Breast Health Month…Every Month

October is Breast Cancer Awareness month. I prefer a focus on Breast Health rather than cancer. Let us examine our breasts with love rather than fear as a natural part of taking good care of ourselves. Let us listen to our bodies easily, before they have to scream to be heard over the daily cacophony of life, often taking care of others first.

Twice I have had breast cancer, in 1996 and in 2007. I learned a great deal about healing body, mind, emotions, and spirit. And each time I was cracked open–in a good way–breaking through old defenses, encouraging me to bloom. Even my relationships were healed. Writing saved me, allowing me to access inner wisdom about my healing process. This poetic journal, begun after healing from MS in 1995, continues still.

Here is poem I wrote last week. When I read it to him today, my voice teacher encouraged me to post it as part of this special month.

10/12/09

From the Stars

Here I am
naked before you,
all scars, weakness,
vulnerability revealed

as beautiful.

Steely resolve,
stubborn determination,
hard-won power

as foundation.

Unashamed,
unassuming,
hiding nothing
I might once have deemed

unacceptable.

Something to be said for
enduring, growing,
transforming, transcending.

Every wrinkle
tells a story
of care or neglect.

every scar a tale
of chance or choice,
guilt, healing, awareness, or regret.

I can tell you
have come from the stars
just to see

life here in action.
Here I am.

Margaret Dubay Mikus
Copyright 2009

Making Big Changes

Some time ago I realized I needed to make changes in my home to support my own healing and health (and that of my family). This is a nice house, but things had gotten worn and shabby and repairs were needed. Everywhere I looked something called for attention. It was like a balloon with a thousand pinholes, leaking out the air. I noticed myself often saying that I slept better away from home. Our 22-year old carpet (and its disintegrated pad) had to go to help my breathing and to eliminate my chronic morning cough.

Years went on and though we made plans, the work did not get done. It was a big project to contemplate, a major remodeling: revitalizing the entire house.

In June, I went to my first women’s writing conference at Skidmore College (International Women’s Writing Guild.) (see June and July posts) I was welcomed and found a small group that fit me well. At lunch one day, one of my new friends said she had removed her old carpet even though they could not replace it right away. It was better to live with plywood floors! I was inspired to get going in my own house.

The time was right—or the planets and stars aligned or something. We easily found the right person to oversee the project–and right in our neighborhood! Elliot was one of those experienced, positive attitude, good energy people who was connected to the other good workers we needed.

Early on, I realized this was a huge opportunity to clear away years of clutter, freeing up space for current living. This was a highly charged emotional process for me. Deep feelings surfaced of perceived past failures in my creative work. Self-forgiveness and inner guidance were essential. Also daily energy balancing. Unlike before, somehow I was not frustrated at having to put aside “my work”. It was clear that raising the energy of the house was the work I needed to be doing. And this would pay off in the work arena too.

Knowing me, you can imagine I wrote a lot these past three months. I will release a new collection once the dust settles. (see previous post) Here is a poem from last night (2 AM). Getting toward the end of it all and looking back.

10/6/09

This Big Thing

If you knew how long
it would take to do
this big thing,
this vision,

you would never begin.

If you knew how much
energy at times,
how little sleep at times,
how many tiny details

would make up the whole,
what worries, what waiting,
what driving, what negotiation,
what re-invention, what chaos,

you would never begin.

You would not know how
the progress of day to day
could feed you,
awaken you, open doors for you,

let in light and space and room to breathe.
If you had not trusted,
if you did not understand clarity,
if you thought you were standing alone

you would never begin.

Of so it seems
about all the other times
big plans stalled,
and so it seems

looking back on the
peaceful revolution miracle of
allowing change to unfold,
even embracing.

From fearful to sure,
or sure enough
to take one step…
and then another, not necessarily big leap.

Not to erase the past,
but creating the future, your future,
from the endless supply
of present moments.

Margaret Dubay Mikus
Copyright 2009

Remodeling

A poem written 9/5/9

Remodeling as a Transformative Device

(Better than Illness)

Every summer for a long time,
or often anyway,
illness has caught me—
serious enough to warrant
immediate concern
life-threatening even.

And all time was then divided
into before the diagnosis
and after it, life wiped
away as I had known it,
what had seemed important
became less than trivial.

Amnesia set in
about how things had been
and I couldn’t get back
to “normal.”
The process of healing
took the time it took

and the lessons came
and some stuck;.
some left until
the next time.
And on and on it went
with help coming at key moments.

I learned how to ask and receive.
I learned how to balance in chaos.
How to laugh at darkness.
How to let myself feel
and even cry in the presence of others.
And I wrote it all down:

the insights, the quest, the stories
that seemed to give meaning
to suffering, to healing.
Was there no other way
to transformation than
ripping off my skin

again and again?
Then, this summer:
remodeling—Let everything be different
than it had been. Let clutter
be cleared, past failures forgiven,
all belongings spread out,
nothing where it had been.

Ask: If I were moving,
would I keep this?
And as dusty carpet went out
and clean wood floors went in,
light came too, gleaming.
Kitchen cabinets refaced in rich cherry,

Santa Cecelia (patron saint of creativity)
and the name of our chosen granite from Brazil.
All that was worn and shabby
made new again.
Moving on without moving away.
Color, space, clean air,

promise, possibility, openness.
We can’t find our way back
to what was…
even it we wanted to.
Old habits are breaking
like how high to reach to answer the phone

or where to locate a pair of scissors or stamp or fork,
nothing is where it was,
all part of the 17 or 39 or whatever number
of changes in the environment to sustain
healing changes in me.

And the rest of the family?
Well, they are in the thick and thin of it too.
If they can be nourished
by all this,
if they can learn to function
without the usual foundation,

if they can be surrounded by and
immersed in energy for where they are going…
all the better.

From the Sky–Journey to New Mexico

For some reason, I cannot copy-paste text from a Word document into this blog (though that is what I did for the first 21 posts!). This makes it harder to put my poems here–tough to re-write everything. “It” will allow me to insert photos (thus the previous mask photos from a mask-making workshop at my first International Women’s Writing Guild conference at Skidmore College–and yes, that is my face).

So here are some pics from a trip to New Mexico last week. This combined business and vacation for my husband, but in my life there are no boundaries between “work” and “the rest.” I can write and take photos anywhere and to a high degree I am my healed self everywhere I go. It all flows together. The good thing is that I am enriched by it all. The hard thing is that with no boundaries it can be easy to get over-stimulated and over-extended, with insufficient rest.

These are two photos from the plane. (I always try to get a window seat.) On this trip I was struck by the awesome variety of clouds, some of which moved in fast layers over the others or some seemed to be planted in rows like seeds in a furrow or might part to reveal patterns on the earth below. More to come.