There you go again life,
Shattering me into a million pieces of broken.
Scrambling my taken for granted tenacity to rise above.
I try writing and my words fall like thuds,
Lumbering banalities of cliché terms of love.
“Be kind to yourself” I say, “pull yourself together”
And some days I do,
Till a new slap of life’s brutality
Shatters me anew.
I am broken to pieces
At a daughter’s story of isolating with disease
Till one nurtured moment in the arms of her mother
Causes the moment she now grieves.
Sheltering in place didn’t happen for me.
Navigating those first fearful days of lockdown
Wheeling dad through the storm of uncertainty and pain
His, mine, my family’s, the world’s –
Interactions with caregivers masking their dread
Nights not sleeping, hoping I was not bringing covid home
Not knowing what news each morning would hold.
And can my shattered heart ever let go of hate
For the willful stupidity and blatant rape
Of the Constitution and promise of freedom
That my father stood proudly for day after day
His life’s commitment to peace, equality and love
Expressed through his wounded eyes
Pierces my soul through my sobbing goodbyes.
He questioned whether he could hold on long enough to cast his vote.
But he was needed more, I guess, on the other side.
At least my music soothed me, till I listened with a critical ear
Hating my lack of rhythm,
And angry that I couldn’t cut myself some slack.
Hold on, I sang, hold on, hold on to love.
So go ahead and shatter me life – bring it on!
Force me to see what I could not see before.
That we are all broken – No matter how we spoke
That we all can be woken – No matter what we broke.
We may bask in privilege and wallow in despair
But here we are – accountable to our being.
And here we are – all choked in our breathing.
It simply isn’t this or that, good or bad, left or right.
It isn’t just you or me, us or them, or even run or fight.
There are places between, that if we co-mingle
We could contract a deliberate dis-ease
And hear deeper into what’s unknown
Allowing the questions to grow.
Life happens, though it’s not what we thought.
Life shatters, whether we like it or not.
Life changes in the blink of an eye,
And ends in the breath of a sigh.
One thing that life’s shattering reveals
Is that it’s a you AND me world
Whatever else could it possibly be?