Every Day Is a Poem by Jacqueline Suskin (manga ereader txt) 📗

behind for you, and what work they’re asking you to do in their absence. Single lines of clarity about life, death and loss, emptiness and pain, all of it can keep you company in your darkness, not as light perhaps, but as a part of the process.

Without You

It’s your birthday

and all I can do is think

about your parents while looking

at this photo of you as a baby,

when you were new. Just learning air,

joyous and blank, free with the same

eyes, the same open look saying yes

to this weird life. Without you,

we celebrate the years you left us with,

a small chunk of time that overflows

with stories. You were a shining man,

always giving us a reason to rejoice,

and so you still are, you always will.

Are you misplaced and betrayed? There is a poem to soothe you. What are the words you use to soothe yourself? Can you expand upon them now?

What are the words you would use to soothe someone else? You’re allowed to use these words for yourself. Put them down in writing and let them be of aid.

What would you wish your life to be like instead of what it is? Write it all down. Read it out loud. How does it sound? Does it show you where your wound resides?

There is nowhere else you need to be. Just here, lost, begging, beginning, asking, searching, saying yes to the truth of this adversity and knowing that you’re not alone. Here, in this poetry, we accept the fact that it’s hard to be alive.

Whenever my life gets unbearable and I ask myself questions like Why keep going? Why stay here at all? Why is life worth living? I always circle back to my curiosity about the great mystery of existence. How miraculous is it that the hardest things push us into rebirth? What is this wild and weird reality that we get to be a part of? The conundrum of the quest is itself a poem.

Throughout human history, we’ve used the succinct power of poetry to unite our suffering. Poetry is at the helm as we navigate the horrors of war, the weight of political abuse, and the hardship of trauma. We still look to Homer’s Iliad to process the causes of bloodshed, we read Pablo Neruda and explore his response to his country’s political strife, and Sylvia Plath guides us through her personal pain.

It’s poetry that rises as we process our

grief—slow and steady songs of reality to

hold us while we do the work of healing.

Knuckle Tattoo

First I decided to stop in town

at the old house by the pasture—

I thought maybe you’d be there playing guitar

or curled up on the couch talking

about steel drums and parades. I parked in front

of what used to be my window, the room

where you taught me how to harmonize.

And the neighbor girl approached.

She said some semitruck

smashed you last night and now

all we have are your songs.

Your best friend stood at the kitchen sink,

your girlfriend wailed as I stroked her hair,

poured tea, built an altar.

This is when I tattooed my knuckles—

a nickname forever in ink

near bone to remind us

that even if we can sing in perfect pitch

we all leave this place

not knowing why or when.

EXCERCISE FOR MAKING PAIN USEFUL

FIND THE SOURCE

This is a tender exercise, a tracing of pain, the path back to the deepest wound. For myself, a huge hurt that I carry is often the source of great realizations and growth. I’ve worked with many different types of therapy for years to figure out where my pain stems from, and my curiosity has been my greatest guide in this effort. I want to know why I am the way I am, and my trauma informs so much of my mindset. Do you know where your pain comes from? Does it point back to a certain occurrence? Do you have only a vague idea, a slight memory, that seems to be the source? What do you do to familiarize yourself with the hurt you carry?

In our writing, we can uncover the how and

why of our pain, looking deeper into the

process of its becoming, and then we can

begin to dismantle it.

There are countless, well-trusted methodologies to help us become acquainted with our pain, and when we dig into this work, the cave of our understanding becomes incredibly deep.

I like to turn my pain into a guide. I follow its directions, meditating on where it all began. It’s at these starting points where I find the most potent feelings. My heartbreak from a failed relationship will often give me a chance to let out my sadness in verse, but not before I try to unpack the whole story. Only when I attempt to understand the many aspects of this failed relationship can I fully feel it and pay tribute to it. I begin this kind of investigation by rambling in my journal. Then, if I feel inclined, I might pull the heart of my understanding into poetic form. I recently wrote a book of poetry called Help in the Dark Season, which focuses on my childhood trauma, the way it affects my adult relationships, and the modes of healing that have helped me grow. Writing this book was extremely hard, but after I finished, I felt like I’d turned coal into gold. I pulled back the curtain inside myself and let light do its thing. Now I not only get to feel the inner effects of my work but I’m also able to witness the importance of sharing this book with others, the way my words act as a key to unlock their personal process of healing. The result of this revealing has been an honesty and a newness that I couldn’t have reached without the alchemy of writing poetry.

I urge you