Easter, Roses and Liquid Opal - Poems for the Spring...

 

Bench under the cherries in Descanso Gardens, 2014.

The spring is the time of change of generations. So many people are dying. So many babies are being born. Wave after wave, humanity persist on the discovery of what's possible when dealing with matter, nature, life on this planet. So being a part of one wave of humanity, we never know when and how the end will come. Do we? We never know if the angels that watch over us are benevolent or maleficient... We, frankly, don't know anything about anything, or, to put it differently, know nothing about nothing. We just stumble in the dark, trying to make the best choice possible, catch a sunray while we can...

Easter Apocalypsis

           ~ After "The Discovery of Heaven" by Harry Mulisch

It is coming. The angels know.

They dwell in their Piranesi castles,

twisted spaces where outside

is inside. They are not indifferent.

Not too smart for their own good.

Not cruel. They don’t tell us.

The end is coming, it is near.

Not death, mind you, not that

ugly spinster without its twin.

No. The end of the end. Finis.

The satin fabric of a wedding dress

trails behind the veiled beauty

as she glides towards her beloved.

The river’s end tastes of salt

in its own mouth, opened widely

into the waves of the ocean.

Nothing we can do will stop it.

Just stretch your fingers,

let the water cool your skin.

Why resist? Heraclitus

dipped his toes in this river.

Shape-note singers praised it.

Saints dove in and swam around,

luxuriating in incandescent glories

that passed us by.

The end is coming, flowing

swiftly down the slopes.

Let’s sit on the porch, doze off

in honeyed sunlight,

before it, too, disappears,

transfigured.

Let us believe there will be

light enough inside us - 

that kindling of kindness,

a half-forgotten smile -

to keep us afloat in the final flood

coming, coming to erase the world

and remake it, anew,

bejeweled.

(c) 2011 by Maja Trochimczyk, published in "Heaven and Hell" issue of The Scream Online.

I recently sent a translation of this poem to be published on the Pisarze.pl porta in Poland. The set included a new, original Polish poem that the editor did not select, so I translated it into English and placed here. 

A Rose Is a Rose

Petals, petals, petals,

keep falling, falling, falling,

free, sleepy, fragrant –

rosying, more rosy than the rose,

until only a stem, a dry stalk with thorns 

remains in place of bright blossom.

So it is in life - day after day

hours flow away from now into 

sometime distant, a long, long time ago –

when the southern sun shone 

pure gold in vibrant blue,

a long, long time ago –

before enemy planes turned 

the sky into a gray soup

of chemical poisons 

and the earth into a fallow field 

of aluminum dust in which  

Monsanto grains grow alone.

A long, long time ago

a flower opened into a rose

above all roses, a flower of one day

as beautiful as my life –

unique, original, without flaw

Years passed and I collect petals,

petals of memory – In words I cover

the faded skeleton with a vivid robe

of memories of kindness, love, joy –

and the petals, petals, petals

that keep falling, falling, falling

more rosy than the rosiest of roses 

(c) 2025 

The two favorite paces of mine are my garden, where my roses magically boom, and open spaces with ocean waves and hills on the horizon.  I take my kites for a walk  on the Oxnard beach or in the mountains, and look up at the astounding, vibrant sapphire sky.... 

Liquid Opal

I took two butterflies for a walk –

two colorful kites soaring above me 

while the ocean waves licked my toes and tried to 

tip me over so I’d roll down the soft, sandy slope into 

the seaweed meadows and kelp forests beneath. I would be happy

in the eerie  underwater light of aqua and aquamarine, 

the ocean whisper assured me.

Yet, I resisted, sinking deeper 

into the wet sand, holding onto my kites 

that floated overhead and pulled me up into the sky, 

the pristine, vibrant expanse of the azure. Endless peace.

No sorrows and no secrets. 

I look at the filigree patterns 

of seafoam lace, shifting playful shapes. 

Endless invention. The slowly setting sun colors

the ocean surface with metallic hues of titanium, nickel, chrome 

and liquid opal, changing with every wave, every wisp of the breeze.

