Letter to Ira Rosenstein

Dear Ira,

Dear friend of a friend

So you ask me if I love life? This is to ask if I also know death—the flip side of the coin. You speak of being held at gunpoint, & question where that passion comes from—if I’d ever had a similar experience because I live in a rural area.

This morning my uncle died, in less than 48 hours I leave for Russia for an unspecified amount of time, and I thought because my uncle tried to sell my grandmother’s house and land out from under her without her permission “for her own good” because I was growing up too wild and untamed (unfit for society’s restrictions) and he made her cry, bullying her with his first-born male energy—that I was somehow exempt from grief.

A son is a form of God in an Irish (or Jewish) family. My grandmother was a strong woman, stronger than most people of any/either sex and I inherited some of that strength and passion—what comes with the territory is the white-hot rage and anger—another socially unacceptable trait. 

I attacked my uncle, a 12-year-old who wanted him dead, and so now he is dead, and I’m surprised to find myself depressed, in a fog, suffering from grief—because I discovered that blood is thicker than intellect or emotion—no matter how disfunctional the family. 

I remember his wife washing my mouth out with soap and sending me to the bedroom for some minor infraction—she was unaware of the deeper mine of wrath and anger below the volatile surface. She labeled me as “child” but perhaps like Athena, I was born fully formed from my grandmother’s brow.

Do not assume that because we grew up in different circumstances that I led a ‘sheltered‘ life; it’s not that cut and dry. 

Growing up rural is a strength that has allowed me refuge from the traumas that followed my family. I’ve faced death both in a global and a personal context. 

No, I have never been held at gunpoint, other than at a roadblock deep in the Guatamalan jungle—with no witnesses. We were lucky and escaped with our lives. 

No, I have never been held at gunpoint, but I watched the campesino sleep with studied indifference as the soldiers practiced kickboxing with uzis slung over their shoulders (a sweet US/Israeli deal—arm the army). 

The other side uses AK-47s. I’ve seen both. 

And in Peru, we came upon the body of the lawyer dumped in front of the Chorillos tunnel in Lima—his crime, a good lawyer for the other side. 

No I cannot shake the larger images of war from my mind, it wasn’t my own life I was worried about, but the perpetual genocides committed by both factions in the name of liberty—for whom? 

The passion is genetic. I am the grand-daughter of a revolutionary. My (IRA) grandfather, while working for the city jail, shipped suitcases of guns from San Francisco to New York to Ireland during the Rebellion, and knew Parnell and Liam Mellows first-hand. 

And was there when India struggled for independence—anything to be on the side opposing the English. When Indians weren’t considered human, not allowed to own land, he sponsored them, bought land under his name for them. 

Recently I came across the engraved invitation from the Indian Consulate dated 1945, inviting my family to the Independence celebration in San Francisco. Another letter from Seamus (James) Mooney, the famous longshoreman and political prisoner of the ‘30s who killed someone during a union riot (I was surprised to hear a lawyer, speaking of ethics, refer back to the Mooney case). 

My grandfather took the city on, suing them and winning (he was his own lawyer) when they discriminated against him, firing him to give his job to someone else. It's down in the lawbooks as a landmark case. Reilly vs SF. To fight is to survive. My family emigrated to America after the Famine, so, genetically speaking, we know no other way than passion to survive.

My second cousin, a mathematician, was whisked off right out of high school to a PO Box address in New Mexico. When she died of cancer, the story came out. Manhattan Project. Fermi Institute. 

In Santa Fe, I stood at the bridge where the Rosenbergs were captured, and shivered in the sunlight—born during this age of Light, I have no choice but to weave the stories. 

Nor could I stop crying at Los Alamos—what we’ve done in the name of an idea. Remember the Bay of Pigs? The scars go deep, and I cannot stop writing about it. Bearing witness—it is this writing I cannot get published because it’s too dark.

Yes, I too am uneasy about the new Russia, as I am about the new Latin America. Now that we’ve had our cake, we (who really do see the other side of the coin) have the audacity to tell them they can’t have it—when we’ve set up the wish list of ultimate attainment to begin with. 

I know we can’t convince the Olegs of the world—they are incapable of seeing out of the trench of their miserable lives, and there’s something in the Slavic character, that will continue to hold them there—the root word “slave” speaks volumes and needs no interpretation. 

Need I say that what I admired in Oleg while we were in the Ukraine evaporated on American soil? Oleg’s limited vision and inability to look inward for root causes is a microcosm of the whole; have we deluded ourselves into thinking that the ideals of communism (vs. anti-capitalism) or another system could overcome some basic human traits?

Of course, no matter the country, it’s the same old story—war between the sexes, only I’m no one’s footstool. I love life because I love my art—and every man, no matter how enlightened, seems to want that space for himself. 

