Tag Archives: pain

Four years

A funeral is a condensed soup of stories

a testament to how they moved through the world

honoring the human they are no longer

wish flowers blown free by a child’s breath

The absence of their laughter, wisdom, joy

is a sullen void of yearning

Haunting the rooms where they lived

with a sharp recognition of the hollowness

The mortality displayed on our own faces

The recognition of our fleeting contribution

Our role in the stone soup of life

Our own responsibility to love so loudly

that we echo through our children,

leak into the community with emboldened abandon

Cherish each gift of spent intimacy

whether it came neatly wrapped in shiny paper

or a hurried wrapping in Sunday comics

Who we are is a reflection of everyone we know

who we become is the distillation of their best parts

Miss Mabel, June 13, 2025

The Witnesses (updated)

To honor Good Friday, (2015) I was asked to write a poem. I do not proclaim a faith, just a belief in love and the goodness of the human beings that walk this plane. The three part poem below is written from three perspectives witnessing the crucifixion. When it is read, it is from three different voices they come. I hope it speaks to your spirit if you’re so inclined.

Verse One: The Observer

I’m not a Christian, but Lord, if I was,

I’d not stand by and watch them offer up applause

For that man they called a criminal for preaching about love

For the one some call Messiah, while others cry Peaceful dove.

I stand here in the crowd as they cheer this brother’s pain

My heart is filled with sorrow, as his beaten body strains

The laughter that I hear from the festive vicious hearts

Breaks something inside of me, tears my faith apart

I want to scream above the crowd, “HEAR!”

In a voice shrill and loud, “ME!”

With my head no longer bowed, “LORD!”

Releasing my own funeral shroud, “I AM NEAR!”

But I am weak, just human. I am nothing compared to them.

But maybe, my kindred spirits, that’s what moves me to condemn

For I love my God with all my heart, and in God’s house I walk

I serve in supplication, I don’t just talk the talk.

I am not a Christian, but Lord, if I ever loved,

I’d heed the wisdom of the dying man, and thank my God above.

Verse Two: The Participant

How dare that man pass his judgement down on me!

Who does he think he is, telling ME how to believe?!

I’ve learned and taught the toe-RAH

I’ve worshipped at the sacred altar

I’ve cantered every prayer

I can recite them without flaw or falter.

Then this mortal man comes along and claims to be

Far more holy than even me?

The Son of God? Oh, reeeeaaaaaaallly!?

I’ve fixed that preachy “Love Thy Neighbor” fellow

I paid my thirty silver to hear him scream in falsetto.

Sometimes the laws I enforce prevent me from doing what’s right

I pass the coins to Roman hands, let them bloody their own hands tonight

This should make my people think twice before leaving our faith

To follow a crazy instigator, that rejects my loving God’s face.

Verse Three: The Intimate

I am hidden in the darkness, afraid to show my face

“Oh Lord, why’d they tell us that Yeshua fell from grace?

You showed me my friend Judas with thirty silver in his fist

Forsake my dear beloved with cold betrayal’s kiss

You let my holy brother be taken

from the garden where we prayed.

You allowed him to be arrested

when you could have let him stay.”

I am hidden in the darkness, afraid they’ll point at me and say

That I was clearly one of his. That they’ll kill me the same way.

“Oh Lord, why have they called for my redeemer to be killed?

When ne’er a drop of anguish from his gentle lips have spilled?

I do not feel you near, Oh God, I’ve lost your loving light

When they took my sweet friend, Yeshua, away in darkest night.

If I weren’t hidden in the darkness, barely safe from Roman harm

I’d scream out my torment, beating my chest to sound alarm.

“Hosanna! Hosanna! I sing to your precious name

Hosanna! Hosanna! My finger points my brother’s shame.

My faith is ever yours, even when I don’t understand.

I mean, you took us through the desert, 40 years we wandered sand

And yet, my Father, I hide here, within this darkened room

I wonder, holy patriarch if his death will also be my doom.”

I am hidden in the darkness, despair my wretched dominion

Oh God! My Loving God! Remove my deserter’s vision.”

