Sunday, November 12, 2017

Forest of Bygones

The last time I needed music and art this much was in high school; when you're feeling so much for the first time and you can't seem to make anyone see it as big as it is to you. 

Since that time, I have spent my life trying to recognize the role I'm playing in this world. Who is this character? What does this character believe? Why am I here? Why does the world respond to me this way? How does she respond to it? 
It's been much easier to listen to other's suggestions of who that should be because whatever I'm doing isn't working. 
I'm a highly spiritual person however I've discovered that religion is not a home for my spirituality. I have tried very, very hard for the last 15 years of my life to belong to the Christian religion and I have finally relinquished that banner with relief. 
One day I said, "That's enough," and I learned to listen to my intuition again. 
Put down expectation, labels, guilt laced restraints. With burnt sage and a forest of bygones, I see who I am. And I am learning to respect her. The pain of feeling so entirely alone in a giant, empty universe is hard to make known. To get anyone to see it as big as it is to you. The pain of a listless spirit tired of trying to make sense of itself. These lead to dangerously bleak times. 

And here yet again, art speaks it for me. The medicine in art cleanses. Suddenly it's clear and not only that, it's affirmed that your transformation is big. And those who see it, you hold close. That's the spiritual community, the light and the loving we need. 


A Comet Appears

One hand on this wily comet,
Take a drink just to give me some weight.
Some uber-man I’d make,
I’m barely a vapor.

They shone a chlorine light on
A host of individual sins.
Let’s carve my again face off.
Fetch us a knife,
Start with my eyes
Down so the lines
Form a grimacing smile.

Close your eyes to corral a virtue.
Is this fooling anyone else?
Never worked so long and hard
to cement a failure.

We can blow on our thumbs and posture
But the lonely are such delicate things.
The wind from a wasp could blow them
into the sea
with stones on their feet
lost to the light and the loving we need.

Still to come,
the worst part and you know it,
There is a numbness
in your heart and it's growing.

With burnt sage and a forest of bygones,
I click my heels, get the devils in line,
A list of things I could lay the blame on
might give me a way out.

But with each turn
it's this front and center
Like a dart stuck square in your eye
Every post you could hitch your faith on
is a pie in the sky
chock full of lies
a tool we devise to make sinking stones fly.

And still to come,
the worst part and you know it,
There is a numbness
in your heart and it's growing.