Yesterday upon waking something slow was stirring in my soul. I searched the lexicon of life as I prepared the dinner, simmered the soup, and made muffins that taste like donuts.
—
It is Old.
It is Ache.
It is Need.
It is Nurture.
It is Loneliness.
It is Loss.
It is Longing.
It is Pain.
I sat with it.
I listened to it.
It had a story to tell.
—
It is a story to which I will listen and not yet repeat.
Some stories have to simmer out the sorrow;
to reduce the ruin;
to boil off the brutality.
—
The supper served.
The soup sealed.
The muffins made.
I sit with it still.
It is Sealed.
It is Seared.
It is Silent.
It is Sorrow.
I asked it to speak.
It did as I comb her wild wet hair.
As I pulled out a pushy baby tooth.
As a cleaned her freshly pierced ears.
As her homework we work through.
It says, “Who nurtured and nourished you?”
—
A low front rolled in last night as we tucked into bed.
The rain drenched the still frozen earth,
The rivulets turned to rivers as water rushed over the stiff surface.
It was an angry rain with a shouting match between equals.
Thunder and lightening punctuated the downpour as the rain threw itself hard and horizontally at our home.
That is how trauma feels, thinks I.
The weather speaks the unspoken.
—
I wake up heavy, having had nightmares again.
I care for the children.
Then head to the gym.
Movement is a decision I make.
It is a medication that I take.
—
I decided today that nothing and no one can give me what I did not have. Nothing.
I decide that I am not them, I am me.
That thought this morning brought me peace.
—
I sit will with the losses.
They are many.
They demand to be heard.
Listen, I will.
They whisper of wanting to eat.
Instead of being eaten.
I will nourish.
I will nurture.
—
I will live from the gains.
I am still here.
I am now loved and I love.
I can give and receive.
I can now impact my world,
I can give what I got not.
I can, to some degree, give some to me.
—
I can and I will.