the bay on humid August daysOr any other day for that matterIn search of an Atlantic breezeOne by one they went homeOn the return to the cottage whereAunt Charlotte was dying from Too much smoke and too much alcoholAnd too much time with a mean man

Now Bernadetteʼs wistful blue eyesSearch for flowers and birds In the nursing home hallwaysWhere there is no one who wearsColorful crocheted slippers or uses hot padsThat will outlive her in neighbors homes

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! !! ! Box cover by Bernadette Outwater

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! !

! ! !

Waves on Horseneck BeachRemember family picnicsWindblown girlish hair

County Street gablesFor lovers of hide and seekKept sister’s secrets

The last CarignanForgotten and forgetfulTide bound sandcastles

! !! ! Box cover by Bernadette Outwater

Bernie in Assisted Living

Full circle at eighty eightBack to New Bedford toWhalerʼs Cove assisted livingFor Bernadette CarignanBorn in gabled eleganceOn County Street

Considers herself an orphanAfter burying her siblingsOne after anotherOver the yearsHer trembling handsArthritic and bent after

Years of crochet hooksKnitting needlesA seamstress delicacyThe decorative brush ofHer artistʼs infallible eyeFalls in love with clouds

Cumulous and cirrusCamels and leviathansOutside her high windowsLooking west to sunsetHer favorite noisy gullsFloat in blues and grays

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County Street, New Bedford

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! Always Light

! Dozing waking dozing waking! In the always obscure room! Never familiar for eye or ear

! Dozing waking dozing waking! In this unknown season ! With no garden certainty

! Dozing waking dozing waking! With these strange voices! Among unseen busy footsteps

! Dozing waking dozing waking! In the always light! Confusing night and day

!

County Street, New Bedford

Eighty Nine

My mother is eighty nineCovered by one of her many afghansCrotched with purples and pinksShe looks up from the bed and says“I need to be doing, I need a job.”

She has always made and doneMy prize winning halloween outfitsHer handiwork and art freely givenTo friends and cantankerous relativesAnd anyone else who came along

Her hands no longer obey the eyesThat still see possibility everywhereFor the overflowing boxes and basketsFilled with multicolored yarns and fabricsFodder for her seamstress fingers

The steady click of crochet hooksTurning out colorful pot holders

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Pot holder by Bernadette Outwater

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Aunt Charlotte

We used to vacation with my Aunt Charlotte in Fairhaven, Massachusetts. We would stay for a week or so, sharing the second floor of a building that housed the small grocery store that she and her husband, Poolie Wlodyka, ran. It served the neighborhood and fisherman. Fairhaven Center was lovely with old elm trees, brick walks, a drugstore with hot fudge sundaes, fishing boats coming and going from nearby wharves, MacArthur, a 25 year old German Shepherd, who made his rounds for snacks midmorning and once, a hurricane that took the roof off the church across the street. I watched from the second floor as it rose and fell, then blew off and flew down the street over the electric wires sparking among tangled trees and limbs.

When it was over, my mother let me go out and take pictures. They make up the greater part of my childhood photo album.

! ! Pot holder by Bernadette Outwater

Mom and Movies

On some Saturdays we would take the trolley and go to the movies. Snow White and Fantasia rise in my mind and popcorn with real butter on it and fountain cokes, vanilla if you were lucky. The Night on Bald Mountain was quite frightening and I had dreams about it.

We would walk from the little Cape Cod house where Uncle Eddie had finished the upstairs so we could have our own space.

I see my tall, slender, almost always smiling mother looking down at five year old me, listening carefully to whatever I had to say.

