I Change
The changes that come to all who lose a loved one affect each one differently. And every one we lose affects us in a different way from any other loss.
Losing the mate changed my entire way of living. I sat in the back yard one day and was changed again. I was venting in prayer with a song. It was a hurt, lonely, angry song. Then something touched me. Something came over me. Something freed me. A feeling like someone was there and loving me went right through me.
This was written to try and express that healing of my heart the way I experienced it. It is not exactly what happened and it is not quite NOT what happened. It is what I felt and thought as I was having my heart remade and what it meant to me in words. It can't really be explained that way.
It is my closest representation of a truth. I was healed, that is truth. My blind grief was lifted from me and I saw the world again without the denial of my mate's death between life and I. It all happened in my heart.
It makes a difference to read it out loud. Try it.
Love now, later is only a possibility. D. S. Weiler
Changes
The very first time I thought someone did me wrong,
and did not understand why,
I put it in my heart and it hurt.
So I made a pirate chest and put that hurt in there;
with the hate I was told I shouldn't feel
and the anger at them I couldn't show.
I bound it around with chains and locks
and forgot it,
I thought.
I buried it deeply under the roots of a large blasted tree.
Black and crooked it stood
to mark the spot.
An X of red on the ground
showed me where
the hurt would be found.
In life that hurt would escape it's depths
and sting in my heart.
If I was depressed
or life was hard,
I'd start with that first hurt
and go through them all.
I'd sit under the black tree by the stinking swamp
and dig up each one
and hurt myself
with all that I'd ever done wrong,
or thought another had done to me,
in my life.
Then one came to me, right to my heart.
I said, "Why are you here?" He said,
"A friend asked me to come."
I was shamed of the
tree and the dark
and the swamp.
He said, "There's nowhere here for us
to sit and talk. May I make one here?"
Then he paused.
He looked at me with so much sweet care.
I saw what he saw and
bowed with my fears
in front of him, then whispered, "
Please - if you would like
to talk with me."
He walked the length and then the width of my heart,
and stopped in the center
under the tree.
He was right on the x of that very first hurt
He smiled and said, "This might hurt,
but I promise,
for only a moment or two and then it will always
be beautiful. May I do as I wish here?
It's up to you."
I knew that he loved me and saw what I'd built
then thought, "Anything is better
than this dark smelly filth."
So I lifted my head, I looked into his eyes and
I said,
"Yes".
What a surprise! Too much pain!
The tears filled my eyes, in anger and shame
and hurt and grief - the deep sobs came.
The touch of him burned deep and true
through each mucky place
he walked through.
Each one was showed me as I had carried it there
and then he changed it
and made it pure.
The swamp became a singing stream with
grassy banks where
cat tails grew.
The trunks he dug up, blasted the chains,
opened the tops
and out it came.
Betrayals, mine and done to me,
hate given by others,
hates given by me.
Unfairness, Shame, Lies and Theft,
all my Broken hearts
from the loves in my life.
He showed me it all and I felt each pain as he looked at it
but with His love it changed, or was gone -
as he decreed.
Every hurtful time, each shame filled deed.
He took them all into the flame
of his love,
and then began
to give them back
in their truth.
In His hands, the gifts he gave
of wisdom and understanding
were flowers for me.
Lilies of yellow, red, white and glowing
now along the stream
were growing.
My crying had slowed and in awe I stood,
stooped with the exhaustion from the work
he had done.
He said, "Just one more time, I need you to be
right here with me
in front of this tree."
I joined him there by the beautiful brook
under the blasted tree
and then the ground shook
while his hand reached out to steady me.
His flaming love took that tree inside
and gave to us
a stump of glowing golden wood where soft green moss
grew along the roots and we could both fit
to sit and visit.
He gestured to me to be seated there
beside him in the center
of my heart.
He put his arms around me, pulled me close,
said, "Close your eyes"
and so I did.
There was a glow and a breeze with the scent of the flowers,
then "Open your eyes" I heard
from his sweet voice.
In front of my eyes there was green and dancing
a happy little
willow sapling,
just tall enough to shade the stump
on the grassy bank
by the singing brook.
