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.

Responsibility vs Love

Like Atlas, I bear
the world’s weight
call it responsibility –
a painful delusion
requiring walls

Life has its own rhythm –
light and dark,
joyous and sorrowful –
orchestration outside
of my domain

Love, however,
is limitless
in its capacity –
open-hearted acceptance
protection in itself.

Trading one focus
for another
permits appreciation –
I vow to assert love
and forgo control.

Grateful Pause (Paws)

I’ve been a grumpy lion
lashing out in pain –
punctured shell smarting
by an objectionable barb.

I am a prideful feline,
with a formidable roar –
an offensive defence
intended to intimidate.

Even so, you ventured near
and in a single act of good,
disarmed my furious outrage,
calmed this bellowing beast.

Like a mouse, you quietly –
with understated grace –
gestured with such kindness,
I withdrew all complaint.

You restored my faith in beauty,
revived a nostalgic sense of bliss,
offered possibilities: sweet and
unexpected; soothed my soul

An not, I have noted, without
self-sacrifice on your part –
I am not so egocentric
to have missed the cross you bear.

Your gentle demeanour prevailing
over my abhorrent rant,
is a worth a million thank you’s
to a wounded-heart cat, like me.

(Image my own. This poem first appeared here February, 2015)

Family Rifts

Division, the determining factor
in their relationship –
who can understand
the dynamics of blood ties?

Cracked images suggest
a camaraderie, at least
once upon a time, and who
recalls the cause of the rift?

Fixated on the anger
distance a monument
to the breach, till one dies
and the absence is cemented

(Image my own)

Distance

Even in togetherness there is distance.

I am alone.

A central figure, distracted,
aiming for contact –
unable to eviscerate control –
repeatedly producing a singular confusion.

Define success
Is it the one on the top,
the know-it-all,
or are these the mechanisms
of estrangement?

I am unable to discern-
stability never more than a dalliance.

The pavement ahead whispers
promises of a sense of belonging…
Can I tolerate the quest?

Unfulfilled, I am protective
fear off-shoots of depression,
shield tender inner places…

Bring on change, there are others
watching, looking to me
as an example.

I can strive
on their behalf

Never alone.

Always distances to cross.

(Distance first appeared here February, 2017. Image my own)

Let It Go

It’s not intentional
this accumulation
amounting to clutter

It”s inevitable, given
the emphasis on chasing
material happiness

Its impotency is ironic
all superfluous now
that health teeters

Weighs heavily
on my mental state
craving simplicity

The sentiment
we treasure beats
in heart’s memory

Objects age,
lose relevance
generationally

I let go of fear,
the guilt, find
blessed relief

New space inspires
openness, excitement
ensues – freedom.

(Image my own)

Midnight Encounter

Midnight
and moon casts an eerie light
shimmers of white-kissed fields

Headlights off,
I pause to contemplate the glow
endless skies here beyond city limits

A herd of deer graze
ignore the hum of idling motor
celebrate the lunar flood

What drove me here,
I cannot say; perhaps clouds
relentless in February skies

Or may it was another pull,
a knowing, a grace, calling me
to open spaces…an offering

Surreal this suspended moment
stars dispersing sombre greys
tides of emotion releasing

I am transported,
uplifted, encouraged –
Heaven’s stellar promise.

(Image my own)