Selected Poems by Roomi, The Guy You Live with That Communicates via Mystical Verse

Musical Mantras and the Seven Little Fists of Unhappiness

As the saying almost goes, a good mantra is hard to find. Not all mantras are created equal, either. Though widely known and widely intoned, “The Serenity Prayer” doesn’t resonate with everyone and people are plagued by different issues at different times and for different reasons. If you don’t have something committed to memory or tacked to your corkboard or tattooed on your wrist, finding the perfect mantra may involve a Google search – which is an inconvenient task during an emotional crisis, big or small.

Many negative mental moments could be covered by one mantra, especially if the mantra is general in its approach and wording. But what if you had several go-to mantras, customized for your unique set of emotional baggage, that were memorized and readily accessible? This is possible and the key is to make the mantras musical.

We all know hundreds of songs, a vast catalog of lyrics and melodies that can surface or be retrieved at any moment. A song that you haven’t thought of in decades can easily come back to you when it plays on the radio. So if we attach catchy music to a mantra, treating the mantra more like a verse of a song that is sung rather than spoken, maybe it would be stored, and recalled, more easily.

There’s science at play here, which we won’t go into much, but Henry L. Roediger III, who is a psychology professor at Washington University’s Memory Lab says, “Music provides a rhythm, a rhyme and often, alliteration. All that structure is the key to unlocking information stored in the brain—with music acting as a cue,” he says.*

(You can retrieve the chorus of Dancing Queen by Abba, why even bother with a mantra? Just sing Dancing Queen and feel better? It’s worth a shot but may not hold up to repeated singings, especially if you are around a lot of people and are not a beautiful, 17-year old girl twirling around a disco.)

I dreamed up the words “seven fists of unhappiness” a few months ago. I woke with that phrase in my mind with absolutely no idea how it fit into what I was dreaming. I wrote it down, not knowing what it meant or what to do with it.

Even a casual student of Buddhist teachings knows that numbered lists are common: The Four Foundations of Mindfulness, The Five Precepts, The Eightfold Path, and so on. Courtesy of a podcast somewhere, the idea of a numbered wellness list must’ve been planted into my head and so my subconscious mind spit out its own oddball list title. “The Seven Fists of Unhappiness,” I offered myself.

I theorized that maybe these seven fists of unhappiness represent my own mental turmoil, and my inner self delivered them to my conscious self, like a coded message, so I could identify them and go to work fixing them. Once I’d decoded the message, I set out to identify what those fists would be. (Right about now you are thinking I am nuts. I get it.)

After some self-reflection, I came up with my predominant emotional hangups. Here’s my list in no particular order:

1. Dwelling in the past
2. Self-criticism
3. Dissatisfaction
4. Guilt
5. Worrying about the future
6. Resentment
7. Cravings/self-destructive tendencies

Again, the seven little fists that try to beat me down may be different than the ones that harass you. We are all different, including our mental and emotional vulnerabilities. So I may have seven little fists but you may have 2-3 sledgehammers that pound you on a continual basis. Along the way, I added the adjective “little” to the fists to soften their blows and make the title bouncier.

I’m no professional jingle writer, but I tried to come up with a simple and catchy melody to support short mantras and make them easier to remember.

Below is a Soundcloud link that offers a demo of the mantras along with the melody. There are piano and guitar parts written but opted only to include the mantras and a simple run through of the melody on the keyboard. Sharing this simple idea does not call for the production quality of a Steely Dan album. Nor does it need any additional explanation – you get the idea.

Pasted below are the mantras themselves. You do not need the musical accompaniment if you just want a few simple mental reminders to refocus your mind next time you are struggling. If none of my fists match your own issues, try to come up with your own mantras. Personalizing your therapies can only help. Good luck, friends, and be well.

*”Why Does Music Aid in Memorization?”: Heidi Mitchell; The Wall Street Journal, Dec. 30, 2013.

