Shattered

These past months I've been feeling pretty fragmented, like I'm looking out at life through a broken mirror. I'm sure you know the feeling.

Respect

All week I have been mulling over the idea of respect and as usual, it happens that when I am thinking about something, the ‘universe’ decrees that I need to be shown all sides of the story!

This morning while I was typing up my response, I had been working on it off and on for several hours, thinking, typing, walking away, and coming back…you know how you do when something feels important? Then my husband decided to unplug our internet connection without asking if I was online. I lost everything that I had been typing. I guess this is another piece of the respect topic. Unilateral decisions usually are not respectful, nor considerate. A good reminder for myself! Also a reminder to save, save, save!

The first part of the respect equation came on Thursday when I took Lady out of the pasture. Now Lady is not a horse that typically shows a ‘disrespectful’ attitude towards people, but she was in the top ten acres where the grass is over my head. I’m shy of five foot. Horse heaven is what I call the top pasture, the horses get to visit it a few hours a day, they don’t even have to move or bend their heads to fill their tummies with thick, luscious green grass. She was up there when I went out to ride and she was not happy about being asked to leave. I can understand completely, I would be upset if someone took me away from a feast, but Lady got to work on how to act when life throws you a curve ball. And I got to see a big hole in our interactions. She got lots of praise when she fianlly got it right and only then did she get to go back to horse heaven.

Then Friday the stable had a ‘play day’ with pole bending, jumping, barrel racing, relay races, musical stalls, ending the day with a scavenger hunt on all fifty acres. It was a blast and Lady seemed to have as much fun as I did. But there were two women who rode their horses with such a lack of respect and consideration for their horses and the other riders, that it was appalling. The horses were kicked, slapped, and whipped for five hours. Their heads were jerked around so much and with such force that hours of rolkur practice looked kind in comparison. The women also had no concern about slamming their horses into other horse and riders during such games as musical stalls and the relay races. One of the women riding like this was the woman who wanted to ride Lady. After seeing this appalling piece of horsemanship there is no way that I would ever let her near Lady. At the end of the day those two horses were covered in dirty foam and exhausted, then turned out into the pasture without even having the sweat and dirt brushed off of them. One of the horses is shut down, the other one has absolutely no respect towards humans. He will run you over if you are in his way, but the way he was slammed into other horse and riders, I now can understand why. It is not about ‘respect’ but about how he was trained, and is still apparently being trained.

Then yesterday, Saturday, I got to see if Lady ‘Got It’ on Thursday. When I got to the stable, she was up in horse heaven, gorging. But she willingly came to me and lowered her head to be haltered, then calmly and softly walked down to the barn to be saddled. She never even called to her buddies who were still feasting on the tall grass. Wow! Did she ever get lots of praise and carrots and scratches! I rode her past the gate leading to horse heaven where her herd mates were still grazing and the only thing she did was to call to them, but willingly trotted past the gate.

This week I was reminded that respect, be it horse or human, is a two way street. It goes both ways. Respect begets respect. So very true. If you want respect, then you need to give respect. And respect goes hand in hand with consideration. Roget’s thesaurus-Respect: to admire, to appreciate. I don’t think that respect can be taught. Rules can be taught, like, "Thou shall not run over humans." But I think that respect is shown, give and take. If you don’t show any, how can you expect it to be given in return? The horses that I’m around daily, that are treated with respect and consideration, and above all, love, by their owners are polite around humans, but the other horses who aren’t treated with consideration, have human related issues The Golden Rule not only applies to human/human relations, but also to human/horse relations. Give and take, just another piece of this horse journey I’m on.

Anyway, just my take on this little thing called “respect”.

~Kelly King
Written in 2006

To the Child Within

To The Child Within

Every night as I tuck my child
into bed,
innocent and serene,
kiss his forehead, eyelids and the tip of his nose,
as I smooth soft blankets
around his small body,
warm and safe,
I think of you.