As evening falls, the waves rise higher,

intersecting, crashing into each other, revealing 

their underbellies of pure, translucent jade, before 

disappearing  into the opaque beige of the sand, mixed with 

frothy water into an infinite, salty cappuccino.

The ocean caresses my legs 

and dances around me in a joyous display

of seduction and delight. I sigh and surrender.

Today, I found my Beloved on the beach,

in waves of liquid opal. 

On La Tuna Fire and the End of the World as It Was

dragon eye of the sun

looks at the scorched earth -

wildfire 

Do charcoal hills scorched by wildfire make you think of the end of the world? Of return and rebirth, dust to dust, light into light? The sun is surreal, reduced by smoke to one, red eye... I lived through two wild wildfires in my Sunland neighborhood, the Station Fire of 2009 that burned down most of Los Angeles National Forest and surrounded us in our little city on all sides, and the La Tuna Fire of 2017 that burned the Verdugo Hills and the peaks and canyons on both sides of the 210 freeway. Only four houses were destroyed this time ("only" - tell it to the four families that lost everything!) and no lives were taken. But still... the black bare slopes remain.

charcoal on the left

charcoal on the right -

210 after fire

It could have been much worse, if not for bravery and endless work of over 1,000 firemen from the entire Southern California region. When I went swimming on Monday, I ran into firemen from Santa Barbara, Santa Maria, Montecito, Lompoc...They came to the pool to have a shower. Maybe they were called late to tame down the ever growing monster, spreading in four directions at once, maybe they did not see much action, still they were there to protect us.

 

 

flames dance and scorch

firemen dance with water among them

our hearts dance to thank them

Their bravery and dedication is beyond doubt - but, in fact, expected. They are all owed our unbounded gratitude, fire after fire, year after year. They risk their lives to protect ours.

 What was the greatest surprise for me in the La Tuna Fire was the bravery of about ten ordinary citizens who instead of sheltering in their homes, opted to save the cultural gem of the foothills, the McGroarty Arts Center on the slopes adjoining to the area that first started burning and continued through Friday, Saturday and Sunday, with flareups on Monday. 

Willow Bosco and her mother Austina, McGroarty Board member, stayed at the Center overnight; Willow, a delicate young student, with remarkable strength handled the hose, soaking the Center's roof and walls, and all the nearby trees with water. Volunteer firefighter Bill Myers brought the extra long hoses and used them, working along with other volunteers, whom I met on Sunday afternoon, to soak burning trees on Saturday and ensure that all vegetation and ground were thoroughly wet to prevent further flareups on Sunday. The fire came down the hill and some trees in the park surrounding the Center burst into flames. We were perilously close to losing this cultural landmark, the home of the former poet laureate of California, John Steven McGroarty. The flareups were extinguished thanks to heroic efforts of Willow, Austina, Bill and many others whose names I did not get... 

Ray Yocum, ceramics teacher was a fireman for three days.

Willow Bosco took out fires with water

Ray Yocum and Willow Bosco rest after two long days of fire-fighting.

Bill Meyers and Michelle Ramage

he  says  he "only brought the hose"

she that "only came with food"

Austina and Willow Bosco

Austina says she did not do  it, just the neighbors

and her beautiful, brave daughter

they smile, relieved

after red-black days of fighting fires -

they saved the foothills' gem  

Thank you to the heroes and heroines of the McGroarty Arts Center! Willow and Austina Bosco, Ray Yocum, Michelle Ramage from the McGroarty Arts Center, and the MAC's neighbors: Bill Meyers, Kenny Webb, Ben Grupp, Will Meyers, Chris Hall, and Curtis Cunningham.

