Category: poetry

The Sign

April 29th, 2022

Photo by Franceso Alberti

I have had the great benefit of having many spiritual mentors over the course of my life. I grew up surrounded by people that loved me and had my best interests at heart. But I also grew up in a denomination that was fracturing over a number of issues. The biggest question that impacted me personally was the role women had to play in spiritual life. My congregation was affirming of women and their gifts. We valued women and their leadership. We ordained women and placed them where they were being called to serve. Unfortunately, none of those choices could fully protect women in our church from sometimes feeling the pain of a denominational crisis that centered on them.

When she is broken

And she doesn’t have words

She will creep down the dim hallway

To the place where she doesn’t need them.

And there on the door

She will read the rules:

“Menstruating women are not permitted to use the prayer room.”

And as she stares, she will wonder

Why God gave her this body

That men will seek to possess

While dismissing the human inside it.

But then she will reach out

Gently peel the sign from the door.

She will crumple it slowly in one hand

Before tossing it into the bin where it belongs.

Then she will open the door

And defy the rules they dared to set

Because if not for a woman

And her blood

They wouldn’t have their Christ.
Disease

April 26th, 2022

Photo by Reza Hasannia

I have not always had the best self-esteem. I am, at heart, a people pleaser. I want everyone to like me, and when they don’t, a level of self-doubt and even self-loathing starts to infect me. Poor self-image can be just as debilitating as any other mental health issue. The times in my life when I have not liked who I was, most often brought about by trying to be someone else, I wanted to cut out all the parts of me that felt like they didn’t fit. It felt like the person I was trying to become had to kill the person I was pretending to be.

I wish you would penetrate my spirit

This darkness that craves you wants me to become

Something different- something made of you and me.

So force your will on me, violently, so I can’t protest

An overpowering of me so complete that I disappear.

Choke out this darkness that has become me

And devour all my bright, hot parts until

My blood runs down your body and then lick it

Off your teeth.

Slip inside of me so far

Until everything I feel, you feel

One creature, one life, one beating spirit

Push yourself so far into me that I can’t tell

Where you start and I end,

Until I fall out the other side of this disease

This darkness that would let me be consumed.
You Know What I Mean

April 22nd, 2022

Photo by Mayur Gala

I had a spiritual mentor once that was only a few years older than I was. He was not just a mentor, but he was a dear friend. During our time together, I grew to love him in a powerful way, a way that I couldn’t quite define. It was a holy kind of love, where you can feel the other person pulling you towards a better version of yourself. He blessed my life in ways I can’t put into words. I miss him terribly. Normalize telling people you love them. It really isn’t as awkward as you think it is.

I can say this to you because you know what I mean

If I said this to someone else, he might take it wrong

And if someone overheard she might think

Why would I admit it?

But they don’t understand. They don’t know what’s in my heart when I say this to you:

I love you.

And I don’t mean it in the way that people use it

Like “I love peanut butter” or “I love Fridays”

Because you aren’t an event or a commodity

Something that’s tasty or fun.

No, not like that. You aren’t a thing at all.

And I don’t mean it in the way that’s scandalous

Like “I love you. Let’s keep it a secret”

Because I already have a bedmate

And you don’t need or want another one.

No. It isn’t that kind of love.

And I certainly don’t mean it in the way people use

To describe their frustrations.

“I love my sister but…” or “My uncle is…but I love him.”

No. That’s not what I mean when I say this:

I love you.

It’s much more than that

Because when you are near I can’t help being drawn

Into your fire

Burning with passion and light

Pointing to something that is outside and yet inside of me

That can keep my fire going.

That’s what this “I love you” is like.

You know what I mean.
On The Lakeshore

April 19th, 2022

Photo by Brian Beckwith

I had a bad breakup in my early twenties, the kind that makes you reconsider everything. Shortly afterwards, I went on a trip with my family to the Great Lakes. Lake Superior is wildly beautiful in ways that words cannot capture. That trip turned into a spiritual quest for me. There, at the water’s edge, I remember deciding that I should start being myself, instead of who I thought I should be.