Love Showed Up

When I have been in darkest pain
Feeling I could not hope again
Love showed up.
When I felt lost and overwhelmed
Riding grief on a boat unhelmed
Love showed up.
When I’d thought my demon’s vanquished
But they roared to life, causing anguish
Love showed up.
It didn’t try to change my pain
But gently whispered, “Try again.”
Love showed up.
It didn’t try to change my trouble
It helped me to clean up the rubble
Love showed up.
It helped me navigate which way to travel
Clothing myself in threads unraveled
Love showed up.
Its compass pointed to my true north
Showing me how to sally forth
Love showed up.
It walked beside me on meandering paths
Teaching forgiveness for my past
Love showed up.

Unknown Sacrifice

The earth requires sacrifice

The blood of generations

Spilled to sate the thirst

Women’s children slain

Prayers washing sins away

From the dearly departed

Best dressed pieces

Shards of life protruding

Draining deeply into the mud

Returning to the dust

willing to be sheep for causes

Draped in flags of uniform coffins

Souls unwittingly worth pennies to borrow

Billionaire comfort on widow’s grief and sorrow

Stardust and Oceans

I held your hand while stroking your cheek

Whispering to you the depth of my hearts belief

You stared blank at the ceiling but I knew you still there

When the winds stirred the curtains to brush at my hair

With rattled breath you returned to the ocean

Waving goodbye with the power of rawest emotion

Your sweet and gentle passing has erased your pain

But in doing so has increased mine, bring on the rains

Silent your breast, cooling of skin, I sat next to you so very alone.

It was a sacred privilege, an honor, to walk your stardust spirit home.

The Blank Canvas

I should be painting right now, but I’m staring at the canvases lined up thinking of you instead. I say I don’t think of you, but I do. It’s usually late at night in the silence of a sleeping house. I just get the feeling that if you were here, things would be better. I mean, I know they wouldn’t be, they’d be the same, but I could talk to you about them. I could ask for your wisdom and you’d laugh at me.

“Wisdom isn’t something that can be taught,” You’d laugh. “It has to be learned. The only thing I could possibly do is guide you away from what I’ve already tried that didn’t work.” Then you’d ruffle my hair. I’d act annoyed but I wouldn’t forget.

I look at the canvas and I think, “AHA! I’ll paint you!” Because you were always so beautiful to me. So real that even my own body sometimes felt alien, unkempt, and unruly as I watched you move with grace even though your shoulders were hunched over and you shuffled your feet. I don’t know how to capture everything you meant to me. I don’t know how to not cry when I remember the jokes you told me, how you cheated at cards, your morning prayers, poker with buttons, or sauerkraut making in the basement with the family.

How can I capture the truth of what it felt like to be with you? What it meant to be the most important person in the world in a room full of people with every one of them feeling the same way. You never excluded anyone from your love. You never turned anyone away who came asking, or just to be near you. You were filled with an unending capacity that I strive to achieve because I admired it so much.

I sit here looking at the colors of paints in messy bottles, well loved paint brushes drying after last nights foray, and I wish, I just wish I could hug you again. I wish you could tell me with your heart that you love me too.I wish I could coax the colors to obey my command regarding you. But they sit as still as a stalked mouse with me the pouncing cat. The brushes feel like hammers in my hands, refusing as well to obey.

I feel you sometimes, particularly in the wee hours of the morning. It’s usually when I pour my first cup of coffee from the still brewing pot. I sit down at my table and I look at the spot where my husband and usually the guests sit. I can see you sitting there with your own cup, smiling at me. Together we take that sip and the hot bitter beauty washes my tongue with scalding hot communion. We exhale and whisper the prayer together. Then, you usually go wherever you go while I talk to my ceiling and look to the sky.

My canvas is still blank. My heart remembers you. And for no particular reason, my wish is that you hear my words, “I love you so very much.”

Preying Hands

Preying hands

Preying hands

I took my vow of silence when I unwillingly walked the aisle

I knew that once sealed, I was lost. I hoped to be.

I kissed his lips knowing they were poison

I tenderly held his hands that blessed me with curses;

beat me, berated me, tore me down to the floor where

I prayed at his altar with bloody knees,

“Please! I won’t sin again!”

I genuflected my resolved acceptance

of my worth from his unholy blessings and unlawful prayers.

I lay prostrate, willing myself to Mother Mary

Falling short of grace;

denied her forgiveness.