Where was I? In my pomegranate and rose garden, editing a book, looking at clouds of smoke, watching the helicopters flying above every minute, back and forth, with water for the fire, and packing my personal music and poetry archive. Lots of manuscripts, early prints, signed books, letters, the family photo archives of my parents. So many suitcase of paper.

red bird in the sky

brings blue water to red flames

for victory of blue 

Paper, not gold. My jewelry was stolen earlier, half of it, at least... along with my real camera, photo backup drive, family heirlooms, and more. For the whole week I was searching through, checking the losses, so the fire was not the threat that it seems to have been. Clothes and electronics can be replaced, but who will repaint an artwork that took Toti O'Brien 18 years to make? Square by square, drawn and embroidered, it came into being to adorn my wall...

http://poetrylaurels.blogspot.com/2016/12/new-years-gifts-of-poetry-enchantment.html

Sweet Relief by Toti O'Brien and its author.

treasure on my wall

eighteen years in the making - 

sweet relief

Such is life in the foothills in dry, fire-prone California: waiting for the next wildfire, packing precious documents to be saved in case the flames come too close, hoping that this one and the next one will pass us by... And admiring the mountains, or rather the bare hills and canyons, covered with the velvet of green grass in the spring, with the velvet of gold grass in the rest of the year.

I wrote several poems about these mountains, and here's an older one. 

Mountain Watch

They are a bit vain, aren’t they
these mountains of ours, still young.
They like being washed by the rain,
making themselves pretty for sunset.
Wet soil turns into a mudbath 
for these giant beauties.

When they stretch and practice
their dance moves, our houses crumble.
Water jumps out of toilet bowls.
Aunt Rosie’s favorite crystal vase
shatters on the floor. The mountains
shake boulders out of their skirts,
lose weight. Rocks slide into our backyards.

We stand watch. We are ready.
Neighbor calls neighbor: “Are you OK?” 
A friend you did not know you had
stops by. The danger looms. 

In ancient Rome, guards had to hold
one hand up, with the finger on their lips
in a sign of silence, attention. I read
about it in a book, standing on my shelf,
in a crowded row of treasures
I hauled across the ocean, from the 
old country to an unknown world.
I’d hate losing them to mud.

When the mountains dress in red
robes of fire, to dance in the night
rites of destruction, sometimes 
it is too late for treasures. An old man 
lost a hundred years of memories, 
when his family heirlooms –
pictures, tchotchkes – burned to ashes. 
His life spared, he still cries for what
he cannot not bring back. 

We are lucky. Storms came and went. 
The neighbors lived, the houses survived.
We were ready: moved out, moved in, 
moved out, moved in, awakened 
at midnight, sheltered by the goodwill 
of unknown friends. We watched. 
The storms passed. This was a good year.
We will watch. The aging beauties 
will dance again.


(c) 2010 by Maja Trochimczyk
http://poetrylaurels.blogspot.com/2010/10/in-praise-awe-of-mountains.html

I did not write that many poems about the end of the world, though I've been fascinated with disaster movies for a while, especially 2012, showing how the fabric of this world may be rolled back and unrolled again, in a different configuration. There are ends of the world happening on this Earth all the time, at all times. Every day, every time someone dies, it is the end of this world for that one person. And, sometimes, almost the end of the world for the people around them. 

A purple anemone of mourning
life and death, hurricanes and earthquakes -
the spark, the heart, survives

And what about the hurricanes that flatten whole islands? Tsunamis that wash villages and cities away? Earthquakes that fold tall buildings into stacks of pancakes? Or crazy people shooting innocents to scare the rest of us into submission, into slavery?  Yes, there are plenty of the ends of the world every minute.

Elijah's End


And the curtains of fire opened. 
And God walks through.
And I fall on my knees
Struck down by the might
Of his presence.

And the ground under my feet
Roars and trembles.
And God is with me.

In awe, I do not dare to look
Into the laughing beauty of his eyes.
And the gale changes into a breeze.
And God speaks in a whisper,
Sweetly announcing
The end of the world as it was.

And the sun stops in its tracks.
And the world explodes.
Filled with love, so much love,
It could not bear existing
For one more minute.

— now it ends --
— now it blossoms --
— now it grows again --

(C) by Maja Trochimczyk. Published in Into Light, http://www.moonrisepress.com/into-light-by-maja-trochimczyk.html

Easter Apocalypsis

—After "The Discovery of Heaven" by Harry Mulisch


It is coming. The angels know.
They dwell in their Piranesi castles,
twisted spaces where outside
is inside. They are not indifferent.
Not too smart for their own good.
Not cruel. They don't tell us.

The end is coming, it is near.
Not death, mind you, not that
ugly spinster without its twin.
No. The end of the end. Finis.
The satin fabric of a wedding dress
trails behind the veiled beauty
as she glides towards her beloved.

