Poems and stories from another life - Part I

During the 1990's I lived in Ecuador. I guess I will always have one foot here and one foot there and long to go back and see my dear family there. I know we are not blood relatives but you are all special to me.

My last year in Ecuador was one of turmoil. Leaving a twenty year relationship, leaving a home I designed,  leaving family and precious pets.  I did a lot of travelling in those last few tumultuous years...saying goodbye to a country and people I had come to love. No matter how fast I ran I couldn't escape the heartache that always kept pace with me.

In the long hours on the bus fleeting, sometimes blurry images engraved my brain and I just had to write them down.

In keeping with the theme of this blog here is one I wrote about Paccha Mama ...our Mother Earth, and how we have treated her. And as I read it today and prepare to share it with you I see for perhaps the first time that it is tinged with my own feelings of betrayal and loss, of fighting for survival.

Oh and by the way I survived and even thrived!!!


RAPE
by E.J. Brunton
Andes Mountains between Puyo and Alausi, 1998

The valley, green and flat as a pool table, stretches in the protective embrace of a jealous mountain. Like a ripe young woman she is too beautiful to last. Even the craggy arms of her mountain lover cannot stay the ravages of man.

He will slice through those arms and rape her flower-filled womb. From the rape will issue the children, Rock, Sand and Mud who betray her.

The giant spiders of communication and light will string their unsightly webs from prickly poles. Deep cuts of asphalt and cement will scar her face like a razor wielded by a mad man.

Her eye-like pools will become dry sockets unable even to weep. Her mouth will belch poisons and her nostrils become encrusted with grime. Her hairline of silky trees will recede, torn from the very roots. Her ears will long for birdsong but hear only buzz saw.

When they’ve stolen her beauty they will tire of her, as all men do, and leave her dying alone and forgotten.

But in her darkest night, gentle rains will wash her clean. Dawn will see the tender vines begin their climb across her bruised face, smoothing sharp edges, healing her scars.

She, Mother, will survive us all.