5 books that helped me find success
Wisdom from the books
When I was a little girl
sitting next to fire
on a cold
dark
winter night
my Grandmum handed me
an old book
of ancient Slovak legends.
"Think of your life as a journey,"
she said.
From the time I started to read
I knew
a journey is too slow
whereas
you can make your own adventure.
When I moved to Australia
and left my native country,
behind
I was lost,
colours so sharp
sunlight pours fire
into the kaleidoskope
hot, fluffy sand
with dry
salty crust on top.
My father,
I met for the first time,
handed me a new book
by Adriane Wildencamp
called
'Seasons of Love
in Australia
and Germany.'
Rocks meeting water
sand meeting grass
blue meeting blue
on the horizon
human meeting perfection
holding the special
book
close to my heart.
"Only love is stronger than pain.
And when the pain is immeasurable,
the healing love needs
to be infinitive
and the rest is tears."
I repeated the words
of the heroine
and I knew what my Father
wanted to say.
'The English Patient'
by Michael Ondaatje
was the book
I gave
to my Father.
Just like the main character,
he was born in one place
choosing to live elsewhere,
fighting to get back
all his life.
Giving birth and dying
need time and space
a rhythm that goes
in waves
surrender
and they carry
you
ashore.
'River Boy'
by Tim Bowler
was the first book
I have read to my son,
who loved
the dark and secret river,
a river not yet tamed,
full of strange time,
without realizing
is for ever
flowing by us
to the sea.
When my Father
was dying,
he wanted me
to read
'The Spotted Skin'
by Rowena Ivers
one passage
especially:
"As the early dragonflies
of the dry
chase each other,
Cressida catches one.
She cannot feel a thing.
As it attempts to escape,
there is not escape,
she tells it,
and crushes it."
We knew that everything
around us
would pass
away
some day,
trees would wither,
rocks would crumble,
and even the stream
would
one day
dry up.
Yet these things
felt permanent
and that feeling
gave them comfort
now.
My Father told me
to take one day
at a time.
After his death
I felt emptiness,
pain
and love,
not angry pain,
not reproachful,
not desperate,
pain and love,
as in birth,
as in death,
in the beginning
and at the end,
there is only love,
all that matters is that our heart is open.
Becoming a new Australian
I realized
my adoptive land
has bloody history.
Tasmania
is a classic case
of how the white colonisers
came along
and exterminated
just about every indigenous member
of the island,
destroying
wisdom
from the Earth.
There is so much
to be learnt
from Aborigines
the world's
oldest continuous
living tradition.
'My Place'
by Sally Morgan
helped me
to understand
the value assigned
to every person
in traditional
Aboriginal society
regardless of sex or age.
5 Books that helped me find success,
end of summer,
early autumn,
warm afternoon sun of mid-life,
season of fullness and harvest.
Grandmum was right,
life is a journey.
I am coming home
to myself.
I am worthy
not because of 'how much I achieve,'
I am worthy because I am.
