Anything that has birth must have death.
The Spirit is not born but given to one at birth
And it is Wakan, holy.
Therefore one's Spirit will never die.





Sun 7.11


In the steam room we call Manhattan, I sit at this desk in a semi comatose state. This brought on by the unending drone of the AC and/or the fans about the apartment. I don't like an air conditioned atmosphere, so it is always my last resort choice. Both front and back doors are open, the AC is running, but only its fan, and I have a small fan pointed at my back 10 feet from me. For the bedroom, I've hooked up one of those big square fans to the top of the door, and I have another small one for specific uses.

I don't like heat, that is, my body does not like heat. I become a zombie, drained of energy, dragging myself along, as I keep obsessing, When does it end, when is the rain coming? This is hell, isn't it? Never ending burning in the fires of hell? Growing up with nuns at the convent, I know something about hell. They loved to describe the horrors that awaited us if we did not mend our ways. One girl among us, we were 120, was scratching messages on the toilet stalls. Who was the culprit? Sister Stanislaus cast a beady eye on the lot of us, one by one. Who did it?

Whoever it was, and I must say my heart goes out to such a deliciously rebellious girl, did not own up to her creations. Thus began our seminar on hell. Every night Sister Slaus abetted by her cohort, the unpleasant Sister Ione would describe what happens when a person is sent to hell, the endless torture and pain, the misery. This scheme of theirs backfired because they didn't take into consideration that we are all sinners, and these kids, without guilt of defacing the bathroom walls, nevertheless were doing other things that Catholicism deems sinful. They would wake up in the middle of the night screaming from nightmares. This went on for weeks after the seminar was stopped.

She was never exposed.

Can you imagine that girl being hammered every night, along with the rest of us, about the damnation that would befall her if she didn't own up to what she did? I'm sure she was scared, trying to look normal, not wanting to attract attention on herself. Yet a part of her had to be proud of her act, especially as days rolled on and she was not caught. Nobody had ever done such a thing; it was an insult to God himself to whom this convent was dedicated.

And also the act of writing, speaking her mind, putting it down for her world to see. What did she say, I wonder? Not fuck you, I'm sure of that. A cry, a call for help, for deliverance, the infamous, Going Home mantra that we all repeated, or a defiant middle finger raised to the world? It undoubtedly saved her, allowed her a private world as valid as the one she physically inhabited. She had a secret. She would tell it in her own good time, shout it to the rooftops. Her message? I am.

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Current favorite this past month has been Circles & Squares