Tag: legacy

Love Lessons

Had a weird sort of lexicon
the man who professed
to be my dad –

Clamped in his chokehold
he’d demand words of devotion

Became inured to this dichotomy –
spent a lifetime searching for love –

Just the right balance of cruelty and kind.

(Tuesdays, I borrow from Twitter @Vjknutson.  Sketch mine.)

Familial Legacy

“…too young to notice
how fear persists, and how
the anger that causes fear persists…”
– Immortality, by Lisel Mueller

Purposeful, this fortress
permanently ungrounded

Burdened without bearing
fear underlying motivation

Reassured that life is unfair
dedicated to defying limits

Challenged by rage
bloodline ingrained

Pulled towards inevitable
complete collapse.

(Inspired by the promptings of Reena’s Exploration challenge.  To see the full poem and prompt click here.  Image from personal collection.)

Interior Motives

Mother lives in me –
her hopes and fears
now embodied
in my choices,
this guilt borne
of her suffering…

and her mother –
who laboured often
with unwelcome toil,
her only respite
widowhood –
it’s her legacy
I bear.

Potential –
who once appeared
with all the radiant
charm of youth,
exists within, also,
although our connection –
drowned out by the banter
of those gone before –
lacks substance.

I remember how
we used to sing –
hearts joyful,
full of daring.

How even in the face
of rigidity, we raised
our voices, dreamed

Now, both distracted –
I, shaking off fragments
of Mother’s hapless life,
extracting splinters
of a grandmother
destined to woe;

potential,
glances away,
forlorn as
a forgotten child,
pouting.

Artist’s Calling

Spirits dwell
in unlikely places,
speak to us
through lenses
their essence
embodied in
child-like faces,
or animal snarls,
begging to be freed.

I am shamed
by my awareness,
helpless to intervene,
have not perpetrated
the original sin –
guilty by DNA,
lineage tracing back
to the slaughterers,
those who ravished
land and Peoples,
disregarded the elementals
who once breathed life
into this sacred place.

How is it then
that I should capture
the tortured?
Is this merely projection
of an internal demon,
or am I being called
as witness,
my hand poised
to illuminate,
give voice
in service to
the suppressed
and violated?
Is this not,
after all,
the artist’s call?

(The image that inspired this poem was taken on the Kettle & Stony Point Reserve on the shores of Lake Huron. Can you see the face?)

Tired of Same Old Endings

Tired of same old endings,
in which hopes are slaughtered
and tragedy and insanity win.

Raised by the bottle, learned
to set standards low –
still afraid of heights –
have fallen as the ground
beneath my aspirations crumbled –
a certainty under alcohol’s rule.

Tired of same old endings,
in which self is battered by indifference
and ego loses the battle for control.

Mother’s denial a coping mechanism
negating children’s need, obliterating
safety, disregarding long-term damage;
even in the older years, when we tried
to get her out, were powerless against
his manipulation, his eternal imprinting.

Tired of same old endings
in which the heroine, resources spent,
succumbs to the madness, suicides.

Want to believe in a future, greener,
hopeful, in which relationships
are fulfilling, and life goals are
supported, in which encouragement
is not fodder for deviousness, and
personal best is rewarded, sustained.

Tired of same old endings
haunting my dreaming hours,
taunting my waking dreams.