I have been wandering all of my life, in this twilight slipstream I have watched others.

Never quite finding the key, or bus stop to make direct contact. Catching glimpses, superficial touches, before sinking back to where I’ve been for so long.

Alone

The loneliness taking my hope , and crushing it into drugs, behaviours, that made me feel alive, for a brief instance. After time, emotional, and spiritual death, were accompanied by thoughts of physical death.

I reached out, in one last effort.

Somebody grabbed my hand this time. They put a key in it, and said here is the bus stop you need to connect.

I’ve made my connection, and I stand here, wondering at all the possibilities. Learning to navigate this bright, emotion filled world has its challenges. At times I still want to shut down, from the sensory overload.

I grieved a long time for my lost world. It still has a soul numbing attraction. Then I look around, and I see you. I speak, listen,and reach to hold you in my arms, mind, and heart. I tell you my secrets, I listen to yours. I let the pain ooze out of my eyes. I hand you a tissue for the pain in yours. Of my shame and guilt, I tell you, listening as it dies, replaced by your voice, and touch in my heart.

I’ve learned the key, the sign on the bus stop. It says in bright letters.

LOVE

No longer must I stand apart.

HOME

The dark, frozen, oppressing winter gone.

Spring.

I stand in the light, let it warm me. I feel my juices start to flow. Tears. They water my soul, bringing it to fruition. Soaking into the seed of love that lies there, causing it to stir. The bud starting to plump, the stem lengthening, pushing the bud closer to the sun.

I wish I could say this was painless. Its not. I have this hard shell around me. It is armour that I have thickened over the winter. It is there to keep out the cold, I thought. What in effect it has done is to keep me small. I was not watered, fed, nurtured. I lay dormant like one of those plants in the desert. You know, the ones that don’t grow or flower for years, till there is enough rain.

I crack, break, split, and shatter, as the flower issues forth into the world, my husk dropping around me, to lay, withered at my feet. My love new, full, and vibrant.. The petals red, engorged with life.

What to do with this flower ? I could stand hear, and say, look, but don’t touch, its my flower ! I can’t. There are others who haven’t had a chance to flower, they stand still in that dark place. shivering in abandonment.

Please, take a petal, or two. I offer it so you can find that spot in your soul, and start to flower. I can’t give it to you. You have to reach out, and grab it for yourself. I will help you tend your flower, I’ll show you what I have learned. Together we can nurture our blossoms. There is still danger here. I can forget to do the work, tilling the soul, nourishing it with the program, and you. I then stand alone, and eventually my petals lose their lustre. My blossom starts to wither, and droop. Soon I die.

My dream is to one day look around.  As far as my eyes can see, only blossoms.

When I was young there must have been a time when I thought that I was okay, by the time I came to you, I was a scared, little 54 year old, to timid to own myself.

Not sure why, but so alone.

You dug through the denial, selfishness, anger, and fear. You put yourself into the muck, ugliness, and depression.

After bringing the little boy to the light, you said he wrote something beautiful.

You said you were proud of him. I looked around, and saw I could be proud of myself.

You said you were inspired by him. I feel inspired when I look at the sky, and reach for it.

You said you were amazed. I am amazed myself by all the love there is to give, and receive.

By your acceptance you encouraged him to reach out. I grasp that lifeline today, and pull myself out of a pool of despair, into an ocean of love. No longer isolated amongst the human race.

Now I walk the streets, work, home, and feel the connection.

I hold others, it reminds me to hold him.

I love others, it comes from loving him.

I feel okay, and beautiful today.

Thanks for reminding me.

For CHS, and Lenore.

I often drive in the old riverbed that I live in with a sense of wonderment, and curiosity.

I live in Drumheller, Alberta. one of the largest dinosaur areas uncovered by man.

We have layers here that were uncovered by a huge river. The Palaeolithic, Mesozoic, Jurassic, Carboniferous, and Devonian periods. To mention just a few.

I have often gone to the world famous museum that we have here to see what came out of those eras. It is amazing to behold what came from them.

I am reminded of the layers that I have gone through on the journey that I have been on.

First I came in contact with that scared little boy. I held him, and told him he was safe.

I search through my years, and feel the touchstones of the past, the incidents that made me who I am.

They resonate, and bring up feelings that I have very little idea of what to do with. I often wander down by the remaining relic of that huge river and look at the layers on the hillside, wondering which layer I am crying about now.

This journey through the layers is literal, figurative, mental, emotional, revealing, and wondrous.

Will you please help me dig ?

A person said something to me the other day that left me confused.

This person was talking about his relation to me regarding recovery.

