Drifting

   Drifting, in stops and starts through life. Moving forward and then back. I make some progress, I gain some ground, but then so quickly I give it up, so quickly I allow life to numb me, to pull me back, to pull me away. My heart is coming alive, I think of God, I sense him, and I know, my heart is coming alive, but then deadness tempts, it desires, it allures. Deadness, with its numbness, with the temptation not to feel, to wall up, to back off, to run away, to hide. To hide from this world, from the pain, from the disillusionment and disappointment. Deadness tempts. 

   And I realize I have a choice, every day I get the choice. The choice to move closer to death or to life, the choice to engage or to numb. It is a hard choice because engaging means feeling the pain, the sadness, the grief, the loss; engaging means facing myself with all the disappointments, the failures, the let downs. Engaging means actually seeing me. Where numbness means I get to escape; I'm still in life, but I'm not really living. I'm just going through the motions, being where I'm required to be, following the rules, and always looking for the things that numb. Moving toward deadness means I always need something to keep me distracted, to keep me numb, to keep my eyes closed. Its this sense of desperately trying at all times to keep something in front of me, so I don't see, so I don't engage, so I don't live. Desperately trying, but its a quiet desperation, so quiet, so elusive that sometimes I don't even realize it is there. And I do it, I do it all the time, I fall into numbness, I fight for numbness, for deadness; because sometimes I don't want to live. I don't want to engage, I don't want to see, I am scared of the pain, I'm scared of me, I'm scared of what is inside, I'm scared that it's not actually enough, and so I numb instead. 

   But by numbing, I don't realize what I am missing. I don't realize the cost. I don't see the other side of engaging, of truly engaging; of living instead of dying. I don't see that engagement also means finding the joy of knowing deep inside that I actually am enough, of experiencing the peace and acceptance on the other side of grief; of encountering intense, pure engagement in life, of seeing nature and getting tears in my eyes because of its beauty, of dancing in reckless abandon, of feeling the ecstasy of simply being. The engaging, the living, the seeing, which I am so terrified of, is actually love, joy, and peace; the heart and soul; it is what I've been longing for. Engaging is life; it is what I'm created for. It's daring to take that deep dive into the pain and discouragement and fear that I'm not enough. It's actually allowing my heart to feel the pain, to see the pain, to live the pain, to become the pain; and to come out on the other side and to realize that the pain does not define me, to realize the pain cannot destroy me, and to realize the pain no longer holds power over me. To live, to truly live, is to embrace the pain, knowing that in it is life, in it is freedom, in it is where I find the treasure of truth that make me come alive. 

   Numbness, moving toward deadness, is tempting, but today; today I choose life, I choose adventure, and I choose the pain because I know that is where I truly come alive. I might be terrified of the pain, but today I am looking at the other side. Tomorrow I might forget, I might slip back into numbing, I might forget to look, but today, today I choose to embrace what makes me come alive, and in so doing, to truly experience God. 

Wrestling in The Dark

Wrestling in the dark

I don’t know what I see

Wrestling with my heart

Not knowing how to be

Anxiety and Confusion

Being thrown at me

Judgment and Doubt

For what I believe I see

Wrestling with the truth

But darkness hides it all

Trying to see its light

But blinded to its call

Groping in the darkness

Trying to find some light

Confusion is surrounding

Not knowing what is right

Believing I see the truth

But judged for what I see

Grasping for the light

Not knowing who to be

How do I live in light

Darkness pulling me apart

How do I live in right

When no one sees my heart

How do I find you God

In the midst of the despair

How do I find your truth

And believe that you care

I will continue to wrestle

The dark is overwhelming me

I will not give up though

For I know that I will see

Gone

Its in my hands, I feel in now

So close to me, inside my heart

Its in my hands, I know it now

So close inside, within my soul

And I cry out loud

A battle cry

I scream to the clouds

I yell to the sky

Because its gone

Gone, gone gone

Like a cloud on a summer day

When the sun shines and the mist fades

It’s gone gone gone

Nothing to show and nothing to be

It is just gone

So far away from me

I want it now, but cannot be

So far away I long to see

I forget the sense inside of me

When it was, back at me

But its gone

Gone, gone, gone,

Like a cloud on a summer day

When the wind blows and the mist fades

I sit in the silence

I sit in the quiet

I mourn the loss

As I decry it.

I don’t even try

No grasping or hanging on

Because like the mist

It is gone

Happiness

So elusive, so obscure

This idea to which we cling

So transcendent, so sublime

Praises to which we sing

Who are you, happiness?

What are your qualities?

Why do you taunt us?

What are your policies?

We pursue your intent

So vague, so intangible

We don’t even know you

Yet you’re so desirable

The harder we try

The more we pursue

The farther you hide

No matter what we do

But when we stop

We give up and submit

Then you somehow come

Even just a little bit

You give us hope

And we try once again

But then you are gone

And we think we’re insane

Stop altogether

And then you are there

How can we be

As we stretch and we tear

You come and you go

You tease and you poke

As if we were pawns

In a huge cosmic joke

Happiness, you are

Elusive and free

You are who you are

And that’s who you’ll be

Today

Today I sit in the quiet

Today I see into the unseen

Today I feel in the stillness

An unrest, a moving

Today I am the quiet

Today I am the unseen

Though I am not the stillness

I see from the moving

The unrest is coming

Through the quiet

Through the unseen

Forward it is moving

Today it is peace

Today it is calm

But within the tomorrow

Constant is the moving

The moving, the churning

The change and the qualm

But within each slice

Is tension between calm

Calm in each moment

But beyond it not

Silence in the present

Within the moving

The moving be present

The moving be strong

The moving be tangible

But today… it is calm

Tension

Tension between

Past and present

Tension be seen

In what is sent

Time ticking

Beyond today

Time sinking

A story to say

Sadness inside

Trying to be

Sadness abide

All throughout me

Running between

Tomorrow and yesterday

Running unseen

By the things I say

Strength arise

Inside the sound

Strength surmise

Though it pound

Crying alight

Between today

Crying at night

From yesterday

Till it is finished

Final and complete

Like it was wished

At the defeat

The Voice of Pain

This dull ache

The pain inside

So consistently present

I keep trying to hide

It’s the sad me,

Wanting to come out

But I try so hard

To suppress the shout

The shout of pain

Of anger and fear

The confusion inside

I don’t want to hear

But she tries even harder

To be heard and be known

This pain won’t be quiet

She wants to be shown

The harder she tries

The quieter I become

As the battle inside

Becomes my tomb

Locked in with myself

And the pain run wild

I shut the world out

From this plaintive child

I become so alone

Always wrestling this pain

Trying to find peace

But it all seems in vain

I think I make progress

And I feel so glad

But then I realize

I am even more sad

I just buried her deeper

Didn’t let her speak

She is even more angry

And now wants to shriek

I try to keep her quiet

By numbing her voice

With food and movies

I don’t give her a choice

And I keep on moving

Through sadness and fear

I keep on trying

To replace her in here

The cycle continues

And I feel so caught

My tired body tries

To perform as I ought

But I am failing the fight

And I can’t go on

She is hurting me daily

This battle she has won

As I give in to the pain

Discouragement and doubt

I give her a voice

Let all the pain come out

She comes with a vengeance

Screaming in like a hurricane

She hurts me so badly

I no longer feel sane

I feel so damaged

Destroyed and alone

All by myself

In this ruin of a tomb

I stand in the wreckage

Of what used to be me

So mad at the pain

I allowed to be

I stand in the quiet

Alone and so still

I stand in the emptiness

As my eyes begin to fill