Tag: endurance

Diamond in The Ruff

Diamonds on a black background with copy space

I decided to seek strength when pain took it upon herself to become the choir director of humanity

in an anxious quest to play doubt on the strings of our faith she laughs…

coughing up the twisted humor of her bowels you see she knows

that our minds have been twisted by the craftiness of sin still falling from the fingerprints of Eve and  Hiding behind the shame of Adam she knows
The ease to which we are apt to scream we’re not able like the blood of Abel, that at times
our lowliest moments give us in to unbelief like virgins vulnerable to the sensitivity of fleshly skin
Faith giving it up like cracking levees… overflowing with trial & struggle she laughs while you drown in sins pain made you promise to go back to

but you tell pain that we are not bed sheets fitted to the corners of her pride

We are not fools, babbling vain words in her congregation

We are not faithless because of her existence

Tell pain that we wait for her

like crouching tigers with gritted teeth

you tell sorrow that with much wisdom comes much grief

tell her, that we are not children

borne about by every sickness breathed from the viruses she plants in our immune systems 4 we are strong

you tell pain that from her humility is born

like truth when it touched its hands on the insides of Miriam’s womb, the Salvation brought forth from pain

a stake of stabbing wounds
You tell pain that the almighty made sure that everything had its companion

You tell pain…

that Endurance was made for her

Never Having Been a Girl

This poem is based on a true story. A sista I know  requested I write a poem based on her childhood. And after hearing her testimony, this is the result.

Waiting_by_prettylilly
Silence lingers on every street corner of her heart
surrounded by the sounds of her own heartbeat
the only child
who knew that loneliness could be so loud?
Never remembering ever being a girl
womanhood emerging from her mother’s womb
responsibilities following her home wrapped in soft blankets and warm booties
yet infancy is kicked off too soon
removed
and replaced with scavenger instincts
tearing away at empty cupboards
hope falling asleep like heroine nods
quickly replaced with the tears of a three year old
silence tearing away at the soft eardrums of a toddler’s pride
never remembering ever being a girl
Quick paces of little feet turned nine
gotta get the cigarettes on time
crowded streets
little feet
unknown eyes that are watching me
(at least somebody’s watching me)
careful now these little feet
having never been a girl
Twelve times twelve,
twelve arrives
sadness in mommies cancer eyes
watch him do it and do it right
gotta give the medicine exactly right
the internal cries of that youthful voice (never really having been young)
somebody please tell me,
where is mommies tongue?
gotta carry cause mommies gone
will someone sing her daughters song?
The woman with the pink ribbons in her curls
the woman never having been a girl
Restaurants to wash myself
weed and drinks cause I watch myself
who cares for cute sinks when nothings left
seems like childhood just up and left
me sitting beside myself
empty benches now colored with the stench of my pain
smelly armpits reach out to beg for change
while relatives sit at home and count my change
whose willing to see this woman change?
Never having been a girl
Hustle proved its source of love
where does an instant woman find true love?
inside the arms of an abusive man she seeks her refuge from lazy hands
money giving light to dark places
apartment buildings giving substance to misplacement’s
where
where has it gone? My love? Where’s your part?
where oh where have you hidden my heart?
Numbers fade away like living water upon dirty dishes
this daughter of mine the result of these stitches
Entering the world as if she owns it!
Gotta hope another woman has not entered this world
praying my first child has the chance to at least,
just be
a girl.

The Power of Purpose

purpose1-1024x680

“The obstacles you encounter rarely have a coherent purpose of their own. They are just there, inconvenient and troublesome to be sure, but with nothing of substance to sustain them.
You, on the other hand, have the extreme advantage of being able to choose and follow a definite purpose. By so doing, instead of randomly scattering your energy and efforts, you can sharply focus and powerfully concentrate all that energy, all those efforts in a consistent direction.
Soft, gentle raindrops falling over a wide area will always yield to the contours and obstructions of the landscape. Yet when those tiny drops of water are concentrated into a mighty river, they have the power to cut through any obstruction.
In the same way, when your thoughts, feelings and actions are centered around a clear and consistent purpose, nothing can hold you back. The random and disjointed exertions of circumstance are no match for a living and unwavering purpose.
The problems, the frustrations, the challenges and the difficult situations come and go. A steadfast, meaningful purpose will carry you successfully through them all.
Give your life a decided advantage over all the burdensome circumstances you encounter. Live each moment in the service of the highest and most positive purpose you can imagine.”

— Ralph Marston

A Writer’s Art

jorge-luis-borges-alt-mit-stock

“A writer – and, I believe, generally all persons – must think that whatever happens to him or her is a resource. All things have been given to us for a purpose, and an artist must feel this more intensely. All that happens to us, including our humiliations, our misfortunes, our embarrassments, all is given to us as raw material, as clay, so that we may shape our art.”
― Jorge Luis Borges, Twenty-Four Conversations with Borges: Interviews by Roberto Alifano 1981-1983

Betrayal

What happened when you read the title of this post? Did you hearken on a definition, or did your mind replay the events of the past?

They say betrayal is something people do to the ones they love. How profoundly interesting a thought. The TV show The Strain, for instance, shows how the infected return to murder their loved ones first. And in the history of the relationships we’ve had throughout our lives, chances are its the closest love that got us. People who admire our work are those who have a history of hating us for the very work they wish belonged to them. Not all admirers but those who secretly hate when we improve. Like the song says, “Smiling in yo face, all the time wanna take yo place, them back stabbers.” They say some do it with a bitter look. Some a flattering word, and others a sweet kiss. And in the words of Dennis Haysbert (the All State Guy) in a clip from the movie Love and Basketball,  the most bold is right at your front door.

Deception.

It comes in many different shapes, sizes, and motives, and often enters under the banner of love. A smile, a wave, or a joke or two that happens as the knives enter your lower torso. Since hate transforms itself into an angel of light, the love we have for these people makes for an invisible wound; a wound that is not instant thanks to our blindness but that appears later. Dripping from holes unnoticed by the sister you called friend, or the brother you thought loyal. The pain has no calendar to which it wishes to disappear into, and is not interested in evaporating so that you have the privilege of time, in which you decide when to trust again. Not likely. Know that the pain will  sit there long enough for you to put up the proper walls that only true love can tear down. As for trust, it is a mirror that only time can restore. Yes, betrayal, it is a broken bone of trust capitalizing on the scars already on our backs.

So what’s the good news? What’s encouraging about this post? Well, nothing. Nothing except that while Betrayal shows up often, it really only has one job.

To make you stronger.

Struggle

“We must embrace struggle. Every living thing conforms to it. Everything in nature grows and struggles in its own way, establishing its own identity, insisting on it at all cost, against all resistance.” – Rainer Maria Rilke

 
What I love most about this quote is that struggle is such a powerful teacher. It passes down the knowledge of self, which without such cannot be obtained. If not for the hardships many of us have been through we would not have understood who we were as individuals. It is a healing experience to transform the mind by having endured struggle, pain, obstacles. No discipline seems pleasant at the time we receive it, but what in creation produces a greater reward than enduring struggle? Show me a better teacher than pain.