VOICES

A collection of poems reflecting women’s stories of loss, hope, love and discovery. Thank you to each of the women who let me collect their voices to sing this collective song…

 

Of the creative.

This bus is so still

Yet wild with breeze 

Flashes of cars passing by outside 

 

So many faces around me

Smiling, laughing, squealing with joy

But I can’t seem to crush the sorrow inside 

 

How can I be surrounded 

Yet feel so alone?

How can the voice inside me

Really be my own?

 

My face they know

But my heart even I don’t 

Feel or know its depths 

I don’t know I’m worth that yet 

 

So I keep on in silence 

Wanting connection but every bone

In my frail body fights it 

Why do I feel so alone?

 

The answer is simple

I must put it all on the line

The safety I feel in silence

Must be forfeited to find what I love

 

To believe in others 

I must believe in her

The one whose body I inhabit 

I must find companion with her first 

 

That the melody inside 

Could become my own

And go outside 

To connect me to others

Whose voices long to be heard 

 

Yet here I sit not uttering a word

I resolve to be the most real me

Because lonely is not a worthwhile 

Price for security 

 

So I’ll let her come out

And sing the lonely away 

For all the world to see the truly 

Beautiful, wholly connected me 

 

Of love.

A full puzzle

The kind where all the pieces make sense

That’s what our love was.

 

Finally

So much heartbreak and loss

But with the winding road

Ending with you 

The pieces made sense. 

 

But the wind came

The pieces flew apart 

Then fire

And rain 

And soon nothing left of our heart.  

 

Of grief.

Seated

Safe 

Secure 

Enclosed in your hands

So strong they were

Holding me tight yet tender

I was so young, but I still remember 

 

Now that you’re gone

Where do I go to find that sense of peace?

Can I still be just as safe

If you’re no longer here to hold me?

 

And now I’m in a sea of grief 

Like waves it flows and moves along

Sometimes in a trough I find relief 

This rhythm is a melody that puts my life to song

 

Other times it holds me captive

Longing to be back in that moment

But then I sit back, passive

And realize it’s not that far off

 

That moment connects us through time

Where I’m forever young

Your safety, your security is now mine. 

 

Of brokenness.

Driving the street block

Of Sevier park

A cancelled flight and a popsicle

Walking arm and arm

 

The promises we made each other

Never quite complete

Three sides of the square

Frame the missing piece

 

Promises we fought for

I fought for you

And what we have to show for it?

An incomplete frame

Displaying what could have been

 

A broken me and you .

 

Of desperation.

I ran until my feet bled

Slammed my body

Into locked doors 

 

I asked others for help

Screamed my point of view

And let my heart melt on the floor 

 

Because it wasn’t my fault

There was nothing I could do at all

As it flew away I stood and watched 

And yelled in silence at the windowed wall 

 

I stayed by your side

At your every beckoning call

And stood there still as you would flee

 

I rehearsed all the lines 

Read every help book I could find

To try to bring you back to me

 

Because I knew it wasn’t your fault

Life fights with lies and attacks 

And though I know that confidently now

There’s still nothing I wouldn’t do to bring you back 

 

I prayed until my knees turned blue

Wagered with God 

Questioned His ability to take care of you

 

Time and time He proved again

He’s the Great Provider

And He cares for you more than I do

 

I know it wasn’t His fault  

This world was never meant to be this way

And though He lets us scream and cry

He will never once turn His face away

 

Of the healing.

Each week a different flavor 

Give me the next one in the line

Meals and flowers to win me over

Couldn’t love them if I tried 

 

The only thing I’m here for

Is the glimmers of you in their eyes 

And when the bubble bursts 

And you’re still gone

I’ve long since said goodbye 

 

They say time heals wounds

And though the small time it’s been 

I’ve healed the way you taught me

Spending my nights making mice of men 

 

Of the abused.

I’m so frustrated by you

By the bubble of mine you burst 

By your invitation that felt so rehearsed

 

He shouldn’t have left you

But he did

He shouldn’t have touched you

But he did

He shouldn’t have invited you there

He shouldn’t have blemished you there

But he did.

 

Right and wrong don’t matter when

I'm left here wondering how this happened to me again?

 

You’re a sick, sick girl

Who likes being broken and used

But when they formed my world

How can I see I’m being battered and bruised?

 

I love to give

And all I did was wanted to please you

Protect you, help you

 

But there’s nothing left for me

Than the wreckage

Of the world we made

 

And somehow I carry the blame.

 

Of the recovering.

The lonely let me love myself

The heartache taught me peace

Your leaving though it hurt like hell

Taught me for the first time how to breathe

 

But the spaces where you used to be

Still ache without you there

And though they took our bench

I think our love still haunts the air

 

I'm better than I was before

I've seen the purpose of the hurt

But now that I'm back to health

Why have you still left me here by myself?

 

Of the hopeful.

I’ve been back

Touched each brick

Smiled at the place that we first met

 

I’ve been back to our old friends 

Laughed through memories 

Even made new ones again

 

I even walked back

Into our favorite midnight place

Sat on our old bench

Talked back through our early days

 

And while the tears still come

And hard times write their songs 

I’ve started smiling again 

Gaining back some weight and strength again

Dancing, hoping, dreaming again

I’ve come back to myself

But where are you?

 

I’ve sat back down

On our favorite church pew 

Where we talked to our Best Friend

 

I’ve been back 

Through all the same old prayers

Praying that I could still hold you

Praising God I even got to know you

 

And while my doubts still flood

And faith squeezes my begging hands numb

I’ve started hoping again

Knowing that He can heal and create new stories again

Writing, singing, believing again

I’ve come back to myself

But where are you? 

 

I look back at our old faces 

And wish I could warn them of the pieces 

That they’d tear their worlds into

 

But part of me thinks they knew 

Maybe better than we do now 

That love is worth risking it all

Worth the pain the heart feels somehow

 

And while the throbbing hasn’t stopped

And I often wonder what it’s all for

I’ve started walking forward again

Trusting without seeing again 

Loving, risking, and living again

I’ve come back to myself

But where are you?

Of Truth.

For the moments when 

You want to give up

When he walks away

When she doesn’t show up

 

When you leave the water 

Running till the skin burns off

Because fears are dismissed 

With a laugh and a scoff 

 

My eyes lock on the reflection

Of the One who was left behind

The One who died

 

"I choose you. 

They may not have stayed. 

But I always will. 

You I will never leave behind." 

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haiku.