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Bernie’s Sisters

Bernadette, Charlotte and FrancisChortling sisters once againFrom where ever one goes from this lifeRaucous laughter flows across the roomAcross clam bake picnic tablesAcross dinning table chowder bowlsAs they once again tell the story Of everyone but five year old meSitting in the kitchen over coffeeAs I happily tossed down leftover drinksIn the living room laughing into the kitchenAnd very soon asleep on the rugMother’s only son and favored nephewOf childless aunts who took us inAfter she kicked my father out

Gulls for Bernie

Morning wake up callSquawkers and screechersDreamers against the nightA renovated school roof perchHome to ever watchful gullsKeening in the airy sun riseEager seekers of possibility My motherʼs favorite creaturesOther than anything small and furrySailing on wind blown memoriesOf Cape Codʼs ocean beachesHer brotherʼs ever watchful eyesAlert to New Bedfordʼs denizensOn the look out for innocenceEighty eight in a nursing home bedDreams of childhood picnics

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! Box cover by Bernadette Outwater

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Bird Song for Bernie

Outside nursing home windowsBeyond the closed doorsOrioles flash and singFor my unhearing motherSlumped in sheepskin beddingDreaming thin spring greensApril’s not quite leavesImpressionist yellowsFilter robin red breast tunesWhen the edge of sunriseBegins the day or sunset ends it

!

Box cover by Bernadette Outwater

!

! The Last Carignan Girl

! The last of the Carignan girls! Spread the ashes of her ! Older sisters over twenty years,! Called me after her brotherʼs death,! “I feel like an orphan,” she said,! After burying him with his two wives.! He lived to be 96 only because! She was there to cook and clean! And care for his failing body.! This parsimonious New Englander,! Unwilling to leave house and garden,! Trying for a hospice care record.! She too did not want him to go,! She knew it was more than a life.

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Box cover by Bernadette Outwater

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!

! The Last Carignan Girl

! The last of the Carignan girls! Spread the ashes of her ! Older sisters over twenty years,! Called me after her brother’s death,! “I feel like an orphan,” she said,! After burying him with his two wives.! He lived to be 96 only because! She was there to cook and clean! And care for his failing body.! This parsimonious New Englander,! Unwilling to leave house and garden,! Trying for a hospice care record.! She too did not want him to go,! She knew it was more than a life.

! ! Box cover by Bernadette Outwater

Bird Song for Bernie

Outside nursing home windowsBeyond the closed doorsOrioles flash and singFor my unhearing motherSlumped in sheepskin beddingDreaming thin spring greensAprilʼs not quite leavesImpressionist yellowsFilter robin red breast tunesWhen the edge of sunriseBegins the day or sunset ends it

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! !! !

! !! ! Bernieʼs Way

! ! Bent and almost used up! ! After eighty eight summers! ! When I was six! ! I wanted to marry her! ! The five foot ten! ! Ex jitterbugger! ! Who liked to laugh! ! But never got free from! ! Dropping out of high school! ! Marrying the wrong man! ! For every wrong reason! ! But forgives him now! ! Her face brightens ! ! When there is swing music! ! Even now she likes jazz! ! If its not too raucous! ! Would dance if she could! ! Across assisted living floors! ! Out into the moonlight! ! To meet her beloved Edwin

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Bernieʼs Sisters

Bernadette, Charlotte and FrancisChortling sisters once againFrom where ever one goes from this lifeRaucous laughter flows across the roomAcross clam bake picnic tablesAcross dinning table chowder bowlsAs they once again tell the story Of everyone but five year old meSitting in the kitchen over coffeeAs I happily tossed down leftover drinksIn the living room laughing into the kitchenAnd very soon asleep on the rugMotherʼs only son and favored nephewOf childless aunts who took us inAfter she kicked my father out

20

! ! Pot holder by Bernadette Outwater

21

Mom and Movies

On some Saturdays we would take the trolley and go to the movies. Snow White and Fantasia rise in my mind and popcorn with real butter on it and fountain cokes, vanilla if you were lucky. The Night on Bald Mountain was quite frightening and I had dreams about it.

We would walk from the little Cape Cod house where Uncle Eddie had finished the upstairs so we could have our own space.

I see my tall, slender, almost always smiling mother looking down at five year old me, listening carefully to whatever I had to say.