Yes, I learned the term “foetid’ from Durrell’s description of an abortion in the Alexandria Quartet— Brit. spelling, but then Durrell’s Irish, as I am. Did you notice the hidden word “foe”? And having been the victim of men’s basic inconsistencies—love/mysogeny, pregnancies/abortions, I too know first-hand about death, having long-term infections that nearly killed me for my decisions to take life. 

You see, I was the product of a divorce; I saw my mother go crazy (and the suicide attempts that followed), an aunt and drunk husband & co. where violence and poverty is second nature to breathing. I knew better than to leave myself at the mercy of society as a single mother. I’ve been the psych wards and have no intention of becoming an inmate.

I love life because I know first-hand how easy it is to abdicate—the way my 17 year-old cousin did at 4 a.m. in downtown Santa Rosa on a Harley. Maybe drugs were involved. I don’t know. 

But when someone close dies, I am usually there in my dreams with them—and I never want to wake up to hear the news. I dreamed the darkness, the fog, and the red light of my cousin’s death—only we’re not supposed to remember these things during our waking hours. My mother banging on the door to wake me with the news, but I refused to waken, because waking was worse than the nightmare. 

There are things I tell no one, but it comes out in my poetry; sometimes I worry about there being too much death in my work, but I am a witness, and this is my most foetid art!

Eileen Mavorneen! (Rosenstein). What a great name. And what’s she doing with an IRISH first name, pray tell? Is it the Black Puerto Rican, or the Jewish side? 

You know of the Irish kids kidnapped and shipped to the Caribbean by the thousands by the British? This is why most Blacks have Irish in them (or Irish last names) I haven’t time to properly introduce delectable British forms of genocide, but suffice to say, centuries later, they continue to practice on the Irish. 

I know Eileen’s disappointment—looking for the bright ones—and the despair that follows when whole classes show nary a shining star. I wonder why the hell I’m bothering to reach them—but ultimately I have faith. (Faith: something scientifically unproveable). 

Then my faith in humanity is restored when a little 2nd grader, Trevor Yeats (great-grand-nephew to WBY) writes to me: 

“This body is to ask

this question of the mind: 

Is the sun to shine on the day of my death?

Is the hole in the ozone layer to stay as big? 

Tell me, tell me, where is the answer? 

This is the breath, to breathe this air.”

         Trevor Yeats

Well, since my work overtakes me, I’m not so sure I can write in sonnet format It has its own thoughts & forms—probably why I hated poetry as a kid was because it rhymed! 

Well, I’ve got to go miles and miles—to the other side of the earth—before I again sleep—and I still have to pack all this shit, or I’ll weep ere the morning comes, and have a fit of despair, with all this packing to do, or go nowhere at all, except deeper into the mystery. 

Maureen

PS Give my love to Edwin too.

10/91

An Uneasy Truce: family

My publisher asked if I loved life, for he was held at gunpoint, & he questioned where all that passion came from. I’m not sure which passion he was referring to, living, or the taking of a life. The question came on the eve of my uncle Bill’s death, his funeral was on the day I left for Russia, I didn’t cancel my tickets, I wrongly assumed I was exempt from grief because he was an enemy. He once tried to sell my grandmother's house and land behind her back “for her own good” because she was “getting on, and I was growing up too wild.” 

My uncle Bill made her cry, bullying her with that first-born energy. My grandmother was a strong woman but a son is next to God in an Irish family. In a white-hot rage, I attacked my uncle, pummeling him with my small fists, a skinny 12-year-old who once wanted him dead. I felt nothing when I heard the news of his lung cancer. Now he’s dead, and I was surprised to find myself in a fog, suffering from grief because I discovered that blood is indeed like the cliché—thicker than reason or emotion—no matter how disfunctional the family. I will learn this lesson again when my parents die.

I’ve never been held at gunpoint, other than at a roadblock deep in the Guatemalan jungle—with no witnesses. Does that count? We were lucky to escape with our lives. I have never been held at gunpoint, but I watched the campesinos sleep with studied indifference as the soldiers practiced kickboxing with Uzis slung over their shoulders. I did count how many. 

Back home in the safety of America, I will have nightmares about snipers. In Peru, we came upon the body of a lawyer dumped in front of the Chorillos tunnel in Lima—his crime, he was a brilliant lawyer for the other side. I cannot shake the larger images of war from my mind, it wasn't my own life I was worried about, but the perpetual genocides committed by both factions in the name of liberty—for whom?

I am the grand-daughter of a revolutionary but I keep an uneasy truce with those roots. My grandfather, while working for the San Francisco city jail, shipped suitcases of guns to Ireland during the Rebellion, he knew Parnell and the executed Liam Mellows first hand. We have photos of him and Mellows in the field below our house in Forest Knolls. Did he know Michael Collins? Probably. My mother’s cousin is named after him.

