Dating : I Hope You Aren’t Missing These

This is the first time I have done an article quite like this. I know that I enjoy knowing the “inside scoop” on how an artist came to their inspiration for a painting, where a lyricist developed their words into song, or what the inspiration is behind a famous novel.

I like knowing how a creator got to the created piece.

So, given my recent upheavals in life, I realize my poems are coming at me full-force and they are difficult to birth. They are painful and personal, or they are deep-hearted thrusts toward hope. Regardless, they have stories behind them. I thought I’d share a few of those with you for some of my pieces.

Perhaps, you will enjoy knowing the inspiration, the story, the birth of these poems.

Here are a few I hope you didn’t miss — and the stories behind them.

About a month ago, I left my home with a few boxes, 2 bags of clothes, 3 pairs of shoes, my essentials, and my computer. My mother picked me up. I left my 15-year-old step-daughter and my boyfriend and moved in with my mom, my heart in a million pieces.

The following weeks birthed several poems that were my way of handling the pain. Some of them are very metaphorical in nature so you may not have realized what was going on behind the poem. Let’s look at a few of them in perspective.

The first poem I wrote out of this heartache was metaphorical, on purpose. The flower in the poem is me. The poem depicts how easy it is for us to grow in a relationship, only to find the love you believed in was based in falsehood.

I designed the poem around the idea of a flower trying to grow in a place where the soil was all wrong. In the end, the “flower” decided not to be a flower at all anymore and the metaphor shifts. When Petals Fall is a poem that helped me to accept that after all these years, it was over. In the poem, I gave myself wings.

I hope you enjoyed the poem — I think it was rather lovely, even with the heartbreak just beneath the surface.

Those first few days of being at my Mother’s were a blur. This poem talks about those moments when I packed my things, the drive to my mother’s, and those first days where I kept finding myself wandering around the yard and the woods. I am not sure what I was searching for but all I kept finding were tears. They came at dinner. They came as I woke up time and again. They came while people talked to me and I couldn’t focus on the words they were saying.

I wrote this poem in long-form, which is not what I usually do. I wanted to try a new form — new life, new form, it seemed to fit. I was happy with the poem and pleased that Blue Insights took it.

Truthfully, I am surprised I could even put two words together coherently, much less write a meaningful poem. But this poem was, indeed, born, and for that — I am grateful. You can see in the poem I used a lot of images — these were all actual things I was feeling, doing, seeing, experiencing. All true. All painful. And now — it is poetry.

I hope you enjoyed This Is Where They All Come, titled after something my mother said to me — “this is a good place to come to heal.” Meaning, my late grandparents’ home where my mother now lives, where I now live until I find my next place to grow. This place has history. (Ladderback Chairs and A Yellow House in Iredell County were both written about this house.)

This poem was born as I stood outside in the dark of night, by the side of the road, all alone with my pain yet fascinated by the fireworks I was seeing in the night sky. (Here in the rural south — lots of people shoot off fireworks on the 4th of July.)

I love the fireworks. The irony of being newly single and celebrating freedom (of our country)— yet my new freedom feeling burdensome, all wrapped up in this fiery, light show in the sky. Shackled to freedom. I thought it a wonderful juxtaposition for poetry.

This one was a doozy for me. When the person you practically worship as a ‘good person’ suddenly becomes unrecognizable, the fall from grace in your heart is a long fall. Late at night, standing again in the dark and staring up at the stars, I thought of my now-ex and how painful it was for me to let go of what I thought he was in my life.

I took a metaphor and used it to express my confusion over it all. When Stars Fall helped me to move past the shock to a place of acceptance, however impossible it felt at the time. Through tears and anguish, I penned the poem and published it completely unedited.

Some poems I write — this one wrote itself and took me along for the emotional ride.

This poem takes a bit of a turn from the focus on my inner pain to the focus on my children’s pain. And my grandchildren, who I would do anything to protect. The poem is brief, but I believe expresses that deep motherly love, while feeling intense regret over my motherly failures. Guilt. All of that.

I wanted my kids and my grandkids to know how much I love them and want to protect them. I try to say it — but not enough.

This time, I did it through a poem.

Yes, many of these are about flowers and stars — because we were doing #Flowerweek and #Starweek at The POM, followed by #Wingsweek. Those themes seemed to fit perfectly with the narrative of my life.

This poem was simple: I was thinking about my flower beds and my cat and my chickens and my ex-partner — and the life I left back at what is now not my home anymore. I turned that into this existential, very macabre depiction of Bellflower tolling…and to be honest, it might be one of my favorites.

I have these purple flowers I planted last year that look a lot like the ones in the picture. If you read any of the poems listed in this article, I hope you will read this one.

Tired of all the heartache yet? There’s a lot more poetry coming, I feel. And The POM’s current theme is “Roadsweek.” Oh, you just wait.

Here, a turn is occurring in the poems of late. A shift that is very noticeable.

It moves from lamenting, heartache, staring up at the stars and pondering my sad life — to “what is next?”

What IS next?

First I wrote “Away,” expressing my need to get away from here and heal. I once again gave myself wings, as I brushed them off (imperfect and damaged from too many past traumas) and decided it was time to use them.

And then I wrote a tribute to my grandmother with a commitment within my soul to get to the place I know I belong:

I have been obsessed with the ocean and the coastal ecosystems for as long as I can remember. It began with yearly beach trips with my Mamaw and Pop (whose house I now live in). Their deep love for the beach is a legacy I now carry deep in my spirit. I am convinced this will never leave me.

My need to be there will never leave me. Not just to visit. But, to LIVE.

So, with this poem, I give my heart to that quest.

What is next? With a whole lot of grace, a little luck, and all of the hard work I can muster, I will build my writing career to the point of supporting me, and then I will relocate to a coastal community where I can — for the first time in my life — truly chase my dreams and honor my own needs.

I love this poem for giving me permission and rooting me to that purpose.

Thank you for taking this poetic journey with me. Sometimes poetry is born in waves and seasons and this was a productive one for me. I hope to continue, and grow, and heal, and write. This season for me is only beginning.

I hope you keep following along.