A Testament to Love

I want to share how powerful love is.
I have been ill for over a month. Yes, over a month. I don't know if you have experienced dealing with being ill for such a long time but I am here to tell you, it takes it toll on not only your body but also on your mind and spirit. You feel like your own body is betraying you! To top it off, not only have I been dealing with illness, It happens to be a very emotional time of the year for me. The month of November, the month I lost my daughter. The month of January the month of her birth. Not to mention all of the things I often celebrate during this time of year, Samhain, Thanksgiving, the New Year and five of my children have birthdays between December 12th and February 3rd. Saying I have been overwhelmed is an understatement. I went to my doctor a few days ago and she ordered me on bed rest for a few days. All I could think was "Bed rest? Are you serious? All I have been doing is laying around sick?!" I realized on my third day of bed rest that I had fallen into a pretty low place. Not wanting to burden my husband or my children (as if they don't feel my lack of positive energy) I realized I had isolated myself.

So here is the good part. This is the part where LOVE picked me up. I have written about my maternal grandmother before. She was not only the woman who raised me but she was a serious source of love and strength in my life. She passed away in 2009. I sat by her bedside for a week until her last breath. I loved this woman. I still love this woman. Like any other person, she had her flaws but the goodness in her far outweighed anything else that could be perceived as negativity. So, this morning, I was talking to my mother and I was explaining to her how I wish I could just crawl in my grandmother's bed and have one of our many talks where she would just pour love and encouragement into me. After crying for about ten minutes, I closed my eyes and I began to talk to my grandmother. I began to ask for her love, her guidance, her wisdom. I began to pour my heart and immediately, I felt her presence. I felt her love. I heard her gentle voice. I remembered her being a woman of prayer. I remembered her being a woman who found strength to keep living and loving no matter what life threw her way. I could hear her voice saying "You are going to be okay, Pooda." I got myself up. I decided to let go and let God.

I have been saying that love is stronger than death and this is yet another example of why I feel this in my soul. Although my grandmother passed on, leaving this natural realm of existence. It was her love for me that was the light that pulled me from a place of heaviness and darkness...

I could NEVER thank God enough for having the love of my grandmother! Her love has been my rock ALL of my life!

What I See

Let the chips fall where they may

Forty Two years in this body and in this mind I have lived
Some memories are forever imprinted in my soul similar to friendships, bonds and connections that eventually fade away but when thought of, send a burn of joy or pain through my being.

To say that I have experienced love as deeply as it can be experienced would be some of my truth.
I have experienced betrayal and envy equally so and loss has worn me down to the marrow in my bones.

I look at my image and run my fingers over the lines in my face that tell thousands of stories. I grasp the roundness of my belly, a hollow mass where life once lived. My gray hair tells the stories that I can't bear to speak about.

Times have come when I reflect quietly and wonder. What is left to go through on this earth for me? I shutter at some of the possibilities and smile deeply at others. I am reminded in an instant that everything I have learned in this life has left some print on me. There must be room for more since I am still here.

The secret to my strength is that I have none. The pores of my skin absorb the poison and the antidote equally. I am loved and I am hated for it. I no longer have the energy to fight for the right to be me. I don't carry the interest to prove anything.

I alone am responsible for the eyes I choose to see through. Sometimes the fog is my clarity. Sometimes I dance in the storm as if it were a light wind. Sometimes I bask in the sunshine.

Older woman

I am finding that, as I am growing into an older woman, that I am discovering and uncovering so many truths and continuously developing myself. If you are older and you feel as though you have "arrived" at some age where you no longer have use to grow up, discover things and open up, then you could possibly be missing out on your ability to be rooted in wisdom.

In the climate of social media. there are so many "trendy quotes of truth" that we are able to access and cling on to we tend to get lazy when it comes to developing ourselves. We become afraid to walk in the truth of our own lives and enjoy the fruits of our own labor in life. We cling to ego through religion, family, friends, titles, sickness, relationships ...etc

I am learning that true peace is not about holding a certain title or wealth in material things. True peace is not about being of a prominent social standing. True peace does not come through the approval of others. True peace is not found in the years spent reading books and learning verses. 

True peace comes through love and acceptance of what is TRUE. There are times when relationships have to change in order to respect it. There are times when you have evaluate everything you think of as real and important. There are times when you have to take a long hard look into your own heart and realize how foolish and insincere it has been. There are times when you have to be willing to let go of everything you hold tightly to. In order to do this you have to be willing to look under, see above, feel around and discover the many hidden treasures that are laid about in our lives waiting to be realized. 

