Well then, here we are

Last Friday I had surgery on my ankle to fix chronic pain that I incurred when my body decided it would be a great idea to not only enlarge my foot nerve, but attach it to the major artery running through said foot. So whenever I would step, extend, or use my foot, I was in constant pain. However, after the surgery, I feel so much better that I’ve been tempted to overdo it a bit because I can’t believe how much better I feel. Although I have irritation from the surgery site and some pretty impressive stitches, the pain level is more at a pinch instead of a cut-my-foot-off-for-the-love-of-Pete!

But I’m back and rolling again.

My friend posed the question: What if someone said “I love you” and you never heard it? It inspired the following poem entitled Rejected Love.

desertoasis

I’ve been told “I love you” in a million different ways

By thousands of different mouths promising devotion

In actions and in words designed to set my heart ablaze

With alchemic bumbling, “Drink this Number 9 potion.”

But the spells they cast upon my heart break up before they land

Their intentions not as holy as the unguarded that you proffered

In the secret place you’ve discovered, my oasis in the sand

While you accepted my treasure trove, they could not be bothered.

The Nomad

Come along and be a nomad with me.

Come along and be a nomad with me.

A Nomad once traveled from port to port,

for every face the Nomad met,

she searched for her own

trapped by her own design

fearful of herself

her own darkness hiding, only barely,

from her own sight.

The Nomad traveled from one end

of the world to the other

pausing only to learn and see

her soulful vision mirrored,

like an oasis,

back at her from the loving hearts

of other damaged spirits that wandered,

not quite as far as she,

from their own generational homes.

The Nomad rejected all roots

even those that moved her spirit

towards home. But, one day,

The Nomad sat at the edge of a great lake

witnessing the birds dance a complexity

backed by the setting sun that shadowed
the daytime heat with the promise of cool night.

The Nomad searched the sunlit blue

then the moonlit sparkles

She realized it was time to revive and reveal.

The Nomad danced abandon as she’d observed

the flight of her con-spirit-ors do

She slithered with colorful scarves

pouring rainbow colors from her fingers,

releasing all that no longer served

or caused her fear and anguish.

The nomad danced in large spirals

on the sands of the shore

revealing a fleshy spirit

ripe with juicy sweetness

filled to overflowing with kindness

that leaked onto her spirit

with compassionate ribbons of hope.

The Nomad wandered back across her path

carefully touching, delicately expressing

but growing bolder, more adept with her

new nudity, transparently clothed about her

Genuine in joy and with a resolved spirit

The Nomad settled into a new life

one more bountiful, wonderful, and thrilling

than any she had found in her journeys.

The Nomad’s own backyard filled with wonderful

The Nomad’s kitchen burst with spices

She had finally found the home for her spirit

that she’d thought was long forgotten but

was with her even in the darkness of her past.

Bone Filled Closets

“The problem with people is that we’re looking at everyone’s front door from our bone filled closets.” –Crystal Beeler

We show the world the prettiest of packages. We wear the nicest clothes we can afford, drive the best car we can, work at a job where we’re considered “A nice person,” hang out with our friends who think we’re hilarious/serious/odd/insert-other-attribute-here, and we still can’t see ourselves honestly. We pull the wool over our own eyes that we’re not as good as others. We hoodwink ourselves into believing we’re bad at everything and at times ponder why we’re even accepted any place at all.

But we reinforce this belief by telling each other about our humanity through platitudes of: “Everyone makes mistakes,” “Don’t worry, it will get better,” “You’re fine/okay,” or one of my favorites, “Pray that God forgives you,” shows me that we all want to be okay; Be considered okay. But hearing it from the outside while we stand in the midst of our failures can do the complete opposite of what we need to do for ourselves.

The truth is, we already have all the tools we need to be perfectly us. We are already loved. We are already beloved. We are already the perfect version of our collective experiences. When you can accept that, the world is ready for you to explore it with the awe and wonder of your spirit that isn’t linked to the physical plane but by your memories and experiences. A collective of the tried and true and the not such a great ideas mingled into the spicy delicious you.

But how do you get over the fear that others are seeing you as you see yourself? How do you look in the mirror with confidence that you have talents unique to you? How can you say that you’re less than anyone else when you are born into the right of love?