He said, among other things ” You’re my hero ”  I thought about this for the next 2 days. It made me cry, you see I didn’t know where to put it.

I have shelf’s in my mind for all the negative things I have said to myself, and all the negative things I’ve taken from others.

They are labelled: self abuse, low self esteem, self doubt, low self worth, and others. They have chunks of dark metal on them that spell out: ” you’re not good enough, you will never do that, you will never be anything ” They are very full.

This is a different thing altogether. It is shiny, it almost floats in front of me, and gives me feelings that I can’t readily deal with.

After a time of contemplating, I came to the conclusion that I will build a new shelf. It will say: GRATITUDE FROM OTHERS: THANK YOU. It is my most fervent wish that I remember to say that when I receive from others.

I noticed the other shelves didn’t seem quite as full after I put the shiny new one up. When I am questioning myself, or when I am feeling insecure, I hope that I will remember to look on this shelf, and the other one that I built recently: GRATITUDE FOR OTHERS.

Words, today, are like scalpels that I wield to cut out the pain. Sometimes they lay side by side, on the paper, with tears.

I also use them as bandages to hold together the psychic wound. they bind it so it can rejoin, and regenerate.

I am like a keeper of trees with some of my words. I graft them onto the damaged trunk of my brain, through self talk, and they grow and flower into self worth and self love.

Mostly I weave my words into a rope that I throw from me to you. They are my vulnerability, ” I love you ”  They are trust, ” I will be open to you ”  They are courage, ” I will face you ”  They are nurturing, ” I will hold you ”

I used to use words to impress, and baffle others. I was shallow, and far from you. I now use words to make me whole, and safe for you.

Grab onto the rope that I throw, and come closer, and if I don’t throw you a rope, throw me one, I might need it.

A year ago I went to a place where I died. The old me started to die on the 27 th of 2014. I let my old beliefs die. My tightly clutched resentments, preconceptions, hatreds, aloneness, and illusion of control died.
I walked into a room where I actively participated in my own death. I’ve cried and mourned that 55 year old boy who died that day for a year now, and I don’t see it stopping, ever. It has, and will get better, different, and deeper.
In that room a new boy was born. He is excited, scared, confused, joyful, reluctant, eager,and willing.
My journey today is to nurture that boy, take him by the hand, and reach out to play, and cry with others. To touch, hug, challenge, and comfort boys, and girls, just like him.
It can sometimes be a frightening, uncertain road, but it is well lit by the ones who went before me.
Far different than the dark, hollow road the other little boy travelled.
When I come across you on this road that I travel today I will remember to reach out, and maybe we can walk together for a while, or longer. You see, today I hold on to things that comfort, and challenge me. I hold onto my love of you, and it makes us holy.

I burn for You.
Take my heart, and warm yourself.

I care for You.
Come into my hug, and feel at home.

I think of You.
Thoughts of you cradled in my mind.

I sing for You.
My song fills the painful silence.

I listen for You.
Your words bring me joy.

I shine for You.
Your Light, and mine will show the way.

I love You.
Without you my love lays like withered fruit on the vine.

I yearn for You.
Please, come in.
_____________________________________
This poem is dedicated to all addicts.

I stride down the hallway, looking at the image in the mirror. Today I see a person who feels, acts, and is there.

I used to shuffle down the hallway, enmeshed with the image I saw. You’re to fat, to old, to skinny, to imperfect, to different.

I travelled into the mirror, it took me back over all those years, my mistakes, failure’s, shame and fears. It magnified who I had convinced myself that I was.

I wasn’t good enough for you, or good enough for me. Today the mirror shows a beautiful person,  me ! I used to see a mistake in the mirror, now I see me, a person who feels, cares, loves, engages with other beautiful people.

It is amazing to me how I can be the same image in the mirror, and yet be totally different then I was a year ago. The mirror not only reflects the image back at me, it also reflects thoughts back.

I care, therefore I am worthy of being cared for. I am responsible for me, not you. I offer me, I don’t tell you. I reach out in love, and I no longer feel so alone.

I look in the mirror, and today I see your Light, shining through my eyes.

When I was young you went away, every day. You came home for supper, then left again.
You left me time after time, I did not know who to turn too, when I was scared.
I felt that I was destined to be left at any time. I developed a pattern where I would never let anyone get close, or alternately, I left first.
I made my way like this till I was oh so alone. I have no idea how I survived without you for so long.
I finally saw what I had become, and acted out of desperation. I reached out, I am always available to others , never leaving.
I spend huge amounts of time staying connected and being there.
I have also made myself available to be part of you. I have said who I am, and that I am worthy of you staying.
Mom called 2 days ago, and told me you were losing your mind, to disease.
Now you are leaving, again.