purpose

More Love Stuff

~ Emma ~ 2 Comments

I started a poetry writing course this week. It was a good idea, I think. Except today I’m having all sorts of rebellion against it primarily because at this point in my life I feel pretty done with education and everything that comes with it. I did not know I would feel like this prior to enrolling. I am glad I signed up though. Intuitively it feels like the right move. And I’ll definitely learn some new skills and tricks and be able to take the feedback and apply it and that’s cool. But, do I even want the feedback?

What is it for? Is what I’m asking myself today. Bigger picture, higher reason and intention behind this. I never have really thought about changing or trying to improve my poems, so what’s driving this?

I think it is to glean a little bit more about my propellor and the wind speed as well as the velocity. To know the exact direction the air is blowing here is a little tough, but there’s definitely a wind force that, I’m trying to just let “be” without searching too hard to fully know how strongly it’s going to blow or for how long and in what direction.

We do things because we enjoy them and there doesn’t have to be a reason. There are all sorts of life events that drive us closer to something while also at the same time, driving us further away from something else. That’s just the momentum of life and of growth I guess.

There are things about this course that are irking me but it’s mainly because of introverted-ness and just wanting one on one with the instructor and not to have to interact with any other students, or participate in any of the group things, like the discussions and such. The first assignment was to write about oneself and introduce ourselves to the class. And I found that exercise impossibly difficult. Writing about who I am, what I like, what I do – I couldn’t access nearly the same kind of creative juices to produce something I was even just okay with, from doing that exercise.

Writing is a lonely, (in a good way) solo sport and that’s why I love it. It’s isolating and that’s why I love it. It’s singular and that’s why I love it. It’s private, hidden (until it’s not), and it’s one of my favourite things to do with my time in whatever form.

So why sign up for a course where other writers are going to hear me, see me, feedback me, and sort of know me? Still not sure, but it’s par for the course (no pun intended) with stuff like this, no way around it really. And I am actually enjoying reading some of the other students’ poems.

The prompt for the start of this blog this past January was, an important relationship ending that had sparked a lot of intense emotion and inner turmoil as well as a transformation that came out of left field. It was as if writing was not an option now. Why? Poetry started to spew out and it was like, what? Funny how break-ups do that. But it’s more than this.

I think of all of the most wonderful poetry that’s ever been written and at least 70% or more has got to be related to some kind of heartbreak, lover entanglement or distressing or obsessive infatuation to the point of demise, kind of writing. But why? I think it’s partly because we know it’s an all too common and shared experience, and we are humans after all, looking to belong to and be a part of some sort of tribe, even if we are introverted solo natured people. Those parts of ourselves have nothing to do with the primal parts of being human.  

Writing about love brings us back to ourselves and at the same time expands the tribe.

Love and its impact. Love and its overwhelm. Love and its underwhelm. Love and its proximity. Love and its consequences. Love and its addictiveness. Love and its tight or loose parameters. Love and how it’s measured (I don’t believe it can be measured though). Love and how it’s given, how it’s shown, how it’s received. Love and how free it is. Love and how unconditional it is. Love and how binding it is. Love and how controlled by it we can get. Love and how conditional it can be. Love and how it royally fucks with your brain, while you are swimming in it and also when you’re drowning from it.

Shall I keep going? I’m almost out, but I know there’s more.

The reason I write is love. I love writing, the act itself and I love writing about love and from love. Even when we think love isn’t running our lives, it is. It is the driving force behind everything and the reason we are here.

I’m grateful for the man who is not even close to knowing the degree of impact he made on my life, for helping to inspire a further awakening, (I feel like if I awaken any more though, my third eye just may never close). An awakening that would not have occurred without him. They are right when they say that certain people are meant to show up in your life to teach you very valuable lessons and to help you become the person you are supposed to be. Even if they are only meant to be with you for a season (or nine).

When I told my poetry instructor about how I came to be writing poetry, she replied that for years she had been writing fiction and then boom, a horrible break-up and there she was, arms and legs deep in only writing personal poetry, no more fiction or short stories for her.

Love does stuff to us that we should never ignore.

I think about Shakespeare and the other love poets and I think about the students in this class, and all of us writing poems from our places and our certain states and how really, it’s all just the same. It’s pretty simplistic. I mean not all poetry is about love, but it is actually, even if the content has nothing to do with love. It’s still the love of doing and the pain of maybe writing, but it still is coming from a loving place, even if the words are cruel. It is your soul’s expression and mode for healing…for something to alter, to awaken…in that moment or in the moments after. Is there heart behind this? Of course. Is there rage, anger, sadness? Definitely. But those emotions never cancel out the ability or the power of the heart.

When you receive a bunch of external validation, approval, acceptance and appreciation (and maybe throw some infatuation and idealization in there too) and then all of a sudden it’s gone, you need to reach and rely on the reserves you have inside yourself, to provide all of that just from you. And relying too heavily (or at all) on any of that from external sources, never a good outcome. Even if you had a decent relationship with providing your own validation and such, you can still get high off of constant praise and affection and adoration when there’s a steady stream coming from something outside of you. And it can end up drowning out your own voice. And when there is a disproportionate reliance here then the result is something like, oh I don’t know, Romeo and Juliet.

I think about the level of chemical withdrawal that Shakespeare must have been feeling in order to write that play and wow, that’s some serious shit.

