Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt, and poetry is painting that is felt rather than seen.
~
Hey, Lovelies.
Poetry has always been a healing balm for me.
I have books of it beside my bed. I have poems stuck to the walls of my writing room.
I have poems burned into my heart.
Yesterday was a crap day for me. It was a crap day for the people I helped. It was a hard day of hard choices when there were no easy choices or gentle measures to be had.
Poetry got me through. As did love and messages from friends, and endless pots of tea.
This is the poem that comforted me.
It’s the poem I will give to the friend whose children will only be made safe by no longer being under her roof – the friend whose coping mechanisms of drugs and alcohol have not healed her trauma but made it worse. She is a good person, with a kind heart – the heart of a healer – still, for now she is lost down the rabbit-hole of mental illness and addiction. I fear more hard decisions will need to be made there, but I am also hopeful she may find her way forward again, with support and with courage. Or maybe not. Addiction is a fierce beast – fuelled by unresolved trauma, and the new traumas heaped upon that old trauma as addiction burns everything to the ground.
I hope this poem may speak to those of you who have known trauma too.
Know that you’re always in my heart, always in my prayers and meditations, Nicole xx
become a lighthouse
