family

chilling

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could not get warm,

could not sleep.

body stiff,

clinging to itself.

mind, racing;

heart, broken. 💔

parricide –

in what state of mind

is such a thing possible?

over and over and over

to rip into the flesh

that bore you,

to hear their cries,

screams,

pleas,

to feel their warm blood,

to witness

Life

leave the forms

from which you came.

chilling.

what we are capable of,

we, humans,

chilling.

the fragility of our psyche,

stunning.

we all walk on delicate ice

internally.

what is considered reality

can –

does –

suddenly

crack!

we fall in

deep,

become frozen.

and there

commit acts

so devastating

they ripple

far and wide. 😢

Message Blocking is Active

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blocked 🚫

mere months

after The Transition

of he who was The Force

keeping family afloat,

tethered,

ever so delicately.

without him,

shedding,

the masks came off,

niceties abandoned.

“Love” disintegrated

to the point of blocking 🚫

take nothing personally.

still, sad,

feels abrasive,

like a middle finger 🖕

borne of deep hurt

a sense of disrespect,

expectations unmet.

The Circle 🔵 dwindling

by death

and, now, blocks 🚫

everything

so tender,

tenuous,

ephemeral.

contradictions

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I don’t recall

ever

seeing your violent side.

To me, you were always

one-of-a-kind  –

the cool,

tall,

dark & handsome uncle.

Never saw the part of you

who terrorized

your beautiful wife;

the you

who would beat

women

children

with a baseball bat!

Could I have loved you

if I had witnessed that?

Like Jekyll & Hyde,

we humans.

So many contradictions

and perplexing multitudes.

“Good” and “evil”

in equal measure

cutting through

all our hearts.

Are we to be confined

to the worst moments

of our lives?

We are made

crafted

molded

into who we become.

No innate monsters,

only beings

tragically un-done

wrecking havoc

in their altered state.

How do we be different –

infuse more love and tenderness;

choose significantly less violence,

champion wit and wisdom

instead of whips on children’s skin

and weapons of mass destruction?

Yolanda

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“Are you homeless?”

she asked,

penetrating my self immersion.

“No, why?

I responded, a tad vexed.

“Because of your bag,”

she said,

pointing to the shopping cart

I was wheeling behind me.

“I am homeless,”

she shared.

I stopped,

emerged from my shell.

We stood

face to face

under a first quarter moon,

meeting each other.

Yolanda was her name –

engaging,

loquacious,

deeply rooted in her faith,

enamored of the Celestial Realms.

She spoke of harrowing experiences in the local shelters,

of the inconsiderate and dangerous conditions  –

especially

for a woman

alone.

Just a year ago,

Yolanda had a home,

a husband,

was employed with a car.

A divorce rendered her without,

leading to her sleeping

outside

for the first time

on a frigid and blustery night.

Yolanda alluded to

grown children,

yet gave thanks

only to the kind strangers

who kept her fed

and still alive.

“I will pray for you,”

I offered humbly.

And I have,

and will continue to

pray for Yolanda

and all in our human family

on their own

out

in the bitter cold.

This is not the way it’s supposed to be!

We are each other’s keeper!

Indeed, we are each other!

When did we forget this?

No mere coincidence,

my time with Yolanda.

Divinely orchestrated,

potent seeds planted.

An assignment awaits.

Mother is Husband

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“I am your husband,”

said The Mother

to The Daughter.

Not entirely an untruth, 

as Mother dwells in household

with her eldest Daughter.

They share expenses

and secrets.

They are each other’s “somebody”

the unspoken priority,

the new nuclear family,

the what remains

when what was The Core

splinters off

never to return.

family

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family –
what does this word mean, really?
blood relations?
friendships?
resonance across space & time?

from the Latin word famulus,
denoting servant;
same root as familiar,
yet family can feel
more distant than stranger.

our people, our tribe,
our ride or die –
we so easily say,
but behave
often
in an entirely different way.

loneliness continues to rise
worldwide.
perplexed, we ask why
given so much connectivity.
might it be
because we
forget
how to be
how to do
family?

“Autobiography begins with a sense of being alone. It is an orphan form.”
― John Berger

Iron

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I will not carry your Iron,
I will no longer bear your Burdens,
I shall not strive to Redeem you,
I will only Thank you,
for being the vehicle of this birth,
the channel through which this River flowed
into illusion, destined to forget
and then
to remember.
I was to spread these Wings
perhaps wider than was allotted to you,
parents, who did what was your story to do,
to “love” as you were “loved”.
Alas, ancestral trauma,
we drag it from
generation to generation
iteration to iteration
until it dissipates,
withers,
is transformed
back into the Love
from which it
ultimately
came.
All trauma is golden
at its core –
was crafted in service
and protection.
Without it –
likely no ancestry,
no bloodlines,
no opportunity to
re-member;
no journey to take
back to where it all began…
I will not carry your Iron,
I will play
my Role
in melting it.

Inspired by and indebted to Mary Oliver’s stunning poem, Flare
“my mother, alas, alas,
did not always love her life,
heavier than iron it was
as she carried it in her arms, from room to room,”


Eleven Years

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On the sixth day in the month of September of the year 2005:

A cell phone rings.

“It is your father,”

says the somber mother

to the busy daughter.

“He has been taken

to hospital…a stroke.”

 

Eleven years ago,

my Pop transitioned;

he left body

and went to Heaven.

One is never prepared for death-

especially that of a parent.

You know it will come eventually,

makes sense intellectually;

a matter to run from emotionally.

The day before he was to die,

he kept calling my cell line.

Over and over, he tried.

too tired and busy was I.

“I’ll call him tomorrow,”

I thought, fully justified;

not knowing he would not then

be alive.

Did Pop sense

his time had come?

Is there something he needed to tell

his eldest one?

What did I miss in

missing his call?

Did he go

thinking

I cared not at all?

Along with grief,

from guilt I found little relief.

Over and over,

in my mind,

I wrestled with my use of time.

Questioned my responsibilities:

Were they aligned with my priorities?

Eleven years later,

older,

a tad wiser,

I can begin

to myself forgive.

We do our best

in the moments we live.

Perfection, not the final goal.

Missteps, falls –

a part of it all.

Lessons learned

in his life and death-

Thank you Father!

No more regrets.

 

 

 

Blue

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what you say about Blue

is really a reflection of you.

what you think about her,

a mere child, another’s daughter,

only reveals

your mind’s fodder.

it’s all about you,

Beloved,

never “the other.”

about the lens

through which

you see

your world

and your brother.

look deep within,

my Friend,

see finally

the depths of

your own self-hatred.

bring up to Light,

the memories,

tragedies,

stories

against which

you constantly

struggle and fight.

the ones that state softly

with great malignancy

only that

you’re ugly and unworthy.

beware,

going there.

for, ego will be scared.

it will deny,

try to you from yourself hide,

play with your mind,

saying:

“don’t go within,

too much of a burden;

play always on the outside to win.”

alas,

illusion, so easy,

often trumps reality

for many.

brothers, sisters, family –

we must re-member what we truly are:

Shining Stars,

servant spirits on a human journey

born of Him

to fully manifest

only our highest

and very best

Self.

Nothing else.