I still don’t want to make changes to my poems or experience constructive feedback in order to improve them. I think they are perfect just as they are. Each one holds a great meaning for me. I wrote them the way I wrote them not for validation or to impress anyone but to hear myself a little bit stronger and a little bit harder and a lot more intentionally. To see myself more clearly and to let myself know, that I am seen. To help fill a bit of a void in my life. But it turns out, voids don’t last forever and they’re not actually real to begin with. The voids exist by our own doing and they can very easily be undone and you can find your way back to yourself, to that void-less, free, and whole you.

I think that the greatest acts of love are not the ones we do for others, but are the one’s we do for ourselves. And maybe running after love is a part of loving ourselves but, choosing not to race after it or chase it, can be an even bigger part of allowing more love into our lives purely because we already have and we already are, all the love that we need. And that is something I think we only discover once we have been changed because of one or more, of the various presentations that love has made in our lives. It jolts us and it’s the undoing and recreation of ourselves as a result.

If I could give any advice to Romeo and Juliet it would be: “Don’t off yourselves just yet, this isn’t that bad.”

Letting Go

~ Emma

Missing them only means you are human. That the connection mattered and was important. Missing them doesn’t mean you are meant for each other, or it’s destiny or that it’s important to forget the incompatibilities because the good stuff was so good. Missing them means you lived, and gave your heart and now you are changed. Maybe you’re changed forever because of them. You aren’t changed for the worse because they are gone, but you are changed for the better because they were there. Not everyone on this earth is lucky enough to have experienced that one soul who, at the right time shows up and reaches inside you and ignites something unexpected, special and sort of life changing and maybe saw something in you that no one else ever had.

Even if you’d done a lot of healing up until when they arrived and you understood your patterns, your nervous system and you were more aligned with your true authentic self, if that person got a seat in your car, your partially healed car, your solitary car that generally remains empty without any passengers, that person, was definitely meant to sit beside you. And when they left the vehicle, they’re actually still sort of there, maybe just now in the backseat…or the trunk, or hanging out on the roof.

I don’t think there’s an amount of time, analysis, processing, understanding, reminiscing, questioning, trying not to miss, or rationalizing that will take them away from that nice place inside of you that is and forever will be, grateful for what they gave. Even when you know that you are better off without them and that you can’t have them in your life, that they are not meant to stay, it somehow doesn’t make it easier knowing that, especially if there wasn’t anything really awful, or the ending wasn’t terrible enough to have you feeling really relieved. That’s maybe even harder, when it’s just a slow fade, a distance created unintentionally, (or maybe intentionally), just two people moving in certain directions whose lives, needs, interests just no longer jive.

I think that some people are directed onto our path to teach us necessary lessons and to bring out pieces and parts of us that had been dormant prior to their arrival. And the length of time they are to stay with us, a specific calculation not to go unnoticed or ignored. But to examine in that very exact time frame what was gleaned, about yourself, about them, about the connection…and about life.

What was awakened as a result of their presence could have only come from them and no one else. The wisdom acquired from having them in your life, a necessary and difficult teaching. It’s cosmically surreal and amazing if you think about it really intimately. Who you were in those moments with them maybe you won’t be with anyone else or maybe you will but a slightly different and better version. It’s beautiful the way the Universe can send us the people who are meant to help us understand and learn the things we are supposed to and then take them away to teach us that important life skill of knowing when to let go and to give us the clarity that their absence brings.

And maybe out of the two of you, there was one who felt it harder, who maybe this relationship meant more and they cared harder, let their walls down faster and easier and just made the decision to fly and feel it all and to let what needed to come out during that time, just explode and flow freely. And maybe that’s where the misstep was. Or maybe you both were just on completely different pages of the same book and never really reading things the same way the entire time. Whatever it was or wasn’t, when you stop forcing, everything that is meant for you starts flowing effortlessly. Having their arrival and departure both feel unforced, is a strong and natural indication that the both of you still are, on the right path. Missing someone isn’t a message or sign that you’re not healing, it’s just a natural part of letting go.

I’m forever thankful for you. I’ll never forget and I’ll always be sending positive energy your way. Thank you for seeing me and for caring. My heart carries your warmth and I hope yours carries mine too.

The Sound of Sirens

~ Emma

The sound of sirens silences.
You never heard them, they were so loud.
The lights flashing, colours blazing, screaming.
The decibels at the highest pitch, you didn’t flinch.

The heart that stole you, the breath that saved you.
Gone in an instant, the injuries and impact, not minor.
Little bumps, little bumps, little bumps.
A tearful scene inside the mind, smoother now, without alert.

Standing by and watching the chaos, feeling the weight.
Waiting for something, anything to lift the suspicion.
She saw all along, but stayed because she is pure, she is love.
But the sirens are silenced now, no more dilation of sight.

You took nine wrong steps, she led you back and you let her slip.
She knows who you are more than you do.
She wanted to love you, she let herself go somewhere for you.
She will not look back, she will never come back.

The risks, the time, the lies, the loneliness is no more.
The significance of her, of you, of it all, holds now a secret, a lesson.
School was in but now it’s out, the path is very changed.
Chalkboard statements erased.

The planets designed this, they directed the show.
The actors and their parts following script, line by line.
Memorizing became easy, learning became the challenge.
Soaking wet scenes full of spark and defence, trying to calm a drowning tiger.

She lights a candle for you everyday, as you do too.
The beauty in the growth, the transition, the purpose and the alarm.
Never ever will forget, never will the tide stop moving.
Washing away, washing away, washing away the clutch, the cling, the sting.

Who are they now? Who are they really?
Two souls of wonderful light, they gave to one another amidst a storm.
The sound of sirens are silenced. She heard loud and clear.
There is no more mystery. The diamond, is stronger than ever.