This Side Or That?

“Suicide is, after all, the opposite of the poem.”   
  ~ Anne Sexton ~

“All I wanted was a little piece of life, to be married, to have children.... I was trying my damnedest to lead a conventional life, for that was how I was brought up, and it was what my husband wanted of me. But one can't build little white picket fences to keep the nightmares out.”   
      ~ Anne Sexton ~

“I am alone here in my own mind.
There is no map
and there is no road.
It is one of a kind
just as yours is.”   
      ~ Anne Sexton ~

“Anne, I don't want to live. . . . Now listen, life is lovely, but I Can't Live It. I can't even explain. I know how silly it sounds . . . but if you knew how it Felt. To be alive, yes, alive, but not be able to live it. Ay that's the rub. I am like a stone that lives . . . locked outside of all that's real. . . . Anne, do you know of such things, can you hear???? I wish, or think I wish, that I were dying of something for then I could be brave, but to be not dying, and yet . . . and yet to [be] behind a wall, watching everyone fit in where I can't, to talk behind a gray foggy wall, to live but to not reach or to reach wrong . . . to do it all wrong . . . believe me, (can you?) . . . what's wrong. I want to belong. I'm like a jew who ends up in the wrong country. I'm not a part. I'm not a member. I'm frozen.”   
       ~ Anne Sexton, Anne Sexton: A Self-Portrait in Letters ~

Yesterday, my daughter shared with me the results of a project she did for her Freshman English class.  It was one of the few "A's" given and it was a beautiful tribute/biography on the life of Anne Sexton, a Pulitzer Prize winning poet who tragically committed suicide in 1974.  I was a bit concerned, at first, by her choice of subjects, but she assured me her choice was about Ms. Sexton's style, not her suicidal tendencies. 

After looking over the project, complete with analysis of various stanzas from Anne Sexton's work, I couldn't wait to read some of her writing for myself.  Admittedly, much of it is dark stuff.  But I also found much of it to be extremely raw, honest, and captivating.  This was a woman who, despite her success and talent, struggled her entire life with depression.  Her work reflected her struggle.  In fact, writing was actually prescribed to her by a psychiatrist as a way to deal with her depression.  I guess in the end that didn't work.  I wonder if anything would have.

More recently, Don Cornelius, visionary and founder of the famous program Soul Train, was found dead in his home, the victim of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head.  After years of success in the entertainment industry, paving the way for a huge number of black entertainers, at 75 Don Cornelius decided enough was enough.  Enough of what?

According to one source, there were 34,598 suicidal deaths in 2007 making it the 10th leading cause of death in America.  It accounted for just over 11 deaths per 100,000 people and there were 11 ATTEMPTS for every "successful" death.  Staggering.  But it still begs the question, "Why?"  You can read all the risk factors for yourself, but in the end the answer to that question is, "We don't really know."

Since I was a young child, I've been fascinated with mortality.  Perhaps that fuels my passion for old cemetaries.  Who are we?  Why are we here?  Where did we come from?  Where do we go?  Is this all there is?  What....is.....NEXT?  Religion, both ancient and modern have been trying to supply us with answers to those questions since the beginning of time.  None of the explanations have ever been adequate for me.  The truth is, unless you've been there AND back, you just don't know.  NOBODY knows.  It's all just an educated guess.  (Or uneducated.  Take your pick.) 

So why do people like Anne Sexton and Don Cornelius (and thousands upon thousands of others without names or faces) decide to end their life on earth?  Is it a decision or is it simply the end to a long illness, void of any choice?  What brings a person to the point where WHATEVER it is on the other side has to be better than what's on THIS side?  What makes the unknown more attractive than the known?  I've often wondered whether people that get to this point just don't get "it" or if by some odd chance, they're the only one's that do. 

I know this.  Anne Sexton and Don Cornelius were both enormous talents, yet that wasn't enough. What is?  Anne couldn't silence the words in her head that wouldn't come out.  Every one and every thing is interconnected.  It's a universal law.  So what makes each path so unique?  I guess we won't know until we're on the other side.  Anne Sexton's work spoke to me in ways no poet has for a very, very long time.  I'll leave you with couple of her poems.  RIP Anne Sexton and Don Cornelius.  You were enough.  You're still enough.  We believe in you.

 

WORDS, by Anne Sexton

Be careful of words,
even the miraculous ones.
For the miraculous we do our best,
sometimes they swarm like insects
and leave not a sting but a kiss.
They can be as good as fingers.
They can be as trusty as the rock
you stick your bottom on.
But they can be both daisies and bruises.
Yet I am in love with words.
They are doves falling out of the ceiling.
They are six holy oranges sitting in my lap.
They are the trees, the legs of summer,
and the sun, its passionate face.
Yet often they fail me.
I have so much I want to say, so many stories, images, proverbs, etc.
But the words aren't good enough,
the wrong ones kiss me.
Sometimes I fly like an eagle
but with the wings of a wren.
But I try to take care
and be gentle to them.
Words and eggs must be handled with care.
Once broken they are impossible
things to repair.

  



Admonitions to a Special Person, by Anne Sexton

Watch out for power,
for its avalanche can bury you,
snow, snow, snow, smothering your mountain.

Watch out for hate,
it can open its mouth and you’ll fling yourself out
to eat off your leg, an instant leper.

Watch out for friends,
because when you betray them,
as you will,
they will bury their heads in the toilet
and flush themselves away.

Watch out for intellect,
because it knows so much it knows nothing
and leaves you hanging upside down,
mouthing knowledge as your heart
falls out of your mouth.

Watch out for games, the actor’s part,
the speech planned, known, given,
for they will give you away
and you will stand like a naked little boy,
pissing on your own child-bed.

Watch out for love
(unless it is true,
and every part of you says yes including the toes),
it will wrap you up like a mummy,
and your scream won’t be heard
and none of your running will end.

Love? Be it man. Be it woman.
It must be a wave you want to glide in on,
give your body to it, give your laugh to it,
give, when the gravelly sand takes you,
your tears to the land. To love another is something
like prayer and can’t be planned, you just fall
into its arms because your belief undoes your disbelief.

Special person,
if I were you I’d pay no attention
to admonitions from me,
made somewhat out of your words
and somewhat out of mine.
A collaboration.
I do not believe a word I have said,
except some, except I think of you like a young tree
with pasted-on leaves and know you’ll root
and the real green thing will come.
Let go. Let go.
Oh special person,
possible leaves,
this typewriter likes you on the way to them,
but wants to break crystal glasses
in celebration,
for you,
when the dark crust is thrown off
and you float all around
like a happened balloon.