Breath of Night

Have you ever stepped outside for a moment or two in the late hours of the night, stood in the middle of the road and did nothing but breathe? What greater moment can you find than this? Where you can sit down in the witching hour, breathe and just be? Where you can unwind the stress and cares of a world that is aching for a better tomorrow? Life halts for those few short hours in the dead of night when almost every soul has collapsed into their beds of weariness. Begging for a moment’s rest from the burdens and woes of life.

If you ever find yourself awake in those sleepy hours go step outside. Watch the air pulse with the throbbing sensation that there is more to that dismal street than eerie shadows and frightening noises.

Breathe the cold air that enters in chill as nightmares

But escapes from your cracking lips white as mist

Your head feels heavy upon your shoulders, your neck groaning from its weight

Your legs ache to keep moving but stand

Stand still and breathe

Breathe in the pain of yesterday

Deep and hollow in your gut

As the air moans with the hush of slumber

Black noise quakes about your aching limbs

My chest has not felt this full

But it is not full of love and yearning

It is full of being

Full of life and needing

Waiting for that unexpected burst of letting go

Of remission

Of submission

Of power, the desire to move on to start anew

Of courage, to believe in yourself and trust those you love

Step out of yourself

Step out of that carcass that stands there in the street

Fading away into the depths of the universe

Watch it crumble into the corners of blackness

Resolve to let go of the day

And embrace the first breath of tomorrow

Fall in love with the night

And the morning it promises

Me

I enjoy. I do. I try. I mess up. I fess up. I stutter. I fix. I mend. I bend. I push. I shove. I give. I forget. I remember. I cry. I smile. I fester. I forgive. I ask. I ponder. I wonder. I pray. I beg. I move. I wait. I sit. I fall. I crawl. I kneel. I stand. I run. I whisper. I kiss. I hug. I live. I love. I write.

Inadequate

Inadequate: not adequate or sufficient; inept or unsuitable; defective, imperfect, incomplete.

Which could describe me better at a time like this?

My shortcomings have grown larger and larger it seems in the last few months, or maybe I'm finally willing to face them. Faults of my own that I use to brush off my shoulder have become constant nags.

Looking in a mirror is almost frightening for I find myself scraping away into my own soul, tearing apart the layers of decay and molding filth of habits too old and wreckless to hold on to. Brazened ideals and worshipped dreams have found their glory rusted and tarnished in the caverns of my mind. Things that I prayed and wished for so desperately have been re-examined, sliced open with a piercing gaze and wounding knife that holds no mercy towards frivolity and must-haves that now seem so childish and naive.

Corners that were once filled with the pulsing stars of heaven upon which I wished so oft have been swept cleaned and I find my closets empty. Imperfection crawls in with her spindly legs and spins a web of festering defectiveness. My thoughts are sucked in and wrapped away in her sticky threads, overpowered by worries that prick into my skin and soak into my bones.

Ripping myself out of the sludge of Doubt's web is always so much harder than I remember. Her unwelcome thoughts scratch their way into my head and prick at the fragile hopes I hold on to. With my back turned, Fear moves in and I find myself racing down this tunnel of suffocating darkness. Racing past Fear and her stabbing claws, searching for light, any light, to reach out to me and help me out of the decaying rut I've placed myself in.

But tonight I washed away those charred words that have been branded on my soul. I scraped away at the still smoldering pain that so many have burned into my heart. I scrubbed and scratched away at the dead flesh until I stood in a puddle of gray and my skin glowed pink with redemption. Then, in the wake of my personal restitution, I opened up my still blistering heart and released the ghosts that have shackled me to the nightmares of doubt and fear, and there, I found the beauty that is me.

Incomplete, but wholly me...which is enough.

Pillows

I sleep with a pillow next to me.

When I was much younger I did it to save me from the crocodiles under my bed.

When I was just a little bit younger I did it to protect me from ring wraiths under my bed and in the darkness.

When I was younger I did it out of habit and in hopes of not falling off a bed on cinder blocks.

Now, I do it out of the need and desire to have something close to me while I sleep. Out of the need to hold on to something real in a place so full of intangible dreams and goals that only condole for a moment. I do it to protect me from the nightmares that still come despite being 24 years old.

To comfort me in moments of homesickness when I miss snuggling little sisters and nieces.

To abate the sleeplessness that comes from sorrow and heartache.

To keep me from just not being alone for a few short hours when I put my defenses down and allow myself to rest from trying so hard to stay strong.

Dawn

Dawn

From blackest night to pale blue morn,

anticipation high in her throat,

choking back her lucent breath.