The Mantras

The Seven Little Fists of Unhappiness
Are trying to win the fight (don’t let them)
The Seven Little Fists of Unhappiness
Are trying to win the fight

[1. Dwelling in the past]
You’re living in the past
You’re stuck in reverse
Excavating shit
Just makes the moment worse

[2. Self-criticism]
You’re judging yourself
Put the shame away
Make a good decision
And trend the other way

[3. Dissatisfaction]
Everything you have
Is everything you need
Pull out some gratitude
And plant a seed

[4. Guilt]
Give yourself a break
You do all you can do
You’d pep-talk a stranger
Do the same for you

[5. Worrying about the future]
Worrying about it
Won’t change a thing
The wheels are all in motion
Let the present sing

[6. Resentment]
This stupid fight
Isn’t even real
You made up a fantasy
To show how you feel

[7. Cravings; self-destructive tendencies]
This is just a craving
Stopping to say hi
Give it a few seconds
It’ll roll on by

The Posthumous Mentor: Philip Gerard and Losing a Teacher

I just spent the last hour driving with Philip Gerard as WHQR replayed clips from his previous Coastline appearances. Gerard died a couple of weeks ago unexpectedly. He was a celebrated writer, historian, and professor of creative writing at UNC-Wilmington. Hearing Gerard speak through those recordings, the cadence of his sentences and the breadth of his knowledge, teleported me back nearly 30 years to Morton Hall on the UNCW campus, when Gerard was my senior seminar advisor.

I’ve alternated between weepy and inspired as he discussed the great passions of his life. His writing, music, travel, history, teaching, all of the things that propelled him for decades. All gone. Listening to an old teacher that’s just passed talking to you through your car radio hammers home the fact that we’re on a game board of sorts, advancing in ranks when those before us fall, all moving towards our own inevitable endings.

With Gerard, it’s not only about the end of an incredible life, but also the end of his creativity. That spigot is dry, and nothing will ever come out again. His sudden death is like a brilliant CD that cuts off unexpectedly in the middle of track seven, and you’re left wondering how that song was supposed to end and what other great stuff lie ahead. Pondering his significant output makes you ask, Am I doing enough? Have I done enough? Likely not. There are dozens of folders stuffed with work that will never be completed – and what would Rachel Lewis Hilburn even ask me?

Gerard taught for decades. Assuredly, there are hundreds of former students reflecting on his passing in their own unique way. We’re saddened yet heartened. We have our own reflections of Gerard, his amused smirk, his openness, his support of countless young idealistic wannabe writers that were trying to articulate their own perspectives and experiences. Whether you were going to continue your path as a writer or not, he made you feel like your story was worth telling and how to share it in the best possible way, and that writing and sharing is a universal and precious exercise whether those words end up in print or not. The 22 year old me was not my best self – I was only partially tuned in. The signal from the outside world felt loud and clear but, looking back at that old me, I was ill-prepared to use any of the gold he was throwing my way. Maybe that’s what’s making me weepy – the conversation is over and I wasn’t fully there when it was happening.

For the most part, Philip Gerard has been a hologram to me for the past several decades, beaming in unexpectedly in a recollection. I’ve only had a handful of interactions with him and the greater creative writing community on campus since graduation. Maybe a few readings, a fundraiser or two, listening to a commentary, catching a random article that I stumbled upon, but mostly he had settled into my memory like an influential spirit, even before his passing. For the last hour, that hologram has come to life and has been riding shotgun as I make my way to the South Carolina Lowcountry. What a companion! It’s made me miss him, and moreover, made me miss that community of fellow writers – big name and no name – who crawled out of the same nursery. Maybe his death will remind us how much that community matters and how important it is to foster those connections while we can.

[Compiled from Voice Notes recorded between Wilmington, NC and South of the Border, on 11/18/22

“Finding Zen with Friends on November 10” – A Guided Walking Meditation

“Emergent” series for Topsail Magazine

While taking a little time off to destress and “work on myself” – that was LONG overdue – I’ve been writing a monthly wellness column for Topsail Magazine’s website. The latest one focuses on interacting with your community to feed your soul, something we’ve largely forgotten in the days of COVID and social media warfare. Here’s the link to the new piece and links to the first four further down. We are all works in progress and it’s never too late to be a little better than you were before.

https://topsailmag.com/emergent-passing-the-pigskin-and-pumpkins/

Part Four – Give and Take – Open Mic

Part Three – Yoga Poser

Part Two – The Neighbor Connection

Part One – Getting Out and Coming Back to Life

I Want My Rewards

Everyone thinks they are owed something and tend to take the easy way out – do we take this tendency to the grave? What if…here’s the closest I can come to a gospel song but it probably falls closer to satire. Lyrics are below.

There was a time I walked alone
I had no faith to call my own
The road was dark, I sang no praise
I had no hope for better days
Then I heard about this special place
With streets of gold up in outer space
I played along, I said my prayers
And now that I’ve up and died
I’m heading there

I want my rewards with my new wings
Where is the Lord, with all my new things?
I suffered all my life
For these promises due
Heaven knows I’m here to collect
Now that it’s through

There was a line snaking through that great room
Like something you’d see in a Far Side cartoon
We talked along, I waited my turn
Then this old weathered gal shared something she’d learned:
“You can’t just fake your way and walk through the door.
It ain’t just what you did, there’s something more.”
I swallowed hard, said another prayer,
Wondered what else I failed to do while living down there.

But I want my rewards with my new wings
Where is the Lord, with all my new things?
I suffered all my life
For these promises due
Heaven knows I’m here to collect
Now that it’s through.

They told me,
“Being good is good,
Having heart is a start,
But buddy, don’t forget the Jesus part.”

Weathering Storms, Old and New

I am water. I am wind. I’m born of currents that make me spin. I travel thousands of miles. Created by the elements, the heat, the waters, the conditions that make me so, flying blind. Though I seem to behave in predictable patterns similar to ones before me, I am not a living thing. I am not conscious. I am only weather.

People tend to create me from their image to make better sense of me. You give me names, and legacies and talk about me years after I am gone. You say I am angry, marvel at my deadly eye-wall. Sometimes the conditions are just so and I come into contact with people. Like a clueless giant that’s stepped on a toy house – uh-oh.

____________________________________________________

Walking through the neighborhood after Hurricane Isaias: along these familiar streets, looking at the yards you’ve seen countless times during runs or strolls, now with limbs, dead trees, haphazardly strewn across the green yards, like civil war graveyards, where soldiers died where they fell. Just dropped. And you’re looking at the casualties of yesterday’s war. Trees are scarred, sheared off the top like vegetables under the paring knife.

There’s a wild smell coming off the drifts of floral refuse – rotting, fecund, as things break down before your very eyes and homeowners wait for the crews to come and haul it away like a memory no one wants.

And you see the thick fallen tree and you know what it sounded like in that home, for those people that rode it out. That horrible crack rising from the relentless howl of wind, then the sickening pause, and then the thud as it hit the wet ground, just missing your house this time. Families look at each other differently after surviving something big together. You’ve seen each other rise to a huge but anonymous occasion, some feat of derring-do or even plain stoic bravery that would not have been there otherwise, and it’s a bonding thing. And while we may be growing tired of being cooped up with our families right now, it’s the same kind of bonding.

While the 2020 hurricane season has seen the most active season to date, southeastern NC has been generally lucky for the most part. After the Isaias cleanup, we’ve mostly been left to watch The Weather Channel and see storm after storm barrel through the Gulf of Mexico and hammer that region on repeat, like a string of gutterballs.

But today we’re weathering a different storm – another force of nature that is keeping us inside. Now you look through the blinds and wonder how close the virus may be. Your neighbor checks his mail and you wonder if it’s in him, a car drives by and it could be in there flying through the vents, your takeout container may have a stray spore just itching to jump off onto your counter and multiply and slink to your coffee cups. A swirling storm is one thing, but the imagination can really run wild with an invisible threat.

Maybe next hurricane season, rather than looking at a branch nub or stump and recalling what happened a year ago, we’ll come across our old COVID-19 masks and reflect on what was lost and be thankful we survived this one, too.

Molson Molson Molson Molz

Our backyard is overrun with moles. Tunnels emerge every day and strolling through the grass is like stepping across paver stones made of sponge cake. Worst of all, the newest tunnels indicate that they are starting to recon our lush, verdant front yard and planning a freeway. I am an animal lover and occasional tree hugger, but the moles must die.

