I like it...

I wrote something! I've been doing poetry with the 9th grade and I taught them this really cool poetry form that was taught to me. It's called a West African Praise Poem and it's all about the author. It's pretty hard to do actually. But here's mine. It's not great, but I'm proud that I finished it.

I am a warrior, a champion.
I have brave sisters,
and fierce and all knowing
parents.
My family tree stretches
back for generations upon
generations.

Sometimes I am a fragile warrior
and a damaged champion.
I can be a butterfly with
broken wings or an eagle
capable of soaring to the sky.

I am the calm in the eye of the
hurricane or I am the hurricane,
the wild wind and storm. I am a
5'6'' gale force wind.

My colour is pure but also
irrelevant. I prefer to think of
myself as blue, both peaceful and
regal.

I move throughout this world
one day at a time, either
calm or chaotic. I
am my own way.

Things to Remember...

Psalm 18:28 You, O LORD, keep my lamp burning; my God turns my darkness into light.

Isaiah 42:16 I will lead the blind by ways they have not known, along unfamiliar paths I will guide them; I will turn the darkness into light before them and make the rough places smooth. These are the things I will do; I will not forsake them.

Job 29:3(b) And by His light I walked through darkness.

Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.
Martin Luther King, Jr

Let the sunlight in
You might never get this chance again
So take a deep breath and hold it in

So let the wind take its course over everything
You have no control when it's out of your hands
You should take a minute for it all to settle in
I said take a deep breath and hold it in

Let the sunlight in
You better get as much as you can
Cause you might never feel the same again
And take the wind, let it blow away everything
I said take a deep breath and hold it in

Olin and the Moon wrote this one. Since I still can't find words, I'm going to continue my streak of using song lyrics to describe how/what I'm feeling.

There's a blaze of light in every word
It doesn't matter which you heard
The holy or the broken Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

I did my best, it wasn't much
I couldn't feel, so I tried to touch
I've told the truth, I didn't come to fool you
And even though it all went wrong
I'll stand before the Lord of Song
With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah...

Hallelujah by Leonard Cohen (end of the 4th verse and the whole 5th.)

I love the honesty and the sadness in it. Sometimes I think that we have to pretend that we're nothing but happy and that everything is okay. Sometimes everything isn't okay and sometimes we can't pretend anymore. I have had no words for awhile now, nothing worth saying it seems, so I'm borrowing someone else's. Someone who clearly knows what it's like to feel broken and to know that there can be light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe not today, or tomorrow, but someday you'll like yourself again.