! ! Pot holder by Bernadette Outwater

Aunt Charlotte

We used to vacation with my Aunt Charlotte in Fairhaven, Massachusetts. We would stay for a week or so, sharing the second floor of a building that housed the small grocery store that she and her husband, Poolie Wlodyka, ran. It served the neighborhood and fishermen. Fairhaven Center was lovely with old elm trees, brick walks, a drugstore with hot fudge sundaes, fishing boats coming and going from nearby wharves, MacArthur, a 25 year old German Shepherd, who made his rounds for snacks midmorning and once, a hurricane that took the roof off the church across the street. I watched from the second floor as it rose and fell, then blew off and flew down the street over the electric wires sparking among tangled trees and limbs.

When it was over, my mother let me go out and take pictures. They make up the greater part of my childhood photo album.

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Box top by Bernadette Outwater

23

Eighty Nine

My mother is eighty nineCovered by one of her many afghansCrotched with purples and pinksShe looks up from the bed and says“I need to be doing, I need a job.”

She has always made and doneMy prize winning halloween outfitsHer handiwork and art freely givenTo friends and cantankerous relativesAnd anyone else who came along

Her hands no longer obey the eyesThat still see possibility everywhereFor the overflowing boxes and basketsFilled with multicolored yarns and fabricsFodder for her seamstress fingers

The steady click of crochet hooksTurning out colorful pot holders

! ! Box top by Bernadette Outwater

! Always Light

! Dozing waking dozing waking! In the always obscure room! Never familiar for eye or ear

! Dozing waking dozing waking! In this unknown season ! With no garden certainty

! Dozing waking dozing waking! With these strange voices! Among unseen busy footsteps

! Dozing waking dozing waking! In the always light! Confusing night and day

24

25

Bernie in Assisted Living

Full circle at eighty eightBack to New Bedford toWhaler’s Cove assisted livingFor Bernadette CarignanBorn in gabled eleganceOn County Street

Considers herself an orphanAfter burying her siblingsOne after anotherOver the yearsHer trembling handsArthritic and bent after

Years of crochet hooksKnitting needlesA seamstress delicacyThe decorative brush ofHer artist’s infallible eyeFalls in love with clouds

Cumulous and cirrusCamels and leviathansOutside her high windowsLooking west to sunsetHer favorite noisy gullsFloat in blues and grays

! !

! ! !

Waves on Horseneck BeachRemember family picnicsWindblown girlish hair

County Street gablesFor lovers of hide and seekKept sisterʼs secrets

The last CarignanForgotten and forgetfulTide bound sandcastles

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! !

! ! !! ! ! I am the aging ! ! ! Emerging in skin and bone! ! ! But Oh! the sunset

! ! !

! ! !! ! !! ! ! Who called me today! ! ! Remembrance escapes my mind! ! ! Echoing voices

! ! ! I can see the past! ! ! Clarity of purposes! ! ! Lost in dark confusion

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Hands in the gardenAccompany my heart songYellow crocuses

Spring flowered gardenGetting along without meA new weed puller

The gulls come at lastFloat by old mill windowsPreserved for my stay

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Infallible eye! ! ! In clouds of descending blue! ! ! Sees whales and camels

! ! !

! ! !

! ! ! Palsied hands reach out! ! ! Hopeful of form and color! ! ! Touch the brushes tip ! !

! ! !

! ! ! Everyone has gone! ! ! I stay with sky sun and moon! ! ! Careful artistʼs eye

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New worlds everydayMemoryʼs confused storiesMerge with night time dreams

The dead do not dreamCome to remind againSummer window rain

Mourning my motherEvery day she disappearsYet she is still here

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!

!! No Regrets

! No Regrets is a journal of poetry, ! prosing, images about the twists and! turns in being human and the search ! for love, meaning and community.

! Editor

! Clayton Medeiros is a poet and collage! artist. ! Neil McKay (Johnny Trash) is technical ! consultant to the web site

! Submissions

! Submissions are by invitation of the Editor!! Copyright August 2011

! ! No Regrets Journal! ! www.noregretsjournal.com! ! claymedeiros@aol.com

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