Monday, May 14, 2012

Authority, Anger, and Awakening, Part 1

My little sister used to fight the world for her and me;
Until she found a little sister that she could mold.
There came a time when they both broke free
What they considered to be fun, to me soon got old.

I wanted to watch what others were doing;
They wanted to create an exciting stir.
I lost the love of my closest little sister
Because I refused to follow her.

They both spent their lives in protestation
Of our all our parents' inflicted fury and pain.
Eventually, each of them ran far away,
And they neither returned home again.

All sources of authority were expected
To cause the vulnerable to cower.
The truth is that we were all victims;
It was okay to abuse those with less power.

It was not in my sister or neighbor to fold;
They didn't stop fighting for authority.
I eventually became quite frightened that
They would take power away from me.

I have felt that I abandoned them both,
Though this belief doesn't fit our history.
I actually didn't run away from them;
The stopped wanting to be with me.

I've often felt that I should have fought
Our parents, The Church, and both of them.
Instead, I put most of my energy into
Finding for myself other family and friends.

I fled far away when I became a mother
To a place where I hoped I could grow.
I now had real responsibility for my babies;
My awesome authority wasn't merely for show.

I didn't have any of the relationship skills,
To achieve leading with awe, not with fear,
So unfortunately I, like my powerless parents,
Used shows of anger to make my points clear.

It was my beautiful children's innocence that
Lead me to sincerely seek another way to bond.
As they little-by-little became fully who they are,
Of their unquestioning trust in me, I grew quite fond.

I came to believe quite strongly that not all sacred
Can possibly have been revealed or written about
In the many versions of the Christian Bible I'd read;
Surely there was not a little something left out.

Where were the sacred words about children
And their enjoyment by husbands and wives?
How were we who now live so many years
To know how to structure our own family lives?

I began to seek the spoken and written words
Of other people, prophets and philosophers;
It could not matter that my childhood religion
And parents then considered me to be cursed.

My beloved sisters and brothers had run away
From the angry God we'd been taught to see.
I knew there had to be a more complete story
Of the earthly manifestations of Divinity.

There are many ancient scriptures of others
That had exalted all of the mysteries of nature,
As if each and every molecule is an integral part
Of The Omnipresent, Eternal Universe's Creator.

But the fear of corporal and divine punishment 
Had put, on my parents and siblings, a fast hold.
They, sadly, couldn't bring themselves to question
What so many generations, so forcefully, had been told.

Though they never stopped wanting for acceptance,
They simply learned to laugh at their's and other's pain.
And their deep shame in who they were lead them
To repeat fearful and angry acts again and again.

It became all about learning how not to feel,
And how to protect themselves from vulnerability:
If we let ourselves follow our mother's God,
The next life He demands might be from me.

My beloved little sister has long-since died;
I've been reclaimed by our next-door neighbor.
She now works to pick me up when I'm down;
I'm sincerely wishing I could return the favor.






Committed Contact

If we have ever experience simply being loved,
That's as close as this life gets to heaven.
There are reasons sacred scriptures
Equate Divine love to that of women and men.

When we are truly loved as we are,
We stand naked before each other.
We don't feel the shame that causes us
To want our weaknesses covered.

The light of pure love can be so intense
That it causes our hearts and souls to break;
Many of us turn from this intensity,
And human compassion foresake.

Physical expressions of bonding
Are the ways we trade our energies,
Parents' strong arms around us
When we're weak, when they're pleased.

When we, too young, are left alone,
We are like abandoned cats,
Constantly trying to knead nurture
From empty physical vats.

Committed contact is a sacred celebration
Where all the love is allowed to explode.
It is the closest we get to seeing The Divine
In our earth-bound, human modes.