Tag: Strength

Amidst and Between

Amidst the thorns,
beneath the wounds,
we can take turns
bringing self-love
to bloom,

we’ll smooth
the edges
so raw and jagged,
each lend the silk
of virgin petals

birthed in kisses
and gentle touches,
countering the poisons 
of previous “gardeners”
with ill-intentions,
fencing us from 
freedom.

We’ll remain
faithful companions,
take turns in the cycle
of taking and giving,

in sun and shadow,
through every internal
season and weathered vane.

We’ll simply heal
and learn
what love is,
together
the right way

until we both
blossom white,
centers exposed
to feel 
the cleansing 
rain. 

Love will 
beget love
which will 
beget love
to spread.

It begins
with us.
It begins 
within. 

Poem and images ©LauraDenise

Mythological Growths

Cycloptic serpent
scorched deep
into my being,
color of decay
not even attempting
to camouflage
into my resilient green,
laying eggs,
disease breeding,
growing larger,
but still unable
to see,
for at my core
is also my heart,
and it bleeds
in light.
You try
to grow more eyes,
but this love
inside
will always
render you
blind,
not Karma
but what is right
finally
for I have falsely seen
too clearly
all my life

your lies.

The exorcist has arrived:
self-love.
Parasite,
good final bye.

Poem and image ©LauraDenise

Almost Worthy

The silent tear
and its companion,
slipping away
from a hidden river
subterranean,

an inner well
I wish to visit,
I pay the obol
but am refused
admission.

I touch the solution
risen to the surface,
released to me
at the green-galactic
entrance.

It absorbs, vanishes,
as if it were only
imagination,
but I know it exists within,
the ancient pool
of my essence
preservation,

disturbed
by a pressure,
a fissure,
from the near past,
a conflict of interest
to who I am

attempting to contaminate
the purity of my heart’s intentions,
sent from the sacred waters
to get my attention:

two harbinger drops
to warn of the bubbling,
but how can I mend
the underground rupturing

when I cannot access
the pre-war,
cannot reverse time
to remove the source

that lies beyond
the lies
in layers
of conditioning,
beneath the protection
of pain
self-buried?

Desperate, kneeling,
thoughts begin spinning,
I get dizzy
in the spiraling,
plead for the ripples
to take me down
into the spring.

“I want to go there!
I want to come!
Let me face
what I know not
head on!

I am brave!
I am strong!”

The portal
closes shut.

What more must I do
to be worthy
enough?

Pitfalls and Wings

I remember you describing it like trap doors.

That unexpected drop we don’t see coming. It’s one thing when you are watching your footing, placing your soles carefully around the eggshells, having been conditioned, trained, skilled, at moving around in this on-guard, defensive way. It’s another when you’ve just started to have confidence in the spring in your step upon trusted ground. I was outdoors, in my favorite place, when it happened this last time.

A trap pre-set by a predator disguised as a friend. Another very unexpected fall. No problem. I’m used to it. I know what to do. It’s all very logical. Except when I go to grab onto the root to begin the climb, it opens another hole. I unexpectedly drop again. I reach, I lift myself, I lift myself, I reach for the wrong root again and another hole opens… I don’t understand these. They come from deep within my own self. These were not set by him. There is no logic; I’ve tried every pattern. Eventually, I make it out.

And then another pit sends me plummeting.

I’m thinking about these pitfalls today, sitting upon a rock in a favorite dress on a beautiful day, revisiting the scene, the trap pre-set especially for me. I find myself thinking the all-too-familiar question for each of us, so universal, so personal: why me?

I honestly do feel I should have been spared by my higher power. I’ve paid my dues. I’ve done my time. With Trauma. But what sense of entitlement and special treatment is that? Not to mention the whole free-will clause which others can use to interfere with my own hard work and desires.

