Oh, How I Pray

These hovering lows
how does one escape the pull?

Defensiveness a useless tool
I cannot read intentions

I self-animate
a contrived endeavour

Shine reduced
I am humbled
off colour

Grief, on repeat
I want to disappear
like Peter Pan
childlike, armed
with illustrious fantasies

Could this be metamorphosis –

A paralytic calm
a spell-binding ponder
cracking righteousness
till clarity fades the gray

Oh, how I pray it is
the light of love
chiseling a new path

(Inked sketch my own)

Could It Be?

Walking away is the only solution
I’ve ever excelled at, and yet,
absence does not obliterate
that which dwells within

I can pretend that I have nothing
to offer, but life and circumstance
require more: challenge me
to exhume remaining potential

Am I up to the task?

There is flattery in being looked up to,
the feeling that someone needs me –
but that is akin to temptation –
an ego play…

Could it be that wisdom acquired
has merit only when shared,
that we are all here to do our part,
that we are meant to engage?

Will I find a flow, rediscover
a synchronicity, reignite
a passion, and belong again?
Dare I hope?

(I first wrote this poem, two and half years into a debilitating illness that kept me bed bound. This version is edited, and I chose to share it now as a reminder not to give up. The answer to the questions posed is a resounding “Yes!” Image my own)