trauma poetry

loss

~

How swiftly the strained honey
of afternoon light
flows into darkness

and the closed bud shrugs off
its special mystery
in order to break into blossom;

as if what exists, exists
so that is can be lost
and become precious

by Lisel Mueller

grief

~

And the medicine now is naked, choiceless attention, being as spacious as the mirror itself, making room for thoughts and feelings but not mistaking them for the truth. Your beauty lies in your willingness to feel, and see beyond all labels. Hold the totality of the image the way the mirror holds it, not resisting, not hiding, not shaming, not trying to adapt yourself to some secondhand idea of beauty or perfection. Your imperfections are so perfect in this light; your wrinkles and blotches a work of divine art, fascinating and real, and so human.

See. And in the seeing, allow yourself to be seen.

You are beautiful, without changing a thing; your beauty is not earned.

by Jeff Foster

We all have tender places

It's easy to say "I love you".
It's easy to talk about love,
and presence, and awareness,
and a deep acceptance of what is.
It's easy to teach,
to say things that sound true,
and good, and spiritual.
But they are just words.
There is a world before words.
When anger surges, as it will, can you stay close,
and not numb it, or lash out?
When fear bursts in the body, can you breathe into it,
and not fuse with it, or run away into stories?
When you feel hurt, rejected, unloved, abandoned,
can you make room for that feeling,
welcome it in the body,
bow to its intensity, its fire, its presence,
and not attack, or act out, or call people names?
Can you commit to not abandoning yourself
now that you need your own love the most?
It's easy to talk about love.
It's easy to teach.
Until our old wounds are opened.
Until life doesn't go our way.
What triggers you
is inviting you
to a deeper self-love.
Can you see?
There is no shame in this:
We all have tender places.

by Jeff Foster

The well of grief

Those who will not slip beneath
the still surface on the well of grief

turning downward through its black water
to the place we cannot breathe

will never know the source from which we drink
the secret water, cold and clear,

nor find in the darkness glimmering
the small round coins
thrown by those who wished for something else.

by David Whyte

Let this darkness be a bell tower

Quiet friend who has come so far,
Feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. As you ring,

what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.

In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.

And if the world has ceased to hear you,
say to the silent earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.

by Rainer Maria Rilke

~

There is a place in the heart that
will never be filled

a space

and even during the
best moments
and
the greatest
times

we will know it

we will know it
more than
ever

There is a place in the heart that
will never be filled

and
we will wait
and
wait

in that space.

by Charles Bukowski

trauma

At the heart of all trauma

At the heart of all trauma, a terrible sense of isolation, disconnection, loneliness.

Follow your trauma to its devastating core, friend, to its heart of darkness, and you will inevitably meet the abandonment wound, the pain of all pains.

Abandoned by mother, father. Forgotten and misunderstood by the world. Cast out of heaven and separated from the Godhead. Divided from life.

Of course, it’s an illusion. You were never separate from the mountains, the forests, the diamond drops of morning dew. You were never broken, never rotten at your core, never separate from the One. You were always loved. The terrible heart of darkness was always your own exquisitely beautiful heart of light, so fragile, so powerful, so loveable, so real.

Ultimately others cannot save us. Each of us are called to confront our aloneness, dive into the heart of our trauma, and find solace and sanctuary there. Others can hold our trembling hands but they cannot travel for us.

There is no external saviour, and the lie of love is that another human being - parent, partner, guru or god - can complete you.

No. Your completeness is in your brokenness. We cannot save each other but we can weep together, walk together, share our terror, our horror, our shame, our hope and our awe.

Walking in the forest at dawn, our eyes meet.

I recognise your longing as my own.

Love is a recognition.

by Jeff Foster

The shattering

sometimes you don’t get to be a Buddha.
sometimes you just have to break. and feel.

you have to lose your precious ‘spiritual awakening’.
you just have to be a human being, feeling.

sometimes old pain resurfaces. old fear. sorrow. trauma.
the searing ache of the abandoned child.
the rage of a forgotten universe.

and suddenly, all of your spiritual insights crumble, all the beautiful spiritual words by the beautiful spiritual teachers, all the concepts and ideas about awakening and enlightenment, and the pure perfection of pure untainted awareness, and the selfless non-self self, and the path to glorious futures, and the wise guru, they suddenly are all meaningless, empty words, second-hand drivel, and dead to you.

what’s real, now, and alive, is the burning in the belly, the fire in the heart.
unavoidable. intense. so close. so present.

sometimes you just have to feel. you have no choice.
and sense your feet on the ground.
and breathe into the discomfort.
and trust, and maybe trust that you cannot trust right now.
and take it moment by moment, by moment, by moment.
and know that nothing is working against you.

and awaken from your dream of how this moment ‘should’ be.
and throw away all your second-hand ideas about the path.

sometimes your spirituality has to shatter,
so you can finally realise
this deeper spirituality
of feeling, presence, and feet-on-ground living,
and the sound of the birds singing in the distance,
and a total surrender to this one precious moment.

by Jeff Foster

Aftermath 9/11

the great mistake is to act the drama as if you were alone
as if life were a progressive and cunning crime
with no witness, no witness
to the tiny hidden transgressions
to feel abandoned is to deny the intimacy of your surroundings
you must know the way the soapdish enables you
or the window latch grants you courage
alertness is the hidden discipline of familiarity
the stairs are your mentor of things to come
the doors have always been there to frighten you and invite you
the tiny speaker in the phone is your dream ladder to divinity
put down, put down the weight of your aloneness
and ease into the conversation
the kettle is singing even as it pours you a drink
the cooking pots have left their arrogant aloofness
and see the good, the good in you at last
all the birds and creatures of the world are unutterably themselves
everything, everything is waiting for you

by David Whyte

Wild geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile, the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting -
over and over announcing you your place
in the family of things.

by Mary Oliver