My heart is keloided,
From being torn asunder,
And healing
Slowly,
Carefully,
Meticulously,
Closing the wound,
Remembering with scar,
Again,
And again,
And again…
Keloided Heart
Tag: Empathy
Honestly Good
They told us to trust authority,
To think empirically
To put two and two together,
To critically think,
And then they said no more.
They told us to look closely,
To see the hidden image,
To glimpse behind the curtain,
And then they said we can’t trust what our eyes see,
They told us to care,
To be invested deeply,
To train our emotional intelligence,
And then told us “no” to empathy.
May the lessons nurtured by a caring world outlast oppression,
May our skills of living, breathing, feeling, knowing, seeing, thinking be carried on,
And instilled in the young,
May we remain unjaded,
Steadfast and aware in our moral understanding of basic ethics,
A guide that filters right from wrong,
Sympathy from cruelty,
And in times like these make the heart ache deep into the night,
Ache for basic, human rights,
May we be a shield of love and light,
Of Hope withstanding;
Resiliently, defiantly
Knowing and illuminating the truth when observed,
By our senses, by our sight, by our awakening;
Trusting intuition, trusting truth laid before us,
Trusting in our hearts, what we know is
good.
A Living Heart
At wits end I balance;
Balancing,
I tight rope walk on feet that are raw,
hold in a pulsating primal scream of release,
That might offend other’s ears;
A caregiver,
I gather the weight,
The pain,
The scars
and the “I just cant”-s in a container of compassion, composed of empathy;
My beating heart feels the pressure
To do and hold it all;
And to yet remain softened,
While the beating muscle toughens from use,
And so
At times I fall
I melt,
Like the tears from my own eyes,
I collapse into that of which I am most made
Water,
And of this substance
I may release,
Relax,
Soothe, and soak
heal a living heart,
And from this recompose.
For the Weary One
I look for your light,
You must be weary yet too,
Here, my light, for you
Admonished Tears
They could not understand
Why I cried,
Why I panicked as if the pain
Were my own,
They shamed me,
judged,
admonished,
And shunned
The empathy I bestowed,
The desperate need to do,
To right a moral wrong,
That my hands were too small to handle
I could feel my baby being torn
From my breast,
As I learned of countless babies taken from families,
In exchange for attempted border security,
Breathless at the prospect,
I feared how far such a set up would go,
I feared how much could be repeated,
And “improved” upon,
I feared,
I feared a fear so great only matched by that of the taken child,
My tears were matched with cold apathy,
As I realize theirs were being met too,
My tears were a microcosm of the anguish at hand,
A reminder of my human heart,
That bleeds and breaks,
And grows with tears I cry for others,
My burden of lone tears in recognition of atrocities was meant to be,
To find my place fighting for the ignored tears,
That should never have need be shed
Both Ways
Open up your heart,
There is so much pain
Outside its walls,
Open up your heart,
And know it’s better for love when shared,
Open up ,
Up is where you will find
The freedom,
Open up,
And know you’ll be letting in
The love,
The light;
This goes both ways
She of Letters 