I remember days of laughter
and childish dreams,
young, strong legs flashing in the sun,
pigtails bouncing,
sun-kissed freckles,
skinned knees and cries of
“Olly, olly, all come free.”

Until those smug eyes
and that sly look
began to chase you
in your sleep.

I remember innocence lost
and stolen trust.

I remember the small space
in which you hid.

Please let me hold you and ease
those memories.
Let me take away
those dark fears.

Let me take from you
the chains of blame
that were never
yours to accept.

Let me comfort you
the way a mother
should have done.

Let the silver veil of sleep fall
around you
untorn, undisturbed,
the sticky cobwebs of your memories
swept from your despair.

A kiss on each cheek, love,
to banish a legacy of tears.

Let there be forgiveness,
you did nothing wrong, dear. ©

~Kelly

The Importance of Math

A world without math
what we would lose.
No wages, no salaries,
no money for shoes.

No travel to space,
no TV (oh bliss!).
Math is used in all of this.

Baking a cake
or building a fence,
a knowledge of measurements
only makes sense.

Double a recipe,
get it just right,
could be the success
of a very good night.

Double a recipe,
get it all wrong
and in a short while
your guests could be gone.

Out in the mall
red tags galore
30% all over the floor!

Buy three, get one free!
What does this mean?
How can it be?

Which is better
you never will know
unless you learn math
and give it a go.

A trip in the car
a vacation we need!
How long will it take
to get to the sea?

Oh! The magical things
that math can do!
Give it a try!
It’s for me and you too!


~Kelly King

"Reduce intellectual and emotional noise until you arrive at the silence of yourself and listen to it."

The Fruits of my Labor

In the photograph, the child stands
beside the pumpkin; one hand rests on it, possessively.

At first glance his face is cheerful, though unsmiling.
On second glance stubborn, lips tightly set.

In the background pale mist weaves
through the tops of the trees, their leaves painted

in shades of brown and yellow
in that half-light of cold autumn days.

My son’s cheeks are round and rosy
in the cool, moist air. His blue sweater is zipped

tightly to his chin. Black rubber boots, splattered
with mud, reach up to his knees.

Oh, how well I remember that day, the day we went to the field
to pick a pumpkin. How he ignored the hay rides,

the farm animals, the laughing children,
so intent was he on the round, orange pumpkins in the hay covered field.

His stubby two year old legs
carried him from one pumpkin to the other until he found

just the right one. Squeals of delight echoed
across the fields, through the trees, and down to the river below.

I remember how determined he was
to pick it up, to carry it himself,

the pumpkin that was almost as big as he.
I had to persuade him

to let me take his picture beside that pumpkin.
In the end we carried the pumpkin together,

the child large in my belly
turning as though to help.

When I look at this picture, I long for this simple world where peace
lies sleeping, like a comfortable old dog.

When the floor boards would crack and pop
during the long cold nights,

while the wind whispered
its contentment around the eaves.


At seventeen,
the same look is upon his face

and in the unyielding stance of his body
as he stands in the doorway, car keys in hand.

The sun, through the glass, glints
off his earrings, makes a halo of his bleached hair.

He argues, until defiance
ushers him out. ©


~Kelly King

Trust Betrayed

A mother watches;

A girl plays in the sand,
squatting, laboring in silence
at the water’s edge. Under her feet
water wobbles, small stones
and pebbles click in the receding wash.
The spilt milk of the surf
foams around her ankles
and not
being responsible
slowly undermines the foundation
of her castle, a thing of beauty
and childhood imagination, adorned
with sea things,
broken shells, crab legs, kelp,
bits of scoured glass.

Overhead gulls scream abuse.

A wave slaps the girl in the face
of her innocence.
She gags and coughs the sea spit
from her lungs, but another wave
knocks her down and
she is tumbled in the water,
her nine year old breasts
scrape on the course sand,
the thick morning stubble of a man’s face.
The suck and pull of the undertow
tugs at her body
and strands of seaweed
entwine in her hair.

And a mother
does nothing. ©

-Kelly King