Take off the front door. Be the human you are without fear because it’s who you are. You are, with all your lumpy bumpy bits, amazing. On the physical sense (and yes this assumes), your heart is beating, your lungs are working, your kidneys are doing their thing, your bowels, your stomach, your entire blood vessel system are all working and you don’t have to think about any of it. You can’t run a mile? That’s okay because you can pick up a grain of rice between your toes. You can’t lift 100 pounds? That’s okay because you can read an entire book in a day.

Replace those negative thoughts with the things you CAN do even if they’re not remotely related. Look on yourself with the same compassion you’d show a friend who stripped off their pretty package and had a meltdown in the grocery store. See yourself as a child who only occasionally needs correcting by your loving attention. Give yourself tenderness by taking time to recharge/renew/revive yourself.

There is no shame in taking care of yourself. People will come and go in your lifetime which means that you are the ultimate expert on you. You’re the only one that is around you 24/7/365. You are the only one who know your every thought, every emotion, every goal, every dream, every aspiration, and what makes your truly happy. I repeat, there is no shame in taking care of yourself.

Comparing yourself to others is judging yourself in the harshest of lights. There is no room for error when you’re trying to measure up to someone else. However, if you realize that you are your only competitor for your life and spirit, it really is empowering to know that you can set the goals YOU need to feel successful.

Search deeply into your hidden secrets without fear. You already know what they are. They aren’t a surprise to you. You lived them. You experienced them. You learned from them. Throw them around the room as if you were looking for your favorite toy or outfit that somehow got buried under years of denial, regrets, self-loathing, shame, guilt, and other harmful self-incriminating tactics you’ve used against yourself to declare an invalid self-worth.

Just like as if you were doing a spring cleaning in your house, do so with the negative. You can keep the lessons you’ve learned, but don’t cherish that time you hit your brother over the head with a dictionary. Let it go. If we hold onto the childish mistakes of our past, we’re likely to hold onto the inexperienced or ignorant issues of our adulthood. This isn’t self-care, this is self-sabotage. You’re worth more than that.

By allowing yourself your humanity, you’re giving the gift of yourself to others in a way that can’t be duplicated. Embrace yourself with the knowledge that your imperfections, quirks, obsessions, snarkiness, anger, kindness, and actions are a reflection of the spirit of your humanity.

Give yourself the greatest gift you can give to yourself, love. Everything you are is utterly fantastic. Even the worst thing you’ve ever done is not the definition of you but a measure of how far you’ve come. Put down the baseball bat you’ve been beating yourself with and let those cuts, scars, and bruises heal. When you reach for that self-abuse, remember that a loving person would never harm you. You ARE that loving person. I don’t even know you and I can tell you this for a fact.

A Perfect Storm


I love a good storm. The kind where the wind blows so strongly it feels as if I jumped, I could fly as far as the winds would take me. Strong enough to tickle my clothes against my skin in strapping slaps. The kind that threatens imminent danger but harms nobody. The kind that cracks branches, throws flower pots, and stomps through the curtains flying in my windows.

I love a good storm. The kind where stepping out of shelter immediately soggys my clothing. The rain that forces me to seek an umbrella in a feeble hope that it will be enough. The kind of rain that outcries every sad moment; Cleansing deep down into my spirit.

I love a good storm. The kind that holds the early summer heat intimately as a lover. The kind that compels me to lay naked on my bed with the windows wide open, towels on the windowsills. The moment when the heat speaks the language of eternity and I bow in submission.

I love a good storm. The kind where rage-full graces flash across the sky. The kind that turns the sky with powerful strokes into a momentary masterpiece. The chocolate sky drizzles cotton candy oranges onto a grey palette. The kind that temporarily freezes the world; burning into my retinas. It’s a perfect snapshot of my world, gifted to my memories.

I love a good storm. The kind that sounds like it explodes my windows with the force of it’s response. The kind that shakes the earthworms up from their homes. The kind that startles me with its ferocity. Or the kind that washes the air with bass so rich the earth applauds. Man, I do love a good storm.

Chronos woos Thanatos

Let the heavens encircle me and devour me whole

For there is no consolation discovered in my soul

As I stare at flirtatious Chronos, intimate with Thanatos

Life’s theater curtain dropping embroidered with asbestos

I howl my lamentations, tears are tumbling forth

I beseech every corner: East, West, South, and North

That this play has no finale, that this can’t be the last act

But there in the doctor’s lines printed, it’s a matter of fact.

My suspended disbelief refuses to actualize this truth

While Chronos solicits Thanatos with a mortal bloom of youth.

Their eternal courtship dances on the stage in front of me

I glare daggers at their conduct, contempt at their complicity

All Grown Out: TRIGGER WARNING!!!