As an older woman, I am waking up and I feel far more free than I ever have in my life. My soul dances as my body is slowing down. I am learning to laugh. I am learning to expand. I am learning to let go. I am learning to accept what is. I am learning to find ways to live and walk in truth. I am learning to trust in love. I am learning to embrace my emotions and trust the lessons I have chosen to teach me.

Hunted

Hunted
to be carried in shackles to a land where
violence and brutality
stripped away humanity
generations upon generations
of torment and toil
I wish that I could cling to the skirt
of my greatest grandmother
and ask
How do we survive being hunted?
I have held tightly to the illusion that
we could
blend in
fit in
be in
but it seems all we have left is to
give in
I imagine her soothing my worries
I imagine she would say
baby no matter how many times
our bodies and our blood has mixed together with theirs
your black skin was produced
and black skin aint safe in a white land
We have mistakenly
forgotten that
layer upon layer of hatred
has carefully been handed down
like a precious gem
so that their security could be preserved
somehow our torture brings them peace
the birthright of this land is not freedom for us
our birthright is being the hunted

Beautiful Loneliness

There is something downright comforting about being alone.

I am not talking about the mass of my body being removed from the physical space of others.
I am referring to walking on your path of life and knowing that it is for you and only you.
When I walk in this truth, I find that I have much more appreciation for those who choose to share moments in time with me. I appreciate the conversation that is filled with substance. I appreciate the shallow niceties of strangers.

There was a time in my life when I did not want to relate to this loneliness. I wanted and longed for a life filled with people and their approval of me. I wanted a life where I could share the burden of my troubles by loading them upon the backs of others. I wanted a life where I could place responsibility for my happiness or blame for my unhappiness in the lap of God.

Then something outrageous happened. Death knocked upon my doorstep and took my daughter with him. No matter how hard I tried to share everything I walked through, I realized that I simply could not. I realized that my life is my life to live. I realized that the lessons I learned and the things my eyes were opened to were for me. I could not have transformed into who I am now without making peace with, taking comfort in and accepting being alone.

Choosing Love (The process)

Sometimes the people we love the most are the ones who seem to crawl right up under our skin and burn it from the inside out with their many human complexities.
There are the subtle yet blatant forms of disapproval and discontent we mangle ourselves in.
Before we know it, we are tangled in a web of deep inner thoughts that feed our comfort with all of the reasons to let go of the love.
We start searching for all of the reasons we should turn away from loving them so much.
We feed ourselves thoughts that will be sure to harden our hearts over time.
We feed the spirits of envy, deception, entitlement and self righteousness.
It feels hard to love through the storm of differences and we began to tell ourselves it is impossible.
It is amazing how we can flat out refuse to forgive when we desire it for ourselves.

At the end of the day, the question I ask myself when I find that I have engaged in this type of self manipulation is this...
"Is it worth me carrying to my dreams and into the next day if I live to see it" and "Am I comfortable having this in my heart if this person I proclaim to love was to leave this earth"

After evaluating, I usually decide to forgive and continue to search for love. I begin to feed myself all of the loving thoughts I can muster about that person. Before you know it, I am finding reasons to see the good in them. I start to appreciate their presence in my life. I feel an amazing peace come over my entire being.
I can then relate to them from a place of wisdom. I can approach our difficulties with care and understanding. I can truly appreciate the diversity and their own unique way of seeing the world. I no longer have the need for things to be MY way.
There have been times where I have held on much longer than a day or two but I am learning to let go.
I am learning that I ALWAYS have a choice to love.

Ancestors Dancing in My Veins

They are nameless but their blood runs through my veins

I sob as I listen to the rhythm of the drum

I wonder if the holy chants provided the strength that led them to survive all the things that erased their humanity

Thoughts of them burying their hopes and dreams into the ears of an infant
who will never be seen again
but whose soul will instinctively, without knowledge of where or how the seed was planted,
remember their responsibility to quietly pass along the tiny whisper of hopes of returning home

I returned home today

Today, they danced in my veins

My soul felt their hands grasping through the chains
and their arms embracing
and their voices calling to my core
as some distant memory of who I must be
how I must live
how I must honor