With the community choir ignoring the sermon

of discipleship he insisted I learn,

fifth in hand

I begged physical communion

I knew he’d lay down the fists for lustful sins

grunting self-satisfied “amens” of self-approval.

While I lynched my own redemption

on the clothesline laden with our dirty laundry

begging silently with screaming stains of humiliation

Betrayal drip drying fresh spilled secrets

Everybody listened

Nobody came.

Everybody knew

but denied my name.

Until

I found my voice

Until

I left six bullets in the clip

putting them safe in my pocket

one still in the chamber.

I knew you were a crappy shot

I won my life in a daring public race of rushing roulette

As I ran among my neighbors that I’d shared bread with

taken their children on vacation, gifted with Christmas

Challenging them to shine a light,

to allow me one phone call from my personal prison

Each house darkened but one remained.

My prayers finally answered

by confused badges of protect and serve honor.

I surrendered my protection

my haven

my home

because his shame lied

lay bruises on my arms.

Hear this, Father of my ex-communication,

I am again holy.

I am true in spirit.

I walk in grace while you walk in your valley of darkness

I pray you find your way to your own righteousness

I pray you never feel the transgressions you offered to me

visited upon your person

I pray that understanding of your offense

be never washed in the blood of another.

Amen and Blessed Be

NaPoWriMo: Pain and Sleep

Pain in the Foot

Love, Lucky Happiness, and Courage. You can see Courage and part of the luck in this picture.

Love, Lucky Happiness, and Courage. You can see Courage and part of the luck in this picture.

The best thing that ever happened to me was pain

I’m not a masochist if that’s what you think

(and even if I was, that’s personal preference not pain).

I worked many jobs that didn’t quite fit me.

Who needs happiness when I got bills, ya get me?

Then I learned about pain when I bare handed broke my foot

THUMP! VOMIT! “That can’t be good.”

Two days of crying while I hobbled around before I got to see

A doctor who looked at me and exclaimed, “HOW could you BE?!”

I’d collapsed my foot bones, broke them in two

By rubbing a cream on my foots that were as stressed as I was.

But that pain, that pain that, two years later remains

Is a constant reminder of how much I’ve gained.

I have time to create, to speak, to volunteer.

I have time to be, to love, to give, to cheer.

Pain has pushed me to places I’d never have learned

Pain has given me new ideas to churn.

But Pain, dear pain, has given me more of myself

Than anything I’ve done, nay, anything else.

It’s taught me courage, strength, endurance

It’s taught me to keep going even with hindrance

Pain is a wicked friend but it never lies to me

It allows me to push limits; to set up healthy boundaries

Pain is the best thing that ever happened to me

My only issue is when it won’t let me sleep.

magalyguerrero.com/napowrimo-with-magaly-guerrero-2015 NaPoWriMo

magalyguerrero.com/napowrimo-with-magaly-guerrero-2015
NaPoWriMo

NaPoWriMo: Feeling So Deeply

NaPoWriMo

NaPoWriMo

IT HURTS!

I heard my Gram scream in the desolate silence

It was early January, out in the country, snow to navel

five blanket kind of freezing and she was screaming.

I jolted awake, scrambling beneath the cocoon of blankets

She screamed as if the hounds of hell were chasing her

When I reached her side, she was five years old.

I rocked her back to sleep.

IT HURTS!

I walked into my home with hope shining brightly

on legal sized paper declaring my parental rights

The phone rang, it was handed to me.

I listened as the perfection I imagined

threw me to the floor unable to support my vision

ripping a universe apart with six words

unable to support the weight of my sorrow as I screamed

IT HURTS!

I rode the elevator upwards without hope, holding knowledge.

I waited patiently for the doctors to return to the room

waited but already knew what they’d discovered.

He was dead. I was alone. There was a void of pain.

An echo of maybe and an absolute removal from now.

When I leaned down to kiss the cold skin of his once warm forehead

I was pulled away for my contamination of the saint with my sinner’s taint.

IT HURTS!

He packed the last of his things into the suitcase.

My eyes barely opened from the days of begging on my knees

My lip bloodied from our last confrontation

when he tried to burn the music out of my soul

when he tried to show me who ruled the roost.

I sat on the cold slab floor with brown tile hiding my shame

I deserted his God. I left him with the pile of discarded cardboard.