I was sent a link to this video by a friend of mine. It punched me really hard in the face, but in an inspirational way. I pulled up Word and started writing in time to the video. Some of this isn’t in there, some of it is, but it made me think about reactions and how others deal with trauma.

Every one of my dolls had genitalia
Carved into their bodies
Testament to that 10% I couldn’t see
Of that 100% “friendship” he promised me
And the 90% of his misogyny
Bloomed rottenly
Beneath his alleged kindness
That made my body feel good
But my soul feel dirty, covered in blood
Take your foot off from my neck
But MAN-ipulation made me beg
Without cognition,
For the shame
And guilt to rule me and to reign
PTSD
An unforeseen eulogy,
That mourned what I could never be
I wouldn’t be as stupid as her
I would never wear that
I had to divide my attentions
From those that “came out”
Separating myself from the victims
Because I said repeatedly
“It will never happen to me.”
When it did, I couldn’t say
Because of how they’d see me “that way”
You know him
Not a stranger in the bushes
With a weapon
My boyfriend, husband, acquaintance
Breaking my trust, my faith, my beliefs, my body
And my stunned silence fights back
But there is “Nothing we can do”
Say the police, my friends, my family
That couldn’t happen to me
I wasn’t ready
I said no
I didn’t want it
I put away those dolls from my childhood
Stained with my innocence
Refused by me because they allowed
Me to violate their bodies
Just like mine.

My path to Spiritual Love

Hello there! You’ve indulged my need to post poems for a couple of weeks now. For that indulgence, I thank you. I’ve been grateful for the kindness you’ve shown as I show you snapshots of the people in my life and although there are more that I will be sharing, I thought it would be nice if you could see a snapshot of me and pray the same indulgence.

I’m not telling you this story to be a witness or a proponent of the church I am now a member of, but to explain how I came to my own realization of my own faith. I don’t think anyone or anything can tell you how to find faith, love, or even whether or not God exists. I find love and God, in my life, to be synonymous. It’s my goal to help others because that satisfies my love for myself, my love for my neighbors, and builds a stronger community. I’m not asking for you to believe as I do nor am I encouraging you to follow my path. I say, flat out, that I’m not a Christian and I experience God like the Cowardly Lion,  “I do believe. I do believe. I do believe in ghosts!” But I do try to live by a basic rule, Love My Neighbor as Myself. It is difficult to do when people don’t “get” me, but I still put forth the effort because I also use Namaste.

We are ONE

We are ONE

I’ve attended so many different churches and other religious establishments in my lifetime. No matter where I landed my butt on a Sunday morning, my primary concern of finding faith in the love of God became discarded after a conversation with a pastor’s wife in Lake Station, IN. At the time, I attended and was heavily involved in a Covenant church which has rather extreme views about the roles of women and men. It felt awkward, but it pleased my husband so…I went, participated, and attempted to alter my heart to fit into the culture.

The nutshell version of that garden conversation is this: God won’t accept you if you don’t believe in Jesus.

This did not fit with my heart. It didn’t even come close. At that moment I realized, that for me, God (or whatever face you see or don’t) can’t be contained into a neat label any more than an individual can be labeled only one thing. I left the church in search of Love as the face of God.

Johnny Lee’s 1980 hit, “Looking for love (in all the wrong places)” fits quite nicely. I searched everywhere I could think to without results. Years passed, I didn’t even claim faith any more. At times I’d even mock the faithful for being so gullible as to fall into the junkie mentality with religious fervor and misguided ideals.

A shift in the spiritual winds of my soul started out as a light breeze, but about two years ago, it hit with a hurricane force. There was no fanfare. There wasn’t anybody asking me to go to their church. There wasn’t any outside influence suggesting to me via written, conversational, or other form of communication telling me to go to church. It just happened. A screaming Mimi in my mind saying, “GO NOW!”

A friend of mine held a group that I really dig at the Oak Ridge Unitarian Universalist Church (ORUUC). The fact that they allowed that particular group to meet under their roof (It’s the Red Tent Temple) caught my attention. Noting the time of their service as I drove past, I thought, well if I get up on Sunday, I’ll give it a try. I had no intention of honoring that fleeting thought.

As it happened, my eyes popped open early enough to not only shower, drink coffee, dress, lounge, and still make it to the service that I felt compelled to comply with my intuition that started doing a happy dance as soon as I accepted the wisdom.