So I do now reflect on the possible reasons. Does God have yet another lesson for me to learn, yet another trial to overcome? How strong does He want me to be?! And why?… When I think of this, I do not feel like a victim; there is very little woe is me. I actually get a bit excited that He is preparing me for big things. Like I am a chosen one. And if ever I were to be in training or to serve, I would definitely want it to be for Him! I feel empowered. I feel an ego I never thought I had. I always thought I was selfless to a fault.

I did it. I think. Again. I’ve lost, yet won.

Are you proud of me, God?

I think, too, about how much I have control of and how much I don’t. I know how we react is everything, our miseries often self-induced, self-perpetuated, the way we keep ourselves trapped and prisoners; we look down sometimes and see the cuffs and chains are unlocked, and we scramble to re-secure them. Why?

Is it all fear?

If so, are we really trusting God is with us, sees what is ahead? We cannot get there if we keep re-locking ourselves when He keeps setting us free.

My past is my past. I have freed myself from it. I must shake the dungeon dust fully off. Perhaps that is the purpose of these new wings.

I feel the breeze of your and His love…

Thank you for always believing in me.

I suppose with wings,
these pitfalls can
no longer sink me;
I’ll keep my eyes
forward in these skies
and focused
on the portals
to my dreams.

Words and images ©LauraDenise

Finally

I am changing again,
another metamorphosis,
finally with wings

delicate yet indestructible,
soft but dipped in
a protective celestial coating.

I think it may be your love
combined with His blessing.

I think this is my last rebirth,
no more rising from the ashes
of my previous selves.

I am ready to fly,
though already home,
so comfortably snug
in your heart.

Coastal breezes
keep me blissfully hovering
above the benevolent sea

as the rising sun
warms my soul
without singeing
my dreams.

Lines in the Dirt

I’ve toed a lot of lines in my life. I’ve toed them recently. I will toe them again today.

My spring out of bed has become inconsistent. My sleep, interrupted. I wake to report to that line again, and that is a different kind of waking. To take my shift to relieve my unconscious self to defend my inner sanctuary boundary-border. Again. It’s exhausting. Physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. It’s not what I was designed for.

I am more than this.

I was beaten when they breached my outer border. But I’ve since recovered. Now I stand resolute at the final white-picket fence, last patch of wildflowers inside. I feel strong again. Weaponless by choice. A pacifist maybe.

The dust of the corporate stampede settles as the hooves come to a halt. And here we are again. At the line. I toe the dirt with my bare feet, my dress hemline soiled. My head is not bowed. I took into eyes. I look to the heavens. I look back into the eyes.

I am passionate. In all things. I used to think it was my blessing and my curse. But then self-love took hold and merged with my faith in loving, divine, individual creation, so now I think, though I’m still on the journey of discovery and understanding and potential, that my passion is only a blessing.

I taste the indignant feelings rising, mixed into the saliva of my mouth. It is not fear that causes me to swallow it back down. There is no fight or flight in me now. There is only strength and unhurried contemplation. I weigh it all. I need to free myself from the weight.

I hear your voice. And I still myself in hopes of His.

It is silent enough inside me that I can hear the whisper of each petal the breeze gives voice to. There is indeed a great injustice here. A war of the world and the self. A war of the ages. And the individual never wins. I feel I was born to take this stand, though I know it will make no difference in the war. It is indeed personal. But it is mostly the morality that is part of my blood, flowing in and out of my heart.

I will bow gracefully. But not for them. For me. For my wildflower patch.

The two-headed serpent will reside among us. Its poison can no longer make me sick. I will see to it that my flowers flourish despite his presence, slithering so deceitfully all around us.

The corporate stampede stand-off I have stirred in my rebellion retreats with patronizing words I pretend I am too ignorant to perceive.

I turn my attention away from them and him, and begin again to love, to mother,

to teach.

The dirt returns to white sand,
the waves resume their soothing music.
I return to showing my flowers
how unique each is
and all they are capable of becoming,
come the May winds….

Words and images ©LauraDenise