Deep, endless water

Dark, angry; a grave of many men.

Waves splash, choppy white-caps crest

Are swallowed, softly crash against the shores.

It is cold. The beach stretches out for miles

Rocks, pebbles, stones. No sand.

Not here, in the north.

Summer doesn’t seem to penetrate.

Sun shines, not a cloud in the sky

But the breeze is chill and frosty.

A wide open sea

Mysterious as it is beautiful.

Compelling, my heart cries to sail off into its waters

Until I reach a brand new world.

I feel free.

I am shedding all the shackles I had

And drowning in the possibility

Of a rebirth after such an agonizing death of my heart.

Reborn on this lakeshore.

Secluded. Wild. Free.
Vulnerable

April 15th, 2022

Photo by Vincent Giersch

I had a habit of wishing for things I couldn’t have. There was a particular guy who fell into this category. We had a very frank conversation one night after work in which he told me he couldn’t offer me anything other than his friendship. It was the right choice, for many reasons, even though I didn’t want to see it at the time. I’m not sure I’ve been cured of the malady, but at least the things I can’t have no longer take up so much of my emotional energy.

It would be easier

To be his plaything

Than have a thinking, feeling heart.

Then his fire would not burn me

Cause me to sear inside

For his returned vow of love, in faith.

If I were a lioness

Or a wild mare

Then I wouldn’t put myself

In any position to be the

Gentle butterfly in his

Gruff hands.

It would be far better

for me to be a flower

In his window box

Than a rose on the collar

Of his freshly pressed shirt.

A flower never picked

Dies of its own will

Not by the hand of the one who cuts it.

Yes, I would have been much happier

Being his servant than his friend

For if I was bound to him

He would ask anything and everything of me

Then my thinking, feeling heart

Wouldn’t be burned by his fire,

The want of his

Returned vow of love, in faith.
Consumed

April 12th, 2022

Photo by Gary Meulemans

There are times in life when you just don’t have the capacity to feel anymore. Deep pain, grief or trauma can take you to a state of emotional shut down. It can be protective, but it can also be debilitating. In a past life, I loved a man who probably would have loved me too, if the circumstances had been right. I honestly think he tried, but there was just too much in the way for us. It hurt watching him hurt for me, and it hurt that he couldn’t give me what I wanted. It hurt for so long that I almost couldn’t hurt anymore.

I have no tears

You’ve run me dry

When I turn the spigot on my heart to cry

Nothing comes

You’ve consumed all I have.

I have no tears

All the nights used them

When I was supposed to be asleep in the dark

They spilled

Now there is nothing left.

I have no tears

But still my heart breaks

When I turn off the light, when I open my eyes

You remain

Consuming me.

I have no tears

You’ve run me dry.

I wish I could cry to ease the hurt but

Nothing comes

And your face remains.

I have no tears

Nothing to cry anymore

When I turn the faucet of heart

I’m dry

You’ve consumed all I am.

I have no tears.
Bonfire

April 8th, 2022

Photo by Hans Isaacson

In the country, you burn the trash. This is something I learned about by going to visit my grandparents. When I was little, they lived just outside of town in a big farmhouse, on a large plot of land. There was a burn pit at the bottom of a sandy hill. Later, they sold the land and the house and moved to a manufactured home, which they placed in a field owned by another member of the family. There, they had burn barrels. My grandparents died 13 months apart, and once my grandpa had passed, it become our task to burn the trash. Ironically, we made a burn pit at the bottom of a sandy hill, and got to work. It was odd, throwing magazines and tv guides and other papers into the fire. It gave me a sinking feeling: I’m never coming back here. This part of my life is over.

The fire burned low, sucking up his life

I stood watching, massing all my courage

Just to keep the tears away

But he still burned in the fire.

The smoking, tortured fragments of his life

Reached their charred and blackened fingers

To the sky, as if to say, “Please save me”

As escaped pieces darted across the shadowed sand

Frantic to lay down in the cool dust and die.

I stirred the burning mound, smoke bathing my face and hair

In the emptiness of the afternoon.