I entered the church expecting what I was familiar with, a fashion show with pretty people pretending to be good long enough to get a pat on the head from the pastor then back to neglecting their spirits for the rest of the week. Cynical, yes, but that’s how I viewed the church.

Instead, there were people in jeans, dresses, suits, bohemian eclectic, dressy casual, and they were hugging each other. Genuinely hugging. Not the “A” hugs where the hips don’t meet. Not the half-hugs where an arm and a hip touch. But “I” hugs, the sincerely glad to see you kind. The welcome table had a sign in sheet and name tags. I refrained. I figured if they want to know, they’ll ask. It weirded me out as the service time got closer when I saw friend after friend of mine from social media arriving. Then I was the one being embraced with “I” hugs. I was still resisting.

The service was pretty typical at first. Call to worship, blah blah blah. But, the first hymn I heard? John Lennon’s “Imagine.” That got my attention. Who in the world uses secular music, even with peaceful intent, in a church service? My WTF button came out of my pocket as my skepticism faded. I checked the bulletin and found that the next hymn would be John Denver’s “Sunshine on my shoulders.” I choked through the rest of the service in disbelief. Who were these people?!

I didn’t go back for a long time, over a year I think, because the idea that there were others like me searching on their own paths gave me pause. But there was something that called me to return to “those people.” I started attending pretty regularly. Atheists, Buddhists, Humanists, Christians, Jewish, Conservationists, Scientists, all of them together under the same roof in the spirit of love.

One of those people and I had a conversation. She said that everything was created by God but humans are the only one of those into which God breathed life.

“Love is the breath of God.” I thought.  Those words encompass my daily journey to pursue my peace and happiness, harmony with my fellow human beings despite their circumstances or situations. As my favorite song says, “When I breathe in, I breathe in peace. When I breathe out, I breathe out love.”

What you give up

It is far too easy to look towards one’s reflection
To pick apart the beauty; to give in to dereliction
The voices shriek in anger, “How dare you hold your dream!?”
While all along they’re hearing the same bitter peppered screams.
Up in Grandma’s attic filled with cobwebs and dust
Generations scorching them with, “You must, you must, you must.”
There is a wisdom holy that I must pass to you and give
There is truly only one life you have, one life for you to live.
When your eyes drop down with despair, the tears they freely flow
Remember in your heart and soul that you already know
That love is the only answer, that giving is its boon
Gyrate your hips to the music you hear, spiral the cycling moon.
Lift your maudlin mourning eyes for love isn’t found beneath
Don’t believe that you’re not worthy, heed not whispers from deceit.
There is no certain way to be, no cookie cutter being
Remove the power of the “You can’ts.” Remove the acidic peeling.
You are truly valuable, turn loose those inner fears
They’ve been inherited by people who wasted all their years.
Open up your heart to love with the jagged and glued pieces
Take in the deepest breath of peace know you’re perfect and release it.
Because NOBODY can ever know you, exactly as you are
with all your lumpy bumpy bits, your tatters, and your scars
Those are the imperfections that make you perfectly you
You are worthy, you are beautiful, I swear that this is true.

Passing the Torch

As I hung upside down from my family tree
I asked my mother if she resented me
She smiled with wind-chime clarity
Refusing to acknowledge my self-penalty.
She shook her head to disagree
My mother politely said to me,
“You will not understand. You will not see
Until that day the veil calls me
And my face you can no longer see
Just how much you’re loved by me.
But do not worry, do not despair,
For I’m not going anywhere.
My fire won’t die, you’ll hold the spark,
As I pass the torch of the matriarch.”

Nudity Not Optional

Where did my clothes go?

You know,

the warm, comfortable,

perfectly fit ones

with the beautiful colors

that complimented my

every move?

When did I get so naked?

You know,

the raw and futile

belief that everything,

no matter how small,

would keep me warm?

How did I lose my skin?

You know,

the one I felt at ease within

no matter what I tried

to accomplish;

the skin that held my confidence?

Has anyone seen my hair?

You know,

the hair that curtains my face

when I don’t want you to see

that the world isn’t as kind

as I wanted to believe?

What about my feet?

My hands? My hips? My breasts?

You know,

the ones that used to run away

when things got hard?

The ones that comforted tears,

raised the roof, fledged passions?

The ones that balanced my lost clothes

at my side as a mother to a child?

The ones that begged for attention,

offering supplication to the needs?

Where did my clothes go?

Why am I saw raw and naked?