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Repetitive, slow single bangs from a place behind, across the small concrete waterway, that delivers rain and runoff down land. As chopping wood? The refrain of roosters seamlessly fused with the pastel light. Memory of a word, perhaps useless here, equiprimordial. I still shape it into a whisper.
Sometimes the scent of a pale peach rose is the cool feeling on your cheek of the breeze blowing from the west through the rice fields in central Bali that might bring more rain tomorrow but has cleared away the rain from yesterday.
Intensification and a crushing-in by sound that triggers claustrophobia. Awake in dark. Loudness outside everywhere pressing in on our small room. An image comes, half-speculation, of rushing rising from below, lifting up this piece of earth. Anxiety of infinitude. How (could it not be empty yet)? Where (is it all coming) from? The sheer scale of element overwhelms the primate calculation. Ocean, immense. A spare fraction of her being is enough to wash us (and drowned dreaming) all away.
(Stop thinking about anything else, stop writing, cover eyes, and become fish.)
Finally, all are home. Precipitation never stopped. Heavy mood of endless rain, (which oddly doesn’t appear on any radar map), shadowless medium fades to thickened black. Cloaked under cloud, enshrouded by water, all but forgotten by the outside world. The relief of becoming profoundly inaccessible.
Morning of puddles, drips, gurgles, the persistent lap and blur of water on glass, glossy leaves nodding under plonks of rain, tucking in noses and toes to keep warm and dry. Homecomings expected, green shadows, grey shining, detached from specifics of time, but waiting. Sunlight without direction.
Sound of rain, to look up, and admit that morning’s reverie is over. The incense of an offering, long since out. The fact of having eaten, (or an empty plate, sitting there), without clear memory of it. A heavy sigh as day changes position, rolling over into evening, and shifting atmosphere blows trees into an ocean, cooling. Jeki appears, we choose an herb responsive to the coming dark. Feed her and strike a flame. Turn it into smoke, inhale a little nighttime air, and go to bed, quite early.
That was a little witchy, wasn’t it.
I guess I live now in a world of rain. Always about to rain, and sometimes does, and if I wash dishes, my face beads with moisture, from me or from the damp air, pores open, passable, sensitive, vulnurable, and everything must be said in a whisper, as at a funeral. Borderless, spherical. Thoughts too cutting for snails and frogs, who would breathe them in like blades, must be shared without syllables. With touch, immediate, tears tasted by skin, and that this world could dissolve in compassion.
Easy gloom, gentle periods of rain, and barely a transition from sleep. Or at all. Water, earth, air, at an even temperature. The wet doesn’t dry, the dry doesn’t wash away. Coffee blends into a universal container, as the dream becomes lucid, and atmosphere moderates a few simple questions.
Learning to discern between hunger that’s sick and hunger that’s healthy. (Patho-logical and… logical? auto-logical? dia-logical?) In cat care, self-care, care in general. Observing, treating for, recovering from, parasites. (Overshoot, and the ana-logical.) Swallowing bitter herbs.
Unusual calm this morning, absence of demand. (Explained later by the fact, which I missed, I was sleeping, that somebody else took care of jobs that are usually mine.) A shadow of floating, displaced fear, and a choice, to let the intimacy of sensation remind me that we are (here, and not un)real.
A day spent adjusting between conflicted places and moods. Driving through Denpasar in Sweet Orange, windows down, concrete heat. Hair stuck to my cheeks, impossible to clear. Music from a younger country, (pie), dobro and whiskey, as the sun goes down and the city takes shape, interiors lit, full of smartphone advertisements, food stalls, diesel fumes, cartoon boba shops. A moment of lightness (under bright lights) in a foreign space. Dealing out as needed, the inside occupied by questions of boundaries and the effort it takes to let something go. Nothing quite settles until we get home, (it’s not home yet), wash feet, splash face, new toothpaste the scent of orange and cloves. Head on pillow. Ish, asleep. Lalah, playing, on top of the armoire. Waiting for E., and the closeness of warm skin, and for all of these things to slow to a stop.
Anger in writing becomes virulent. It never tires and lacks feeling for when to stop. Rage without responsibility does damage unmeasured, unintended, uncontrolled. You (we) know better than these written words. Friends, take care. Turning untempered anger into writing is making the material of war.
So cloudy this morning that the air gets darker as the sun rises. Everything outside is dripping wet, water-heavy, steamy muffle. Good for frogs, orchids, snails, mushrooms, mold… sleepy farmers. A touch cool, perfect flannel shirt weather, the monsoon holds, the atmosphere keeps wringing out rain.
Leftover notes from yesterday, recorded with morning coffee today. //
We met a guardian of the path at Ranu Pane, sitting on his sleeping mat, with a fire to keep his toes warm. And his bag of snacks, a jolly fellow. Stopped for a chat about mutual friends, traditional farming methods, and the corrosive effects of tourism. Always, what a small world it is, around here. //
The scent of woodsmoke in the mountains, memories of that. //
E. and I got a lot of weird looks from local tourists yesterday, this isn’t typical. Not sure why. People see me, assume E. is foreign too. Stare, heckle us, snap pictures with their phones. //
We saw at least two motorbike accidents on the mountain roads yesterday. Both women, one looked like she was fine, the other one looked very bad, she had blood running down her face, appeared pale and grey. Many had already stopped to help, so we drove on… //
A transport truck couldn’t make it up one of the inclines, it was overloaded with potatoes. “Boss goblok,” said E., who jumped out and helped push it to the next pull-over point. //
The high-altitude villages around Lumajang, which primarily grow green onions, smell like green onions. You catch whiffs of it as you drive through. //
I have clearer photos of the lutung but those feel private. //
I also have pictures of Gunung Batok, will probably share later. //
I have to relearn how to use “the good camera”, another reason it’s ok we didn’t see Bromo yesterday, my camera skills are not (yet?) worthy. //
I forgot my carnelian stone at home, I realized. //
Always, a beginner, again. //
Delayed departures and I notice Bali before leaving, or rather Balis, there being so many. The cocks crow from before sunrise and a pack of dogs barks at a passing presence, feral guardians of night. The scent of cooking rice mixed with floral incense smoke, women’s work, through sunrise. Mourning doves and frogs and tiny finches chirp their ambient language. Traffic heaves a periodic sigh, as on every workday, hordes of red-burnt tourists, the punctuated exchange of horns, brakes squealing, and fragments of conversation picked up from hidden alleyways. Giggling, crying. Colors run more saturated under heavy skies, overwhelming sight, and people walk uncovered, as if open to the sun. Plastics mixed with faded floral offerings crowd the gutters below their feet.
So open you might be fooled into believing she’s honest, a reputation ardently if sloppily maintained. Her government is tangled and obscure, embroidered with extra-judicial bureaucracies, her pathways impossible to navigate by compass, unmapped, and obstacles send you looping back in wild directions. You are the ant and someone toys with you. The more you try to cross, the farther from the source you go. So cloven is the island into slivers and pieces by rivers, ravines, and lava flows.
A silent goodbye to something here, pale jepun blossoms wreathed in green, or barren branches in their ever-staggered cycles, and black grass-roofed temples that house Barong. An extra moment granted to a stranger, the balance of the otherwise unknown.
Tomorrow, as begins a new lunar year.
Bismillah Hir Rahman Nir Rahim.
May our homes and our passages between homes be blessed. 🌘🌑🌒
Must be a snake nest in the garden because the cats have caught three babies so far. Small, brown, narrow heads, E says not dangerous but how they rear their heads and face you off… Then I had a dream some deity, reflected shimmering gold and black, commanded I build it a temple. It was terrifying.