There’s not much to say here except WATCH.
Thank you Julie.
Tag: abuse
To breathe deep, to breathe hard
it may take years, Dr. Ming whispers,
to wash them out,
telling me to breathe deep, to breathe
hard,
the body is nothing but a map of the
heart.
—Len Roberts, closing lines to “Acupuncture and Cleansing at Forty-Eight.”
“On his own at sixteen after being raised by an alcoholic father and an abusive mother, Len Roberts is best known for poems of stark imagery that concentrate on his progress in life and how he has come to an acceptance of life’s flux.”
Notes/Credits:
- Len Roberts bio. Poem from The Trouble-Making Finch: Poems.
- Poem Source: A Poet Reflects.
- Image Source: k-omakino.
I will affirm the good until it sinks in and feels real
“…Help me let go of my need to stay immersed in negativity. I can change the energy in myself and my environment from negative to positive. I will affirm the good until it sinks in and feels real. I will also strive to find one quality that I like about someone else who’s important to me, and I will take the risk of telling him or her that.”
I may be the only one on the planet who didn’t know about Melanie Beattie’s back story. And what an incredible story she has. Here’s more than a few excerpts from her bio on her blog page:
Melody Beattie, is the author of the international self help best seller titled Codependent No More where she introduced the psychological condition called “codependency.” Over eight million copies of the book have been sold worldwide. Millions of readers have trusted Melody’s words of wisdom and guidance because she knows firsthand what they’re going through. In her lifetime, she has survived abandonment, kidnapping, sexual abuse, drug and alcohol addiction, divorce, and the death of a child. “Beattie understands being overboard, which helps her throw bestselling lifelines to those still adrift,” said Time Magazine. Continue reading “I will affirm the good until it sinks in and feels real”
Small miseries
A post by Amanda Patterson on Rudyard Kipling triggered a stream of thoughts this morning. Kipling was born yesterday in 1865. I couldn’t recall ever reading anything by Kipling but I’ve certainly heard of him. (DK. Mr. Contemporary. Always looking forward. Never much for history. Not much for looking back. What possibly could I learn from a life 100+ years ago? PAST IS PAST.)
Kipling, “born in India, was sent to England to live with a foster family and receive a formal British education at the age of 6. These were hard years for Kipling. His Foster mother was a brutal woman, who quickly grew to despise her young foster son. She beat and bullied Kipling, who also struggled to fit in at school. Kipling’s solace came in books and stories. With few friends, he devoted himself to reading. By the age of 11, Kipling was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. A visitor to his home saw his condition and immediately contacted his mother, who rushed back to England and rescued her son from the Holloways.”
Yet, here’s a man who survived this childhood and flourished. He said:
Small miseries, like small debts, hit us in so many places, and meet us at so many turns and corners, that what they want in weight, they make up in number, and render it less hazardous to stand the fire of one cannon ball, than a volley composed of such a shower of bullets.
And said:
I always prefer to believe the best of everybody, it saves so much trouble.
And said:
This is a brief life, but in its brevity it offers us some splendid moments, some meaningful adventures.
And a man, who produced this poem in 1895: