May 2013
15 posts
the strength is not out there,
it’s here, it’s here
it’s here
“In the meantime, like John the beloved, rest you head on the loving heart of...”
– sister pius
i chose to care,
i chose to get care.
i gave him my eyes.
it’s quiet, here, this morning—this place of the heart.
“Nonviolence is the deepest energy for transformation.”
– John Philip Newell
the ego is not the center,
deeper,
deeper,
deeper.
what refuses to unfold is dead.
we decided that at the very foundations of all theology, psychology, mysticism, and belief was a simple, transformative notion:
to be with.
why is it only when—
saying goodbye,
being stripped down,
waiting,
left alone,
(almost as naked as on our arrival)—
boarding an aircraft,
thoughts take me
from this place, to that place,
where faces
are the only things that matter;
where loving and being loved become
a
kind of
urgency.
“How does it serve you to keep a life you do not like?”
– dan b. allender
the unconscious fear, i believe,
is what it will cost me.
what is trying to be born again?
April 2013
28 posts
i am alone with the Alone;
i am telling secrets to myself.
It’s never like we plan.
3 tags
always, i marvel at you,
blessed ones,
at your courage,
at your tenacity,
at yearnings & desires to be
good & whole & helpful & (most of all)
free.
always, i marvel at you,
blessed ones,
for your ability to war,
simultaneous,
your willingness
to
lay
down
the
sword—
and suffer the kindness of your god,
but more importantly,
yourselves.
i come here, this morning as i have many mornings, to my secret corner (it is good for one to have secret corners) to begin; to begin another day of ending; to witness another day of remarkable death.
“Goodbyes are only for those who love with their eyes. Because for those who love...”
– rumi
jay most remembers the story where i ran outside
screaming
my father’s new secret,
private,
unlisted,
telephone number;
he remembers with a hint of laughter
at that rebellious little soul,
but mainly with deep, deep grief
& agony
& sadness.
____
for that young boy,
so many years later,
would still be searching for
his dad’s secret numbers—
for the codes
...
this lighting,
is terrible & perfect—
forty seven minutes past six.
we both gaze out the large window, due west,
partially blinded;
we are tasting sunshine;
drinking it in,
but through squinted eyes.
the dust saunters in here,
the leaves, the blooms, out there.
we are two animals,
taking a moment.
this season has been one of true testing;
i built a sanctuary inside myself.
i’m afraid
that life will leave me behind;
that i’ll be left.
“the rich and lucky can afford to be silent, nobody wants to hear their stories...”
– rilke
oh, how i disdain the sound that goodbye makes, they are such sorrowful syllables, dripping, with secret agony and dismissals, unwilling, unable, unrelentless in thinking things will, again, be as they were. that we, again, will eat at the table, or draw from the fountain of transformation.
oh, how we blind ourselves with our own delusions, and suffer later,
rather than now.
in my rebellion
in my heartache
in my cries of
crucify him!
in my own tiny thousand deaths
i
see
god,
but not the god i’ve called before.
She whispered in my ear
that i was family,
i would always be family
if I were only a little more…
this whole thing?
would have been ours.
“I believe in kindness. Also, in mischief.”
– Mary Oliver
And, I, was myself.
Some love never completely fades,
rather,
it lies dormant like a cancer,
just waiting,
for a sentence like that,
to resurrect it
from the
grave.
at thirty-thousand feet,
with bright shoes,
above bright clouds,
i sat.
i enjoyed my stiff drink of soda
and thought of you.
if only if only if only
if only if only if only
if only if only if only
if only if only if only
had I been a little less cowardly,
a little less afraid,
I could have, too,
given you my everything.
but because I abandon myself,
I abandon you.
Let us go on.
“To study psychological trama is to come face to face both with human...”
– judith herman
I‘m about half crazy with wonder, the other half crazed by pressure, despair, hopelessness and shame—
regardless, I’m roaring with delicious madness.
I wept in front of him; I permitted the tears to cascade down my face, for it had been a while.
“We are all dependent, yet so alone.”
– wilfred bion
March 2013
20 posts
and i noted within the chambers of myself that, mainly, all i ever wanted was to wear that hat of belonging.
on this night,
this night,
i bear my own shame.
the seconds on my mustard pale watch
ticks tocks
ticks tocks
the refrigerator humming as softly as a hybrid car i drove one winter,
barely noticeable.
i slip my forehead into my left hand—
carrying,
holding the load,
bearing the weight,
of a head barely above water
i am a rowboat flirting with a waterfall
I asked him if he didn’t need me anymore—if he wanted to quit me before I could quit him.
I just sat, with my hands on my face; with my face in my hands, I just sat.
i didn’t know what to do.
The most hellish and heartbreaking thing about this work, he softly confessed, is that you see how destructive patients are towards their own selves.
