'You will need to ask for help.'
Those words rose in my mind without warning.
Another step in this journey that seems
bound to end in my demise.
'You will have to ask for help.'
'Oh my god.'
The shame, the embarrassment,
the disbelief, the shock, the shame...
that I couldn't care for myself,
that I couldn't find a way to feed just one person,
that I couldn't be the 'right' person for the job,
that for all my effort, I couldn't 'get it right',
that I made the wrong decisions at those critical junctures
after trying so hard to consider and weigh and balance and
make the 'right' decisions.
That I am a failure,
that I am not needed in this economy,
that I am extraneous and unwanted,
that I disappoint my aunt...and me...
and my children.
All these emotions roll through me like ocean waves,
drowning the calm and peace I work so hard to craft,
washing what little wisdom and faith I can muster out to a sea
broiling, wind-blown and angry.
What is more devastating, I wonder,
learning how to live in the next level of poverty, or
learning how to live with the next level of self hate?
Last week, I was talking with a man
who runs a food pantry to feed Portland's hungry souls.
He shared with me a homeless man's thoughts.
'Homelessness is not about a loss of resources,' he said.
'Homelessness is about the loss of relationships.'
Hearing those words, I felt my heart break.
I couldn't speak after that, so stunned was I.
After we bid adieu, I looked at the scratch pad
scribbled with notes from our conversation.
Those words leapt out at me, dagger in hand,
malice throbbing in anticipation, excitement...
hungry for the kill.
Panic rose like bile in my throat
as I searched frantically through my drawer
to find the eraser.
To erase, to eliminate, quickly and forever,
those words, this reality, the aloneness,
the fact,
from my life.
Those words gone from the page,
I collapsed in tears and horror,
bile filling my mouth and heart,
stinking in my soul, choking me
with hopelessness and panic.
The paper now white as new.
Yet, the words remain etched
on my heart, where no eraser can reach,
seething, breeding venom, stinking...
-----------------
And, another rejection letter arrived.
I know the rejections before opening them.
I can feel the precision of the laceration
on a heart bleeding from all the other cuts.
And I wonder,
is there a point at which healing is no longer possible?
Because, see, there aren't enough jobs to go around,
and there are so many ways in which I do not match.
But, I try to figure them out, to find how I can match.
Twisting myself this way and that,
donning this, dropping that,
acting so, acting not.
--------------
I didn't know why I came to Silverton.
I knew how fragile I felt, how hard it
would be to maintain myself.
Yet, I came anyway.
I told myself I just needed to laugh,
to enjoy the time with my friends.
I held the ruse successfully the first day.
But, the struggle of it wore thin the withering facade
I had hobbled together.
And, the second day, it all unraveled.
'I'm too proud to ask.
I'm too broke to eat.
I'm too weak to bow,
and too strong to bleed.'
Over and again, they sang those words,
cutting ever deeper into the wound that was my heart,
ripping through the tattered facade,
leaving me naked, cold, shattered for all to see.
'Can you sing over me, words of comfort?
Can you break through me, strong hands?
Can you undo me enough to heal me?
Take the weight from my shoulders.'
Exposed, I ran to hide my pain and shame,
but they followed, paying no heed to the
doors closed to my room and my heart.
They held me, loved me, prayed for me,
cried for me...and would not let go.
'You will NOT be homeless', they said.
'You are not alone. You are not alone.'
Again and again, they repeated those words.
At first, I couldn't hear the words,
because they were not meant for me,
because they were not real,
because I couldn't accept them,
because I really am all alone.
But, they wouldn't stop.
Their presence and promise
defied the reality I thought mine.
And suddenly, I understood why
I went to Silverton this weekend.
I came to learn that
I am not alone.
Whatever unfolds in the next 60 days,
I step forward in the promise that
I am not alone.
Abundance Born of Poverty.
The broken heart, beyond self healing.
Hands reaching through the dark
to touch, to hold, to heal, to love.
grateful, so grateful, so very grateful...
