Poetry
Ponderings of the Forest
Is it my place to create a garden of this forest?
Of these trees and paths and animals?
To rewrite it all once again into something new?
To create something more acceptable out of the forest?
Am I not trying to let my mind grow to what it is?
How am I to grow to who I am if I cut it all down again?
What is a garden if not a new suburb?
Should the forest not be allowed to live?
Should the forest be cut and filled and replanted into a garden?
Should it be something pretty and easy?
It should be itself, shouldn't it?
With all its thorns and brambles and thickets
With all its complications and creatures?
Is my mind a place for me to control?
Should I not learn to live within the forest of my mind?
Rather than forge a neo-suburbia for my mind to stay safe within?
I ask these questions, but the answer is clear
The forest must remain
But the groundskeeper wasn't wrong
She simply didn't realize she already had what she desired
The forest shall be tended, grown, and cherished
The flowers and ponds and trees
The forest shall mindfully be maintained
Nothing more must be destroyed
I simply need to embrace the forest for all that it is
Peace
Tonight, the forest relaxes
The animals sleep
The wind is calm
The night is clear
Tonight, the forest is at peace
Damage
As the flood waters receed, I am left aching for a solid sense of self
I feel lost and unsteady. It is hard for me to grapple onto any sense of who I am.
I am myself, of course, and I am all that my emotions and memories tell me I am.
But what do those emotions means? What do these memories mean?
The waterways flow differently
This forest is not the one I know
I am lost within myself
I shall find the way eventually of course.
But for now, I remain lost
Flood
The suburban lawns were held together with dams and waterways
Artificial constructions meant to keep these artficial constructions together
As these lawns have been allowed to grow into a forest, the plants have breached the dams
The water of my emotions has come spilling into my mind
I am too much myself
My emotions flow through me. They displace and destroy everything in their path
These are the waters that have always been here. They simply haven't been allowed to flow where they belong in a very long time
The dam has broken, the flood has come
I struggle to breath. I feel adrift within myself. I feel as though it shall last forever
But the flood shall not last forever. The waters shall calm. The rivers shall flow. The waterways shall route themselves proper
The forest shall survive, and the garden may flourish from this forest
The flood shall pass, and I shall rebuild
The Groundskeeper
The land is my mind
Feelings, emotions, and thoughts
Growing and flowing and changing
Seldom ever ascertained
This land was once a lawn
Clean, suburban, and dead
Concrete and grass and dirt
Fearfully kept contained
This land is now a forest
Growing, twisting, and alive
Brambles and thorns and tangles
Helplessly left unrestrained
This land shall be a garden
Tended, grown, and cherished
Flowers and ponds and trees
Mindfully kept maintained
Euphoria & Dysphoria
Pleasure and pain
Euphoria and dysphoria
Feminine and masculine
Life and death
Joy Demands Pain
Life and death are intertwined
Life demands death, joy demands pain
All things end, and endings are beginnings
The universe demands balance
Trauma and growth are intertwined
One must be broken to become that which they must be
That which ends becomes the beginning of something new
The mind demands balance
All things require time
Time is needed for all wounds to heal
Wounds leave scars, but those scars heal stronger
One just needs time to heal
I pity those who do not know these things
I envy those who do not know these things
I despise those who do not know these things
I love those who do not know these things
Liminality
We are all in states of flux throughout our lives
Who we were yesterday is never who we are the next
I have lived a life where I have seen naught but the void in the mirror
No more
I shall live as myself, I shall live to be all that I am
I will fail at times, but I will also succeed
I will feel as though I have fallen to never recover, I will rest, and I will rise again
I am dead, and I am alive
For life cannot exist without change, and change is death
Tonight, I have died, and I have been reborn
I exist, in liminality