Poetry

“I am alright”

as a response to:

“How are you?”

Became the easiest pill to swallow.

After a lifetime of feeding that addiction.
No other answer would come out.
Your emotions you compressed in that prescription.
Your heart was shallow,
not because you lacked the capacity for depth,
but the thought of fixing what you felt resistant to express
filled you with fear.
So instead you would respond with
what the world would like to hear.

It is okay
not to be okay.

To fall and break
in doubt to drown
in fear to shake.
It is alright
even the times that you convince yourself its not,
because the come up
is always better than the drop.
You only need to look down
for the time it takes for your arms to push the ground
off you chest.

So there is no need to stress;
nothing to fix besides
your inability to find rest within the trouble.
And look for peace
not in desirable effects you’ll never get,
but in the hope that you’ll progress
through every test
and every struggle.

I ponder…
Am I the crowd
or the mind
that stands above the noise?

Am I the one sheep that was found
or one of the many that blindly wonder.

Who am I?

Am I the pond
that remains still until the wind blows over?

Am I the river
that ceaselessly flows
and expansively grows
and its wisdom borrows
from the adjacent stream?

Am I the trout
that goes against the torrent
bound to be hit by the rubble?

Am I the dreamer or the dream?

Am I the one that reads
or the one that causes the trouble?

Am I my wants
or am I my needs?

In every person that ever loved me.
In every hopeful word,
and every broken.
In every drop that flooded my eyes,
and every tear that my heart withstood.

I miss you,
in my volatile mood
and every page
of every book that taught me how to live.
My word to keep I failed,
and yours to spill I tried
over every line that I wrote,
and every thought that I spoke.

But without you,
uphill I tried to go
on a dry river
with a broken boat.
To mend a broken bone
with kisses from lips I failed to seal,
from promising for everything I couldn't keep.

I miss you,
but only when I need you.

When the bottom
of the pit I made for my comfort seems too deep.

I miss you,
when my fears start to creep.
Clouding my thoughts,
taking my sleep away.

And here I lie awake,
trying to remember the way
that I used to pray.

I am scared.
I have always been scared,
but not always ready to express it.

I am weak.
I have always been weak,
but not always ready to embrace it.

I know why I lived how I lived,
trying to hold on to every piece of pleasure I found.

I know that You were,
everywhere I was,
but I was blind by the things that kept me bound.

In hindsight I found my sight,
now able to see where the path You offered took me.

Pain only makes sense once you have been through it.

In my mind I had to dive
and remove the thoughts that shook me.
Before my eyes I tried to place
what I had and what You offered,
in an effort to weigh my options.
And that scale I put You on,
broke under the weight of your grace.
I tried to look for you within the world you crafted,
and wondered why you hide your face.

Just like an architect,
you were not found
within the walls of the house you designed,
but You directly I had to address
to discover the wonders of your mind.

I said

“Father,
why in the sea you threw me with no life vest?”

“To learn not to be scared”
He said.

“To look for me within the storm.
By what you see,
not to be stressed
and in my arms to find rest.

I gave you space to grow,
the will to choose to live
not for your own sake.
And a heart capable of discerning
what is true from what is fake.

I gave you wings
to try and meet me at my heavenly throne.
And the strength to get up
after each blow of wind would ruin your ascent.
I gave you faith in my ability to help.

I gave you access to my wisdom
and endless amount of provision.
And I expected nothing in return.

I know you'll fall,
you will mess up,
you will forget my word to hold.
You will get reckless
in your excitement to experience the world.
You will mistake what is the right thing to say
from what is wrong.

And that's okay.
I don’t expect you not to fail,
and I'll be here to assist you,
through your self created struggle to prevail.

I’ll test your faith,
and your persistence,
and when one single step you take towards my way,
I’ll cover the remaining distance.

For I don’t need your allegiance.
I want to share with you my love.
I want to offer you so much
that will be impossible within your frail arms to hold.
I’ll cover you in blessings

and you will wonder:
“What have I done to deserve this?”

And that is where you have been wrong.

It’s not about what you’ve done,
or what you will,
or what you should,
or what you must,
but what for you I truly want.

I want your trust.

I spent most of my life
worrying about things that I would never get
And I became disappointment’s
greatest captain.

I said I will think my way out of problems that I never met,
and I won every conversation that didn't happen.

I placed my hopes on things that would disappear in a second
because I lacked the patience to wait for life to unfold
and while my own satisfaction came first
my progress came second.

I would craft the greatest dreams,
an architect of imagination
and I would feed on the disappointment
of unlived expectation.

How did I expect
to be trusted with more
when for my present I was ungrateful?

How did I think fulfilment
would derive not from what I had
but from what I wasn't ready for?

I had to learn how to live and
one single thought to always keep;
to only want what I can have
and for the rest to just be faithful.

And this is where I found peace
the button of desire I had to stop pressing.
Soon insufficiency turned into abundance
and everything became a blessing.

When did you start being scared of the unknown?

It used to be exciting
to move with no intention,
to progress simply for the joy of progression.

When was that moment
that you stopped to think
what is the right thing to do
and what is not?

As if you could predict your fall…

All you could do was guess,
and wait for the truth to find
and when that self created bet would fail
you’d suffer prematurely within your own mind.

What made you think that through thought you’d solve it all?

It would be easier to erase
pain with more pain,
or clean up your filthy clothes
with another stain.

You see,
the solution cannot be found within the problem,
so sometimes silence
for your cluttered head
can be the solvent.

I'm tired
of constantly trying to keep up with this world.

Make it faster,

make it brighter,

make it funnier,

make it more.

More of everything
that hasn't yet satisfied me.

So stupid,
how we expect to be content with more,
when we can’t be satisfied with the few we have.

I'm tired,
of chasing after my attention.
And I complain
about all the wrong I get to witness,
when I’ve conditioned myself to seek it.
When I can’t draw a single breath
without thinking about the next.
When I can't make a choice
without regretting the last one.

So stupid,
trying to be present
when I position my eyes and my ears
anywhere but here.

“Let’s go for another walk,
another talk,
another thing that undeservedly I want.
Let's get some more
of all the ones,
that my desire not to feel all of the wrong in the world
would push me to collect.
Your teachings to deflect I mastered;
and in a sense,
above my self-inflicted wounds,
I placed the greatest plaster.”

“You are asking me for more,
than in your slowly dying flesh can store,
but to reflect on the one you need the most,
you falter.
To climb the ladder of progression
you'll have to let me be the host,
your sense of self I'll have to alter.

You thought you knew how to move,
but in your rush
to get to places you dreamt,
you fell and dropped the experience
your feelings were meant to get you,
and ironically
away from your very goal they kept you.

Please let me lead just for once,
and all I ask is trust
in my judgement to abstain,
from the pleasures that you seek
in advance of reason.
Your self imposed prison of emotions,
no more will have to hold you captive.
No longer will we be impulsively eruptive.
No longer will I place
our pleasure over wisdom.
The greatest gift I'll grant you
in return of giving up your short term vision;
a chance to see the world through my lens;
a chance to taste my freedom.”