Pain
Nobody wants it, of course,
the pain, the thing that
stabs and aches and punctures
and ends things for good.
Nobody wants that transition
from the weightlessness of life
to the heavy baggage that
doesn’t ever seem to let
off our shoulders, but
here we are, in the thick of it,
waiting, moving, crying,
breathing, grieving, and yes,
eventually, healing.
It just so happens that
without the pain we cannot
get to the healing,
and without the healing,
the baggage weighs us down
until we are no longer ourselves,
anyway.
So, that damn pain is a portal,
and we must, carefully,
oh so carefully,
walk through.
p
Scar
We are a people of scars,
neither guaranteed protection
nor escape
from pain's slice and consequences.
But we are also created
for healing;
not healing whose visibility
or consequences vanish;
people who are found
by a forgiveness
that debrides our wounds,
rinsing away anger, malice,
resentment, and vengeance,
disinfecting them with grace,
packing them with mercy;
people whose flesh falls back together,
not in seamless invisibility,
but rough, bumpy reminders
of our past;
people who somehow
find the courage to seek catharsis
in our history's telling;
people whose hearts
are forever being pointed
toward the true north of hope.
Yes, this is who we are;
not perfected but blemished,
not fearless but courageous,
not arrived but journeying;
journeying together,
as a people of pain
who recognize the possibility
of tomorrow’s dream.
What's the pain level
On a zero to ten scale
When your heart is sad.