I received a bundle of poems from a woman who described to me her experience of a life-shattering - in every way - event two years ago. While she had written poems earlier in her life, she discovered the therapy of poetry in reconnecting herself after the trauma. From her e-mail to me, I quote:
My poetry has been my salvation, my outlet; it has allowed me to see myself clearly. At times I would wake in the morning after writing late at night and look at my poetry and say, "Wow...did I write that?!!"
I am submitting under a pen name, as the "Victims of Violent Crimes Program" has told me to do everything possible to guard my anonymity. So without further adieu...I hope you will consider my poetry, and possibly it will touch someone else and give them hope. I feel like my life was given back to me, and I am determined not to waste it as I know there is light....Amazingly, on this spiritual journey I also learned what love was about...and experientially what joy that has brought into my life.
20 SECONDS
Soul Soliloquy
THE DRUMMING DIRGE
Me and Si-lan
MY HOUSE
I FILLED THE ICE CREAM WEEKEND
WITH MY FOUR GROWN SONS
ALONE BUT TOGETHER
HEALING...HELPING
MOVE DISORGANIZED BITS
OF ACCUMULATED JUMBLE
FROM THERE TO THERE
REPAIRING THE FRAGILE
CRACKS AND FRACTURES
OF OUR FAILINGS
DOZING IN THE HALF LIGHT OF DAWN
LIGHTLY SLEEPING
LONELY WAKING
IN A STRANGE ROOM
A STRANGE BED
A GIGGLY LITTLE BOY
HUGGING ME AWAKE
HIS CHUBBY ARMS ENCIRCLED 'ROUND MY NECK
HIS FROOT LOOP BREATH LOUDLY
WHISPERING TOP SECRET SECRETS
INTO MY EAR
REMINISCENTLY COMFORTING
REMEMBERING OTHER LITTLE BOYS
WARM WHISPERS AND CUDDLY TOYS
THE SLEEPING STILLNESS SURROUNDS US
HE IMPATIENTLY SNUGGLES
AND THEN HE IS GONE
WAS IT 20 SECONDS
OR TWENTY YEARS AGO?
DOESN'T MATTER...
IT SWEETLY FEELS THE SAME.
My soul ached with confusion
I peeked over the weeping wall of my private garden
And saw a shimmering rainbow
Beckoning to me
I was drawn like a lover
I clamored and climbed determinedly
Up the thorny precipice
Longing for the prismatic vision
Filling my senses and soul
At last I stood tall
My bare toes caressing the top of the wall
Misty rain licked the stinging tears from my face
The rainbow wrapped itself around me
Like wings
Floating on a silken ribbon of colors
I let my senses soar
Impetuously ecstatic
But then I felt the rainbow start to disengage
Dissipate...dissolve
I looked down and saw only miles of myself
Free falling, tumbling
Brilliantly incinerating like a falling star screaming
Through the universe
I felt my liquid core hardening
Collapsing into the infinite within
I heard my babies crying out to me
Tears of torment
I willed the shattered shards of me to congeal
My body and breath survived
My essence enlightened
My soul
Centered
I step out onto the wickered veranda
Pulling my shapeless straw hat snugly down to my ears
The old dog is roadblocking the steps
Basking his watermelon body in the noonday sun
Baking his arthritic bones in exhausted ecstasy
His eyelids flutter in an innocently shuttered greeting
Against the bright blinding light
I gaze at my tomatoes broiling in the sun
The dog has been deviously digging again, undermining things
The roses are razed, wilting and wan
I caress them with consolation
Gently I grovel in the gasping garden
The heat hacks through the thin soles of my decrepit canvas shoes
Insidious solar flames fry my neck
And flog my shoulders as I toil
Liquifying my soul
I revel in the purifying rivers of sweat seeping from my pores
My heart harping in my ears
Light-headed and lithesome
I float on a sea of endless and exotic possibilities and far-flung imaginings
The old dog commands attention
Thumping his tail in a drumming dirge
My muse ends
I seek shade
Parched and panting I am thirsty and so is he
I fetch
The door bang bangs behind me
He lays unmoving
Flatulent and fermenting
Black claws and fat paws caked with clotted dirt
Ignorant
In his heat-stroked stuporous sleep.
We are two women
Standing side by side in a desolate field.
Swaying
As a stalk of wheat and a stalk of rye
At the whim and will of the wind.
The Wind
Blowing us steadily in one direction
And then abruptly changing course
Ripping loose our roots
Our stalks tremble and we are ragged
Yet, our seeds happily soar on the breeze
Never to be held in our arms again.
Our Roots
The channel of our life force
As we joyfully lift our faces to the sun,
Cling onto the cool damp earth.
We feel the rumble of the plow
We bow our heads together in communion
We sigh as we slowly turn
And finally release our clutch on the muddy earth.
It is not the end of summer
It is the winter of rebirth
And then there will be the spring again.
I want to build a house of strength
An invincible fortress
Surrounded by a moat swimming with dolphindiles
I want the walls low enough to see overI want the doors wide open
Allowing the breeze to carry in the fragrance of spring
And all creatures wise and wonderful
The windows should be framed with thorny climbing roses
Iluminated from within,
Day and night warm and glowing and inviting
I need a safe house that will protect me from
Fear and Vulnerability
I will cloth myself in a cocoon of gossamer chainmail
I will have a giant dog with giant sharp teeth
I will feed him intruders and he will lick every drop of blood from the floor
I want guardian angels to watch over me
So I can sleep, and know that I will wake again
I want an army of brutish soldiers
Who will read poetry and ride awesome stallions through the countryside
Warning all of their omnipresence
I want an invisible forcefield around each of my sons
So that they may live their lives
In total safety and freedom
And finally,
The roof of my house will be a shimmering rainbow
And at the end of the rainbow
Will be the golden love of my life
We will whisper and sigh
And then when the final breath leaves my body
I will rejoice.