The river's end tastes of salt
in its own mouth, opened widely
into the waves of the ocean.
Nothing we can do will stop it.
Just stretch your fingers,
let the water cool your skin.

Why resist? Heraclitus
dipped his toes in this river.
Shape-note singers praised it.
Saints dove in and swam around,
luxuriating in incandescent glories
that passed us by.

The end is coming, flowing
swiftly down the slopes.
Let's sit on the porch, doze off
in honeyed sunlight,
before it, too, disappears,
transfigured.

Let us believe there will be
light enough inside us
—that kindling of kindness,
a half-forgotten smile—
to keep us afloat in the final flood
coming, coming to erase the world
and remake it, anew,

bejeweled.


(C) By Maja Trochimczyk, published in The Scream Online http://www.thescreamonline.com/poetry/poetry7-4/trochimczyk.html

The Polish Easter of Sorrow and Joy - In Memoriam

It is quite surprising, if you arrive from Poland, to see the American Easter, with its Easter Bunny that lays chocolate eggs (this idea is somewhat disgusting, if you think what round objects of chocolatey hue come out of the Bunny's other end). Another surprise is the obligatory pastel coloring of the entire set of decorations - baby rabbits, baby chicken, baby ducks, puppies, kittens, and all sorts of baby everything, including pastel colored eggs and egg-wreaths that replace Christmas wreath. And, of course, chocolate. Tons of chocolate. It is astounding to see so many major holidays transformed into excuses for buying chocolate: St. Valentine's Day, Easter, Halloween, Christmas... Then there are the pastel dresses and hats of children running around pastel yards with pastel baskets looking for pastel plastic eggs filled with chocolate in pastel wrappers... Actually, I've grown quite fond of this tradition and continue hiding my three dozens of eggs in my front yard for the neighborhood kids for Easter Sunday... We have a street celebration. It is fun to see the kids grow, have their own kids, year after year running to find the precious "golden eggs" with money inside. 

For a Christian from Europe, however, the colors of Easter are different, starker. It is the hue of green palm leafs of the Palm Sunday, the stone bareness and austerity of Good Friday, the vermilion red of liturgical vestments on this day of cosmic suffering, the shadowy darkness and brilliant new flames of Easter Vigil, and the purity of white and gold of the Easter morning Resurrection Procession. I experienced these colors of truly religious Easter at the convent of Fransciscan Sisters, Servants of the Cross, in Warsaw, where I was baptized as an adult during the Easter Vigil on March 30, 1987.  There was not a pastel Easter bunny in sight. 

Listen: "O, Holy Cross" - A Choral song for Good Friday (14th C. Poland)

Listen: Easter Vigil's "Exultet" - with music and text (Gregorian Chant, tutorial)

Listen: "Chris is Resurrected" - A choral song for Easter Vigil (Polish children's chorus)

Listen: "A Joyous Day" - A Choral Song for Easter (Polish children's chorus)

Listen: "Wipe your Tears" - A Choral Song for Easter (Polish children's chorus)

Yes, there are less austere decorations in Polish homes for Easter - eggs colored in onion peel (dark reddish brown), with scratched out patterns; handmade "palms" with colorful dried flowers - a folk-art specialty, the first branches of willows with their soft yellow furry flowers ("bazie"), and the sugar lamb, the symbol of the Divine Lamb, decorating the table and waiting to be eaten, licked into nonexistence, limb by limb.... 

Easter table in Warsaw, 1981, with Marcin Depinski.

Of course, there is food: the meats, the breads, eggs and salt, blessed in Easter baskets. On our table first and foremost was the mazurka, the main Polish cake for Easter. There are many kinds of mazurkas, many flavors (you see three different ones on the picture above). I favored the Royal Mazurka, which, to Americans, resembles a very light and delicate fruit cake (baked without butter or any fat, but with tons of ground nuts, chopped figs, dates, prunes, and raisins).  I immortalized it in my poem dedicated to Chopin and my grandparents.

How to Make a Mazurka

            After Mazurka in A Minor, Op. 17, No. 4,

                        for my Grandparents, Stanisław and Maria Wajszczuk,

                        who could play and bake their mazurkas like no one else.

