After an hour of mind numbing scrolling I put down my device and reach for my pen and coffee. The night before I went to a small intimate house concert and felt naked with my pain. I knew consciously that my flooding of emotions was a secret and yet on another level I felt vulnerable and weak. I felt like everyone there might notice and see me in my rawness. As the instrumental music flowed I fought the tears. Music usually evokes emotion and here I was smack dab in the middle of a mid life existential crisis one which I have been avoiding and pushing back.

Four years ago I left a relationship bought a house and started living fully thinking that in a few months I would be miraculously healed and restored. What was I thinking? There is no quick fix for healing and the stuff we have repressed for a lifetime.

The truth is that healing can often feel like death. Perhaps because we are uncovering wounds and digging in letting out pain slowly. Walking through the world my words find me in the quiet moments. I give pause and reflect. Another Spring arrives and there is renewal and yet I am still yearning and recovering from the past. Slowly the armor falls and I am left fragile and vulnerable. uncertain how to navigate this new Spring. When feeling this I write and let the words bubble up. Words are the swirl in my coffee. Life is poetry and I let it flood for I am flooded. Artists take pain and make art. Sitting naked with our pain we weave stories. We swirl the coffee with our truth and drink in the sweetness.

I let these words flow out of my lips while sipping and this is my poem.

I don’t want to be that woman that carries a heavy purse weighted down with nothing.

Let me begin and end each day with lightness and a dash or courage.

I want to be the type of person that howls with her dog and cries with her cat.

The sort of gal that has made amends with the past.

Let me be poetry that flows and fills and resurrects.

Let me be love and have love fill me overflowing.

Spring has sprung and life unfolds.

Let me begin again.

When pain rises let me sit with the pain and let it rise.

Sipping coffee I let the warm liquid soothe.

Sitting naked with pain is a start.