I waved goodbye
gazing into
blue space
as rattling metal
dissipates,
leaving
dust
in its wake.
‘Change is the
only constant’
I remind myself
as I turn back to the adobe
to prepare for
my own leave – taking
with a hole in my heart.
Am I always saying goodbye?
The next day
I cannot get out of bed.
Is it too much to expect
that I can continue
to endure these ruptures
that catapult my body into
a coal black cosmos,
even as a spring veil
casts her grace
over the land?
I have no answers
to these questions.
I lean into gray – green
imagining warm rain
that falls quietly for hours
aligning myself
with elements
I trust – hoping
for insight.
I dream about Black bears,
those primal mystics of the forest.
Like them I must have a Tall Tree
to sleep under, to lean upon…
On the outside
I endure
my body exhausted,
wrung out, as
I throw a furry coat
over a shivering child
who no longer trusts
that dawn will come.
Postscript:
I am struck by the personal truth that childhood abandonment creates its own powerful reality – a closed system that even the most self -aware adult cannot shift. Developing keen awareness regarding this issue may even make this ‘knowing’ more difficult because it becomes impossible to medicate this void with denial or any other kind of drug* induced coma. What is left is to endure. This is the position I find myself in as I attempt to create a bridge to move from one beloved earth-space to another.
*I use the word drug in the cultural sense not restricting myself to medical/ recreational drug overuse, although, of course, I include these with the others. We often cite medical/or recreational drug users as the core problem while the rest of us appear to be numb to the fact that unhealthy addiction includes any behavior that is taken to the extreme in every day life. It’s also important to recognize that we live in a culture that celebrates “doing” (read as addiction) as the way of life. In this way of thinking if a person is not actively engaged with some activity or machine every second of her/his time then there is something amiss. Being alive isn’t enough. Healthy doses of silence and self-reflection are not considered useful.