His face was in the flames

And he danced gracefully again with his beautiful wife

While I stood massing all my strength

So my mother would not see the tears that ached

To pour from my eyes.

It was supposed to be a new year

A time of new beginning and hope

But all I could see was the end of his life.

Belching black smoke and choking my heart in grief.
At Phil’s House

April 5th, 2022

Photo by Kinga Cichewicz

The sleepover is an essential part of being an kid. When I was a teenager, I spent the night with friends (either my house, or theirs) nearly every weekend. When I was a young teenager, most of my Saturday nights were spent with my best friend at her dad’s apartment. She did not have a bedroom of her own at her dad’s place, so he always filled up an air mattress for us and we slept in the living room. He’d stand in the kitchen, chain smoking and drinking beer, while we watched movies and talked about boys and laughed at the stupid things that teenage girls think are funny. There were also plenty of shenanigans. That was safe place, a good place, a happy place.

Silly things, like candy canes

And silky dreams on clouds of

Peppermint sticks and lemonade

With real mashed potatoes on my plate

At Phil’s house.

Ice cube fights and Christmas trees

Baby Jesus and the snowmen

We watch the crooks get busted

And ghosts haunt

Phil’s house.

French fries and porkchops

Cups of water on cold nights

Running around in pajamas

And the moon shines

At Phil’s house.

Late at night, at the mirror

Early the next day with soap in my hair

And a van ride to church

When the snow’s on the ground

At Phil’s house.

Sister in my soul

This how I’ll remember you

The way you laugh and giggle

As we talk about church and God

And boys and dreams and family

School and being a girl

In a world full of men

As we lay on air

Under the cow hide

At Phil’s house.
Triangle

April 1st, 2022

Photo by Viswanath V Pai

I don’t really want to admit how many times I got myself into a love triangle. I think about the reasons why often. I wanted to see the best in people, even when they couldn’t or wouldn’t give me what I needed. I believed in redemption, even when there was unwillingness to change. But of all the reasons why I stayed in relationships with men who didn’t satisfy or support me, I think the most important one was because I hadn’t learned how to be strong enough to express my own feelings. I have a whole set of baggage related to being a strong, outspoken woman. It has taken a lifetime to get myself to the point where I can clearly express what I need. When I couldn’t, I sought solace where I could find it, and so often, that included getting stuck between two men.

He sees me. I see you.

You turn your head. I cry.

He talks to me. I love him.

You love me. You cry.

I want you. I need him.

He turns his back on me.

I’m in his arms. You’re in my mind.

You turn your back on me.

I see you. You see him.

He sees the way we love.

You feel pain. I feel guilt.

He sees the pain of love.

He sees me. I am alone

Dark, in a quiet room.

You don’t know. I don’t care.

He’s in my quiet room.

You love me. I love him.

He loves me. I cry.

I love you. You hate him.

He turns his head. I cry.

I am yours. He is mine.

I turn my back on you.

He is gone. I am alone.

I turned my back on you.

I see you. You see me here.

He wants me there with him.

I fall asleep. I cry my tears.

All I want is him.

He sees me. I see you.

You turn your head and cry.

He talks to me. I love him.

And I love you. I cry.
Dark Remains

March 29th, 2022

Photo by Vadym Lebedych

This is a poem I wrote when I was 18, as part of a study on sonnets. I included this piece in my final writing portfolio as a graduating senior. The words of this piece sometimes haunt me. Half my life ago, I managed to capture an image of despair that continues to be how I think about loneliness and depression.

The quiet dark retains this one belief

That he who lives a lonely life does crave

The lively love that bleeds upon the grief

Of dark and sickly hearts down in the grave.

A falling single tear upon my face

Is only one surrender to the pain

The breeds and bleeds to cover my good grace

And kills the lively love inside my brain.

I need to spit the heartache from my head

And wash away the hopeless bitter taste

Of lively love gone rotten here instead

Of grieving over dreams that go to waste.

Yet still I find the quiet dark remains

To burn my lively love in tears and pain.