Author: VJ

Permission to write, paint, and imagine are the gifts I gave myself when chronic illness hit - a fair exchange: being for doing. Relevance is an attitude. Humour essential.

End the Fray

This breach –
this ever-widening gap
fear induced
pits us
against them
as if humanity
can be divided
salvation
a selective process.

We need a balm
to soothe societal
wounds, a tonic
to calm the angst
until clarity
quells the uproar
and kindness
replaces this sin.

(For Ragtag Community’s prompt: balm, and Fandango’s: gap.)

 

Uncomfortable Compromise

Caught relaxing –
ignorant sleep,
treacherous faith

beneath security
salvation preyed upon,
skin-crawling danger

support ill-gotten
rescuer threatening
outcome beastly

misunderstood
I am off-work,
harassed

refuse light
failed legs
kicking back

enemy projects
feigns warmth
damage protected.

I’ll compromise
exert smiles
exit and breathe.

(Today we attend a memorial service for a friend.  My former co-workers will be in attendance including one who tried to stir up trouble for me in my absence.  Grant me strength.  I’m linking this up to Reena’s Exploration Challenge which is compromise.)

 

Herding Cats

One a Tom –
night prowler,
elusive schemer –
renders me sleepless.

Another, pampered,
a diva demanding,
high anxiety to boot –
makes me crazy.

Third, a trickster,
stays out of sight
and then springs –
keeps me on my toes.

This raising children,
like herding cats –
next to impossible,
and I’m allergic.

(A light-hearted poem in response to Willow Poetry’s What Do You See? Challenge:  featured image.)

 

Keep Learning

Tyrannical,  my father’s reign; the ensuing understanding of relationship dynamics twisted.  Violence and threats peppered with “I love you”, as if one was synonymous with the other.  I cowered with the rest, shame a heavy weight.

Oppression dictates
warped sense of love, intimate
nightmare – relearning.

(For Reena’s Exploration challenge #89.  Relationships have been the theme of my dreams lately – thus the reversal to childhood.)