Now tears fell freely across my face
as I looked around at the beautiful place
he had made for me
of the nasty mess
my heart had become
from the life I'd lead.
I was silenced
and numbed
by his gift to me
and just looked at him.
He looked back at me with a smile and said,
"This is my favorite part of loving you all.
I love designing hearts.
Each one is different, no two the same
and you are always so glad
to see I came.
Thank you for letting me
do this,
it's fun."
Stunned, I cried, "What have I done, ever, for you,
that you would give such a gift
to me
and what will I ever be able, as small as I am,
to do for you,
you wonderful friend?"
His smile was so deep and his laughter so clear
then he spoke, "Share this with me,
may I just stay here?
I have always loved you and I always will.
The joy for me
is to be with you."
"See this?"as he reached down and pulled up
the most beautiful box, so small it had gone
unseen.
He opened it up and out flew my joy
and my songs and my dreams
my girls and my boy.
My loves were all safe, and like birds with bright wings
they sat in the willow,
chirping and singing.
"You always kept them here, safely under the roots
the most precious treasure -
your loves and your truths -
but you kept them protected from the swamp and the tree
I knew they were here -
and you kept them for me."
"That's what you have done child, where ever you walked
was love those I brought you,
what ever the results."
He showed me the beauty of loving in truth.
I could not bear it. I cried at their beauty.
then begged,
Please, that's for you. It's too much love
for me to keep safe,
out of it's chest,
and all over the place. I can't do it -
I'll hurt them so I hid them there
where they'd never be touched
by the dark dank swamp,
or the stinking muck
my life had become."
"I know I might hurt them, with my ways or my words,
and I would never hurt anyone
ever again.
I can't bear the shame that I might be unkind
or cruel even, Protect them from me. Please,
You keep them."
I swear that he laughed right in my face
then reached for my hand and
pulled me to my feet.
"I wouldn't forget how you treasured my friends
and the gifts I gave you and you can't begin to know
the love inside you.
You've always kept it apart in your box
and now I want it here
right in your heart."
"I almost forgot to show you this",
then we walked together
to the stream.
He reached out a hand, the singing stilled,
and the creek became
a shining pool.
"Look in," he told me, I want you to view
the truth of the love
I see in you, friend."
So I knelt beside the shining pool
in the grass and lilies
and saw the vision
of who he says I am
with his glow behind me
shining over my head.
I cried out loud, "Oh no, I am not that!"
Again he laughed
but I went on,
"She's strong and clean, alive and fresh
tawny and golden
with not a flaw.
Look at her smile, look at her hair!
What a woman she is,
but that's not me.
"I wish it was but I see
I am not
that."
He asked, "Why not?"
I answered in gasps,
between the tears,
"My teeth are bad, I'm short and fat, like a troll.
And my feet, oh, they are a mess
and my skin is scarred
and my face is ugly, with no eyebrows or lashes
and my eyes are tiny. I have a neck like a frog.
My hair!
It's dry and crisp and hard. I smell of smoke from
cigarettes and sometimes of drink and sweat.
I am not that!"
Then he said to me, "I give it the body I chose to walk within the world
but when we sit and talk here in your heart
hold this thought dear,
the truth of you sits with me here. Your spirit I gave you
is golden and strong and reflects my light
to all where you walk.
The truth of you and your loving heart is a beauty beyond
worldly eyes
or it's hurts"
"It's how I protect those I hold most dear
from the corseness of the blind ones
walking down there.
I hide them in bodies that humans can see -
but not mar, the beauty
of your spirit.
That can only be seen
with the truth
of love.
It's very sad to hide beauty so
But the truth of my love
will always show
to each of you, the beauty that is
the truth
of them.
I have dressed each spirit with my light and my love
and I give you my sight, to search each one
you meet.
Search for the love and truth inside,
for that is where their beauty
forever abides."
I see how kind his gift to me of protection and love
and His wiser ways to guide
my steps.
So now we sit by the singing stream
on the mossy stump
and the birds all sing
while the clean breeze of his love wanders through
constantly washing
the love over all.
I take to him now, my fears and my needs
and my friends and my hurts
and he turns them for me
into beautiful things or he takes them to him
and then they never
bother me again.
And this is promised forever.
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