My grandfather and my grand-uncles met in safe basements, filed serial numbers off the guns confiscated by the police force, and shipped them to a contact in New York. To Liverpool, and then onto Cork. A grand-uncle missed one serial number in the muzzle, and the shipment was traced back to my grandfather. When the feds tried to intimidate my grandfather into a confession, he said, just try and prove it, for he knew his law. Some vow there will never be peace in Ireland until the fifth field is no longer in British bondage. My aunt Jane helped airlift Irish kids out of Belfast so they could experience a normal life, if only for a summer.

My grandfather was a thorn in the side of the English. When the Germans fought the British in WW1, he was an acting German Consulate for San Francisco. We don’t know the details, he was a closed-mouthed man. When India struggled for independence, he was involved. When Indians were not allowed to own land, bought Fresno farmlands for them. 

A grateful Jahn Singh (Singh means lion) sent us crates of oranges and raisins every Christmas. My grandfather must’ve sent guns to India too. I came across an engraved invitation from the Indian Consulate dated 1945, inviting my family to the Independence celebration in San Francisco. A thank you letter from (James) Seamus Mooney, an infamous political prisoner of the ’30s who was held responsible for the death of a longshoreman during a union riot (I was surprised to hear a lawyer, speaking of ethics, refer back to the Mooney case). 

My grandfather took the city on, suing them and winning the landmark case (he was his own lawyer, having “read” the law, the Bar didn’t exist) when they discriminated against him, passing him up for promotion to High Sherriff in favor of someone else. My family emigrated to America after the Famine, so, we know no other passion, other than to survive.

My second cousin, a mathematician, was whisked off right out of high school to Chicago, to White Oak, Tennesee, to Alamagordo, then to a PO Box address in New Mexico. When she died of cancer, the story came out.  They said Manhattan Project. Fermi Institute. In Santa Fe, I stood at the bridge where the Rosenbergs were captured, and shivered in the sunlight, Born during this age of Light, I have no choice but to weave the stories. Nor could I stop crying at Los Alamos—what we've done in the name of an idea. Remember the Bay of Pigs? The scars go deep, and I cannot stop writing about it. Bearing witness—it is this writing I cannot get published because it's too dark.

Yes, I am uneasy about the new Russia, as I am about the new Latin America. Now that we've had our cake, we (who really do see the other side of the coin) have the audacity to tell them they can't have it—when we've set up the wish list of ultimate attainment to begin with. I know we can't convince the Olegs of the world—they are incapable of seeing out of the trench of their miserable lives, and there's something in the Slavic character, that will continue to hold them there—the root word “slave” speaks volumes and needs no interpretation. 

 

What traits I admired in Oleg while we were in the Ukraine quickly evaporated on American soil. Oleg's limited vision and inability to look inward for root causes is a microcosm of the whole; have we deluded ourselves into thinking that the ideals of communism (vs. anti-capitalism) or another system could overcome some basic human traits? He seem to think America owed him something, he could sit back and take life easy.

No matter the country, it's the same old story—war between the sexes, only I'm no one's footstool. I love life because I love my art—and every man seems to want that space for himself. And having been the victim of men's desire, I know first-hand of death, having nearly died because of the babies I gave back. I was the product of a divorce; I saw my mother go crazy (and the suicide attempts that followed), an aunt and drunken husband & co. where violence and poverty was second nature to breathing—to know better than to leave myself at the mercy of society as a single mother. I've been the psych wards from the inside and have no intention of becoming an inmate.

I love life because I know how easy it is to abdicate—the way my 17-year-old cousin did at 4 a.m. in downtown Santa Rosa on a Harley at full throttle. Maybe drugs were involved. I don't know. But when he died , I was there with him in my dreams—and I never wanted to wake up to hear the news. I dreamed the darkness, the fog, and the red light of my cousin's death—only we're not supposed to remember these things during our waking hours. My mother banging on the door to wake me with the news, but I refused to waken, because waking was worse than the nightmare. There are things I tell no one, but it comes out in my poetry; sometimes I worry about there being too much death in my work, but I am a witness.

Perhaps that’s why I teach poetry in the schools. I search for the bright ones—and despair when whole classes show nary a shining star. I sometimes wonder why I bother, the work is so exausting, but ultimately I have faith. The brilliant gift of a 2nd grader, Trevor Yeats (great-grand-nephew to William Butler Yeats) sustains me:

This body is to ask
this question of the mind:
Is the sun to shine on the day of my death?
Is the hole in the universe to stay as big?
Tell me, tell me, where is the answer?

Where is the answer to lie in today’s hands?
This is the breath, to breathe this air.

Trevor Yeats
2nd grade,
Higham Family School
Santa Rosa, Ca

© 1996 revised 2000 Maureen Hurley