            Take one cup of longing

for the distant home that never was,

one cup of happiness that danced

with your shadows on the walls

of Grandpa’s house, while he played

a rainbow of folk tunes

on his fiddle, still adorned

with last wedding’s ribbons

            mix it – round and round to dizziness

stir in some golden buzz of the bees

in old linden tree, add the ascent

of skylark above spring rye fields,

singing praises to the vastness of blue

            mix it – round and round to dizziness

add chopped walnuts, figs, dates

and raisins, pour in some juice

from bittersweet grapefruit

freshly picked in your garden

            mix it – round and round to dizziness

add dark grey of rain clouds in Paris

that took Chopin back to the glimmer

of candles in an old cemetery

on the evening of All Souls’ Day

            mix it – round and round to dizziness

bake it in the cloudless heat

of your exile, do not forget to sprinkle

with a dollop of sparkling crystals,

first winter’s snowflakes at midnight 

(c) 2010, published in Chopin with Cherries

If you would like to know what kind of music is mixed like this, "round and round to dizziness" listen to the Prusinowski Trio. Event the dance of the shadows is just right in this visual interpretation of my childhood memory:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfcsTxTKqH0

My kids prefer chocolate mazurka on the layer of shortbread, "kruche ciasto"- with a thick layer of soft dark chocolate, decorated with walnuts and almonds. One year, in California, we put fresh strawberries on the chocolate-almond mazurka - the best ever!  Traditions change, the colored eggs are made of wood and put out year after year...

The Easter brunch comes, or should, after 40 days of fasting, giving up a favorite food, sweets, or deserts, or anything at all that we like too much.  Then, in a village tradition of "przednowek" - the time before the first harvest, the time of hunger -  the starved celebrants gorge themselves on cuts of cured meats, horseradish, eggs, egg salads, rye bread, and a variety of mazurka desserts. 

My Grandma and Mom also made Easter yeast-cake, "babka wielkanocna" - but those concoctions are too hard to do, in my busy lifestyle. They have to cool off on towels in a closed, warm room. In Grandma's house kids were banned from the house, lest they slam the door and the cake collapses on itself, resulting in the barely edible, ugly and squishy "zakalec."  One year, an attempt at a "babka" ended up with a zakalec that was not only completely flat and rubbery, but also burned. It was so bad that even a hungry dog did not want to touch it...

Family holidays with Marcin Depinski, Ania Harley, Aleksy and 

Henryka Trochimczyk, Maja Trochimczyk and Ian Harley, 1999.

It is fun to remember the holidays, the amusing mishaps, the laughter around the table. But all good things come to an end. For me Easter is and always will be also the time of remembrance, a sorrowful time changed forever by a family tragedy.

On the 4th of July 2013 as I was riding in the Poets' Convertible in the Sunland-Tujunga Parade, my Mom Henryka Trochimczyk, nee Wajszczuk, died in Warsaw, after an emergency surgery. Born on December 16, 1929 in Baranowicze, then Poland, now Belarus, she survived an escape from the Soviet occupation, spent WWII as a refugee with 20 people in a two-bedroom house, met my Dad while removing bricks from Warsaw's ruined streets afterwards, became a chemical engineer, worked for Foton (a photochemical company), took and developed lots of wonderful pictures, traveled, sailed, danced, loved people, loved her children and grandchildren, loved cooking and having parties, and loved life...

Shot in her home by robbers on April 3, 2000 (the bullet went straight through her lung, three centimeters away from the heart), widowed in 2001, she never fully recovered, but in poor health soldiered on. My dad, Aleksy Trochimczyk (born on September 25, 1927 in Bielewicze), fared much worse. The killer bullet went diagonally through his stomach, intestines, spleen, liver... After being tied up and left to die on the floor of the house,  he somehow freed himself, dragged his wounded body to neighbors' houses, but in vain... Nobody opened the door, nobody answered. 

