LIFE 101: Live and Learn

When I was in high school, I used to write "poetry" (all rhyming quatrains) about my adolescent extremes. My dad even showed some of my work to a poet and former professor of his from college (sweet proud father that he was). The poet's polite comment was something like, "Very emotive. Her poems express the angst of youth. No doubt they will mature with time." Or something like that. In other words, these poems are the stuff of a silly high school girl imagining she is confronting the most important philosophical and emotional issues possible, when actually she is merely expressing typical feelings of adolescence.

That was then; this is now. The following are a series of "poems" and writings which arose out of an assignment given to me by my therapist. Once I started writing, I found a seemingly endless well of topics for emotional purging. Here are some of them (in order, from first to latest):

LETTING GO

Letting go means living in the present moment
Letting go implies forgiveness of oneself and others
Letting go is a process which can be profoundly painful
Letting go, achieved fully, grants unbounded freedom

In order to let go we're often taken to the darkest places
Hated faces, self and others, sisters, brothers
Memory chases, time displaces

The darkness overwhelms
We keep on clinging
Each past slight stinging
Sorrow bringing
Memories of long past
Poison that should not last

True and full forgiveness
For past and for present
Is a monumental work of a lifetime
Only when forgiveness
Is present in every moment
Will letting go be possible
To rid us of our torment

For clinging to what was, what is, what shall be
What could be, what has been, and all the things we can't see
This is what prevents us from letting go, from being free
To let go of the clinging allows us to fully be

Once we see how to let go
We know how free that we can be

Being present all the time
Calls for practice in awareness
Once aware, letting go
Can lead us to a life sublime.

© Virginia H. Conard


HELPLESS

Helpless, I can do nothing
to fix or change or assist
Now when I need to do something
time and space resist

Though even could I be there
so little could I do
but place a bandaid somewhere
and hope we will get through

The endless repetition
slogging symptoms, consequence--
Seems no reiteration
can shatter mind's defense

My heart is breaking slowly
I hang on in denial
The pain and panic show me
the magnitude of trial

I know that I should detach
I know that I should let go
Attachment will not dispatch
the suffering that I know

But loving you my whole life
to see you disintegrate
makes my grasp grow stronger
knowing that it's too late

I want to fly right to you
to help your inability
but even were I right there
I'm helpless in my disability

I hear the slow decline
like distant shattering of glass
The emptying of the wine
as all we know must pass

But still the tears won't stop
as if there were no end
to the aching in my heart
knowing loss of my best friend

The memories of a lifetime
clamor with the grief of now
The depth of sorrow nameless:
To helplessness I bow.

© Virginia H. Conard


LETTING GO REVISITED

Letting go as an intellectual exercise
is easy to rationalize
sounds difficult but attainable
makes sense, is explainable

The truths that we come to know
tell us that letting go
starts with ridding of clinging
and ends with absence of suffering

To speak this way
shows we know what to say
But the proof we can start
lies within every heart

When tragedy strikes
or our heart is pulled under
all the logic we'd like
disperses asunder

And we're left with our tears
wounds open and bleeding
Apex of our fears
on misery feeding

Now where are the lofty ideals we espoused?
We gathered them to us, our heads in the clouds
But rip the heart open and watch logic fail
When our heart has been broken it's a different tale

Of course, the goal is to bring them together
Doubly strong, to withstand any weather
To rid us of clinging, help us let go
Free us of suffering so we fully know

But when we're in pain
and logic's in vain
the balance we seek
is easier to speak

[Easier said than done]

© Virginia H. Conard


DENIAL

Is not just a river in Egypt
Is not just a concept from psychology
Is not something easily tamed
Is not without its benefits

Is protecting, pretending, preventing
Is a childhood temper tantrum, "NO!"
Is a way of insulation and rejection
Is containment of forces which threaten to overwhelm

Is a stage of grief
Is ultimately healthy to go through
Is avoidance which helps us deal
Is a coping strategy which has its time and place

Is what I need when I'm crazy
Is panacea but not remedy
Is helpful for desperate circumstances
Is something which ultimately must be overcome

Has helped me to keep it together
Has kept me from falling apart
Has saved me when I thought I'd lose it
Has given me time to accept

Will slowly give way to acceptance
Will return the moment I need it
Will eventually recede into the past
Will flow away downstream

© Virginia H. Conard