Those words rose in my mind without warning.
Another step in this journey that seems
bound to end in my demise.
'You will have to ask for help.'
'Oh my god.'
The shame, the embarrassment,
the disbelief, the shock, the shame...
that I couldn't care for myself,
that I couldn't find a way to feed just one person,
that I couldn't be the 'right' person for the job,
that for all my effort, I couldn't 'get it right',
that I made the wrong decisions at those critical junctures
after trying so hard to consider and weigh and balance and
make the 'right' decisions.
That I am a failure,
that I am not needed in this economy,
that I am extraneous and unwanted,
that I disappoint my aunt...and me...
and my children.
All these emotions roll through me like ocean waves,
drowning the calm and peace I work so hard to craft,
washing what little wisdom and faith I can muster out to a sea
broiling, wind-blown and angry.
What is more devastating, I wonder,
learning how to live in the next level of poverty, or
learning how to live with the next level of self hate?
-----------------------
who runs a food pantry to feed Portland's hungry souls.
He shared with me a homeless man's thoughts.
'Homelessness is not about a loss of resources,' he said.
'Homelessness is about the loss of relationships.'
Hearing those words, I felt my heart break.
I couldn't speak after that, so stunned was I.
After we bid adieu, I looked at the scratch pad
scribbled with notes from our conversation.
Those words leapt out at me, dagger in hand,
malice throbbing in anticipation, excitement...
hungry for the kill.
Panic rose like bile in my throat
as I searched frantically through my drawer
to find the eraser.
To erase, to eliminate, quickly and forever,
those words, this reality, the aloneness,
the fact,
from my life.
Those words gone from the page,
I collapsed in tears and horror,
bile filling my mouth and heart,
stinking in my soul, choking me
with hopelessness and panic.
The paper now white as new.
Yet, the words remain etched
on my heart, where no eraser can reach,
seething, breeding venom, stinking...
-----------------
And, another rejection letter arrived.
I know the rejections before opening them.
I can feel the precision of the laceration
on a heart bleeding from all the other cuts.
And I wonder,
is there a point at which healing is no longer possible?
Because, see, there aren't enough jobs to go around,
and there are so many ways in which I do not match.
But, I try to figure them out, to find how I can match.
Twisting myself this way and that,
donning this, dropping that,
acting so, acting not.
--------------
I didn't know why I came to Silverton.
I knew how fragile I felt, how hard it
would be to maintain myself.
Yet, I came anyway.
I told myself I just needed to laugh,
to enjoy the time with my friends.
I held the ruse successfully the first day.
But, the struggle of it wore thin the withering facade
I had hobbled together.
And, the second day, it all unraveled.
'I'm too proud to ask.
I'm too broke to eat.
I'm too weak to bow,
and too strong to bleed.'
Over and again, they sang those words,
cutting ever deeper into the wound that was my heart,
ripping through the tattered facade,
leaving me naked, cold, shattered for all to see.
'Can you sing over me, words of comfort?
Can you break through me, strong hands?
Can you undo me enough to heal me?
Take the weight from my shoulders.'
Exposed, I ran to hide my pain and shame,
but they followed, paying no heed to the
doors closed to my room and my heart.
They held me, loved me, prayed for me,
cried for me...and would not let go.
'You will NOT be homeless', they said.
'You are not alone. You are not alone.'
Again and again, they repeated those words.
At first, I couldn't hear the words,
because they were not meant for me,
because they were not real,
because I couldn't accept them,
because I really am all alone.
But, they wouldn't stop.
Their presence and promise
defied the reality I thought mine.
And suddenly, I understood why
I went to Silverton this weekend.
I came to learn that
I am not alone.
Whatever unfolds in the next 60 days,
I step forward in the promise that
I am not alone.
Abundance Born of Poverty.
The broken heart, beyond self healing.
Hands reaching through the dark
to touch, to hold, to heal, to love.
grateful, so grateful, so very grateful...
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