Only the next day, fifteen hours after the attack, he managed to get help for himself and my mom, saving her life. His strength astounded the doctors who could not believe that for over a year, until May 11, 2001, his body simply refused to die, against all dire prognosis, against lost hope.  He recovered from sepsis, multiple dialyses, multiple surgeries, blood transfusions.  In the meantime, he managed to tell me some secrets during my repeated visits to the hospital in Poland.  The poem below was written on the way back from the first, shocking trip.

The Polish Easter

Chance. A whim of fate.

A wheel of Fortune

falling off its path.

The bullet pierces the lung,

blood spills in darkness:

shortness of breath,

mouth tied with tape,

agony in the basement

on the cold cement floor.

How does one live after that?

Does one live?

After a midnight stroll

on all fours, searching for help

screaming, unheard?

How does one live 

without the stomach,

kidneys, intestines and spleen?

Plastic pipes carry out

all kinds of liquid.

Seven drains and two IVs

for blood and feeding liquid.

The Polish Easter

is a celebration of

overeating. Food is life.

Would dad ever eat again?

Would mom ever breathe 

without gasping?

Honor your mother and father.

I do.

They did not.

(c) 2000 by Maja Trochimczyk

Written on a plane from Warsaw to Los Angeles, after the attack of April 3, 2000.

That's what Easter means to me: a baptism and two funerals...The end and the beginning.  My father just retired, it was  his first full year in Poland after decades of working abroad. My parents just came back from visiting me in California. They were here for three months - Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year... They went around, to San Francisco, the Grand Canyon, San Diego. They had energy. They had fun. After coming back home, they were getting ready for me to visit in the summer with children. They were planting roses, cleaning up - that's why they went to the summer house so early, when the area was still empty. My mom wanted to have a head start on spring cleaning, planting.  In the evening on that fateful Monday, the robbers cut the wire to the phone, broke in, shot them, tied them, left them to die. Took their wedding rings and the milk money from the purse. There were looking for gold. What gold? In a summer house? There was nothing else to take. The robbers were never found. Four months later, another elderly couple was found in their summer home, shot, tied, and dead. The murderers were never found then, either. 

My father, a half-orphan from a small village of Bielewicze (b. 1927, his birth certificate burned with the Eastern Orthodox church he was baptized in) lost his father when he was 12 and the war was just starting. The teen was resilient, he was hardworking and took care of his mom and brother. Only after the war ended he went on to finish the gymnasium, high school and college. He got a M.Sc. in electrical engineering from the Polytechnical University of Warsaw and worked in the high-energy area of power-plants. He started his doctorate, taught for a while, but then family duty called and he had to earn more money. 

He designed power plants and electrical installations and started travelling to building sites in the Middle East where Poland was constructing these power plants, water desalination plants, sugar refineries, and other infrastructure. He worked in Iraq, he worked in the Emirates. He was very good at what he did. He could not stand nonsense and found an engineering solution to every problem. People loved him, though he preferred books to company. Thus, he made his way through life; took care of two children; traveled to see the world: Italy, Greece, Turkey, Lebanon, Spain. The funeral of Princess Diane in London. Trips to Paris. 

My parents had a rich, busy life and were looking forward to having even more time for having a rich, busy life,  in retirement. Then,  the two bullets ended their dreams. 

Henryka and Aleksy Trochimczyk, Abu Dhabi, UAE, 1980s.

When I posted the portraits of my parents on FB, 14 years after that fateful attack I was surprised by the outpouring of kindness from my friends. I thank them all for sharing their wisdom, advice and compassion with me. It is good to know we are not alone, after all...

 When my parents were shot in a home invasion robbery in Poland at 9 pm on April 4, 2000, I was in my office at USC at noon, just after my morning class. I sat down to answer emails and suddenly I could not move, this incredible peace washed over me, "nothing matters... everything is fine...it is all over... my life is over....it is good"  I was in that state for about 20 minutes, and the next morning got a call from Poland, that my parents were shot and found, alive,15 hours after the shooting. When I arrived in the hospital in Warsaw, my mom told me her experience in detail, that incredible otherworldly peace after life is over that I shared with her on the other side of the globe. That serenity stayed with me for a long time, not long enough..... Fear of death is useless and so is "stay safe" admonition, life is inherently dangerous, we do best when we laugh and love instead of being terrified.