Fully human

Over the past couple of months, I have been emotionally and mentally drained.  The demands of work, and a broken heart, have worked together to burn me out.  I long to travel to a faraway place where no one can reach me, a place where I could recharge my batteries without being reminded of the things I am trying to temporarily forget.

I recently spent a day in isolation at a lovely spa and hotel. I desperately needed time to be alone, in silence, to contemplate my life and to quiet my mind.  I soaked in the tub, ordered room service and allowed my mind to wander to the things I had tried to avoid thinking about.  I cried, grieved, got angry but, eventually, felt at peace.  I realized that I wisely allow only a few people into my mind and heart. I realized that, when I do allow a person into my heart, I love unconditionally and almost without limits.  For a time, after the worst heartache I ever suffered (with the demise of my marriage), I longed to feel nothing.  I wished I had no feelings, a human with a robot heart. I longed to be numb because I felt that I could no longer bear the pain of heart break. 

But when you have an open heart and an open mind (even to the very few you let in), you leave yourself vulnerable. You risk suffering a tremendous amount of pain at the hands of those you love when you love so unconditionally and with few limits. And as I sat there, my mind finally helping my heart understand what it needs to learn, I finally accepted myself for what I am. I am finally okay with being that person. And I willingly accept all the consequences that come with being a person who loves too much. I want to remain open to all that it entails, to lick clean every figurative plate of every dish that this life has to offer. And when my scarred, bruised and fragile heart beats its last, I will know that it felt every emotion that a human heart can experience, from euphoria and elation to devastation and utter despair.  I no longer want to be a robot, numb and dead inside.  I want to live and die fully human.

My poems

Invisible

I cower in the dark
Alone
I scream
But no one hears me
They just walk on by
Can't look me in the eye
My cries are drowned out
by their laughter
Just walk
Over me
Around me
Don't look down
My pain
Intensified
By their indifference
Am I
Invisible?
Or Are They
Blind?
-M.P. '91-

Untitled

Love half-guessed my sincere intentions
And veiled my awkward nakedness
Contemplation marred by fears muted
Now rage unabated,
My soul can no longer contain.
I trembled with a passion
You elicited with one touch
Warmth of sweet breathe
Like a rose caressing
Virgin skin.
But love reclaimed what I could not purchase,
It refused what my desires tried.
Once the spirit that moved the immovable
And illuminated where only darkness trod,
Became a dagger that scarred
A life which, for death, yearned and cried.
Passion resurrected
That which for birth a-waited,
Tortured one whose life,
By Chance, denied.
Love revealed its dual existence,
Creator and destroyer both.
With a hesitance that only pain can wrought,
Reflection precedes unveiling,
Searching for love's vision, blind,
For petal-soft lips to heal
The scars that fear's sheer robe cannot hide.
 -M.P. Oct. '95-

Sinner's Demise

Enveloped in this hazy, dazed confusion
Attempting to incise the daydreams, the illusions
The fantasies that detrimental to my life exist
Succumbing to temptations I can no longer resist
Inhibitions laid low
I slowly let go
Of all childhood lessons not fully learned
Dancing towards hell's fire, wanting to be burned
Feigning deafness to angelic whispers
Reserved for immoral spirits and impenitent sinners
Raising a trembling hand to my eyes
To block my vision of the sinner's demise.
-M.P. Jan. '96-