We’ve tried all sorts of mole removal techniques, resulting in zero moles removed. In fact, they have thrived despite all of the death traps we’ve put in their way. The impossible-to-set medieval spike trap that’s supposed to impale a mole when the thing is tripped, only trips when I test it with a twig. I set it up and the next day the unfazed moles have turned it into a pergola beside their newest tunnel. If you look closely you can see tiny ferns hanging from it. Poison pellets and toxic gummy earthworms are ignored. We’ve also applied the castor oil and dish detergent concoction that’s supposed to make them barf their way into someone else’s yard, but they just sit by the trap pergola at sunset and sip castor-tinis and listen to yacht rock.

There are so many generations of moles out there—they’ve been out there for so long—that the earliest tunnels are field trip destinations for the young moles, like the early subway tunnels of New York City.

It’s time for a new plan. We need a Captain Quint and maybe it’s you.

Remember the scene in Jaws where the people of Amity are trying to figure out what to do about their man-eating shark problem? They don’t want to close the beaches and ruin tourist season, but also don’t want to continue to chum the ocean with neighborhood kids. So Quint runs his fingernails down the chalkboard and makes his pitch: “I’ll find him for 3 [thousand], but I’ll catch him and kill him for 10. For that you get the head, the tail, the whole damn thing.”

We need someone to tell us what to do, or someone to come sit out in our yard and wait for the moles to surface and then shoot them with barrels before they dive back into their tunnels. Can you help?

Lines in the Sand

I am getting old and maybe boring, but a good day at the beach is now spent browsing shells left by the outgoing tide. Sure, I still swim with my kids, body surf, feel the pull of the currents, consider the endless horizon, share a brew or two with my wife, but the shells are the real draw.

Running my hands over drifts of shells, seeing what’s under the top layer, pulling up and examining fistfuls and letting the next wave free the mix from my grip and send it spiraling back through the water to resettle, only to get tumbled again instantly, in a perpetual tidal cyclone.

As the tide moves out, the shells are beached and finally still. They lay there under the relentless sun as people amble along, surveying the day’s offerings, picking up some things, passing over others like useless clutter. I wonder what these other combers are keeping, what makes the cut and gets displayed back in dusty little curios inside their landlocked houses. A giant shark’s tooth set beside the purple scallop shell, the broken sand dollar, a finger of coral that was once part of a living acre, smooth polished rocks of infinite size and color that were seemingly left in the drying sand by beach sprites.

Many fragments and the dull and monochromatic are picked up and deemed not quite pretty or interesting enough, so they’re discarded, or hurled back into the ocean to be scoured by salt and sand, again and again, until, years and years later, each piece is ground into grit or becomes just beautiful enough to be kept.

Our tidal treasures are collected in a faded, toddler’s Scooby-Doo tackle box on the beach, brought home and rinsed, and preserved in various glass jars on the fireplace mantel or in small heaps on tabletops as casual décor and a reminder of the natural. Occasionally, I’ll pull out what we’ve amassed over the years and sort it into like piles and examine the fine details and textures with the magnifying glass.

There are shell fragments with holes from odd snails that burrowed into them when they were complete and seemingly secure mini-fortresses, ate the blob creature inside and pulled back out, leaving perfectly symmetrical circles, arrayed in fantastic patterns. Other pieces have strange, seemingly intentional, etchings—grooves and runs of unknown origin that turned these impossibly hard surfaces into porous drawing pads.

I’m starting to think that these designs and crude symbols are some kind of message. So I look for the right ones, in the right pattern, scan for more code in what other browsers discard every time I wander the tide line, try to parse it out and analyze it back home when I inspect my new pieces and muse over the random marks that defy randomness. It’s like I’ve received these notes from the sea – maybe it’s a section of the reply, a mere phrase, to the messages in bottles that we’ve been chucking into the water for centuries.

There are other collectors out there with the shells that I’m missing, the ones with the coded etchings that would complete the message. We all have incomplete sets and can only figure this out by coming together and finding a way to share the odd clues that we’ve picked up and decided to keep.

Until then, the code remains unbroken and the ocean’s response will have gone out to everyone and to no one, an empty query, like sound waves through space seeking a receiver.

Everybody Left Me