Each blink brighter than the last.

Each glimpse lighter than the first.

With an aching throb

she crept over the jagged horizon.

Stillest breath and glistening branch,

stiff in your frozen landscape

of diamonded dresses

and crystal cloaks.

Feel not her warm breath

until her burning gaze parts asunder

the cloudy barrier

betwixt our world and hers.

Rise up from the deadening world

of nightmares and ghosts.

Grasp onto her trailing rays

of hope and forgiveness.

Shake off the binding chains

of mistakes and regret

that encumber your spirit,

keeping you from living

from loving.

Peel back the drapes that hang heavy

across yesterday’s eyes.

Open up the cage of ribboned bones

and let loose the drooping bird that hangs there

pleading for her warm breath,

pleading for a new morn.

Unclasp your hands and let fall

the ashes of yesterday and watch

as the chains of sin and sorrow

crumble into the very dust

that blows from your quivering hands.

Exhale.

Exhale the pain that lingers

in the cavern of your chest.

Rise.

Rise with the dawn.

Patience

I read a talk today that Elder Neal A. Maxwell gave at BYU in 1979. He spoke on patience, something I thought I was a recent expert on, but as I read I realized that, like all great attributes, acquiring patience is an on-going process. We don't just get patience and are done with it, we need to continue to strengthen it and let it grow within all aspects of our lives. I just wanted to share a few quotes that really touched my heart and hit home with me; ok more than a few. The greatest thing I learned is that patience can change our attitude on life. I've felt as if I have been in a rut lately, not really progressing or digressing, just not moving. It's been frustrating, but now understanding that patience can help the doldrum hours of life has been a bright light in my otherwise drab days. As Elder Maxwell said, now is the time for me to reflect and prepare for the things to come. Be excited for this time to look back on where you have been and what you have learned. Life doesn't need to always be one big mess of craziness. Enjoy the quiet times and just love it all.

"Patience means caring very much but being willing, nevertheless to submit to the Lord and to what the scriptures call the 'process of time'"

"One is not only to endure, but to endure well and gracefully those things which the Lord 'seeth fit to inflict upon [us]'"

"Sometimes that which we are doing is correct enough but simple needs to be persisted in patiently, not for a minute or a moment but sometimes for years."

"When we are unduly impatient, we are, in effect, trying to hasten an outcome when this kind of acceleration would be to abuse agency."

"Patience is a willingness, in a sense, to watch the unfolding purposes of God with a sense of wonder and awe"

"...the seeming flat periods of life give us a blessed chance to reflect upon what is past as well as to be readied for some rather stirring climbs ahead. Instead of grumbling and murmuring, we should be consolidation and reflecting..."

"Patience helps us to use, rather than to protest, these seeming flat periods of life, becoming filled with quiet wonder over the past and with anticipation for that which may lie ahead, instead of demeaning the particular flatness through which we may be passing at the time. We should savor even the seemingly ordinary times, for life cannot be made up all of kettledrums and crashing cymbals."

"patience permits us to cling to our faith in the Lord when we are tossed about by suffering as if by surf. When the undertow grasps us, we will realize that even as we tumble we are somehow being carried forward; we are actually being helped even as we cry for help."



"Patience" by Elder Neal A. Maxwell

Jars

I entered into a writing competition last month, I didn't win but I was a semi-finalist! Figured I would post the poem, and the link with the "honorable mention" - http://mormonartist.net/2012/01/mormon-lit-blitz-finalists/ (I'm just a small name in a small paragraph but hey, it's my name!)

Jars
Jars
Jars that sit empty
Jars that sit full
Full of candies
Full of paint
Full of brushes

Jars
Some with lids
Some without
Ones that sit pell-mell
across the shelves
A room full of jars

Jars to collect
mementos of the past
Jars to reflect
on treasures of the heart
Jars
All once full of peaches
pears
plums
All once full of juices
jellies
jams

Jars that Grandmother’s wrinkled, arthritic hands

have washed for years  Jars that have seen
seasons of fruit
seasons of frost
and passed through so many hands
Hands of sisters
Hands of mothers
Hands of aunts
and hands of others

Jars that hold the echoes
of August conversations
Jars which come to finally sit
upon these shelves
to be filled with objects of forgetting
and objects of remembering

A jar of thread
A jar of scissors
A jar with a spider, enclosed in the glass
A jar with a flashlight, standing upright
Jars once regal in their purpose
once lovingly filled
now stand
oddly placed along the shelves
catching the waning light of autumn
dwindling to mere decoration