Without Knowing

Telling God what to do —
even if in the form of requests, prayers —
controls nothing. God takes no orders
from me. Nor does life make sense,
at least sometimes. Important times.
God told Job it was none of his business
to know the whys. "I'm God, you're not.
Drop it." Would I sit there and take it
if God answered so? Maybe. Maybe not.
Would I understand, just because he said so?
No. Probably not...certainly not.
But it is none of my business
and I don't understand.
And probably never will...

Jonathon Scott Rollins
July 20, 2008

To Speak for God

Dear Lord of life, my hope, my joy —
I see your path for me.
You ask that I be your envoy
To set your people free.

You call for me to teach and lead
The high, the low, the poor,
To show the path that you’ve decreed
For those I stand before.

But like the prophets called of old
To speak your holy word,
I bow my head; I can’t be bold.
They’d laugh. I’d feel absurd.

Isaiah spoke the words I mean,
“My lips are too impure.”
I’m low, I’m dumb, I am not clean.
How can I serve you, Sir?

You cleansed his lips with fiery coal.
You answered Moses’ fear.
You made the shy apostles bold.
Send me. Your grace I’ll share.

Dose a Day

I started this blog,
a poem a day, flung out
to the world, words of faith,
of hope, of recovery...
I started it as a tool
not of serenity, of surrender
but to market, to hype.
Day after day, seven hundred
ninety-eight days, each one.
I stay to recover, to share it,
as a tool not of book sales
but of freedom, of willingness,
of doing the next right thing.
I started this for the wrong reasons
and have watched God use it
to remodel me.

Wickedness

Since no man knows the future, who can tell him what is to come?

No man has power over the wind to contain it; so no one has power over the day of his death. As no one is discharged in time of war, so wickedness will not release those who practice it. (Ecclesiastes 8:7-8, NIV)

Wickedness will not release.

How do you break free?

Only with the aid of a higher power.

The higher power can give you power.

Power over the wind to contain it?

Maybe.

Power over the day of your death?

Absolutely.

Not to change anything,

but to have serenity.

Power to be in the presence of peace.

Peace doesn’t release you, either.

God, hold me in your peace.

Let me always remember

you’re tougher than wickedness.

The meditation is taken from A Time for Verse.

Cleansed

I hated to carry my friends
for the car spoke volumes
to those who knew
of car-veiled hedonism,
of fast food shoved quickly
to hide the evidence,
save for the crumbs that clung.
Long time past, car washes inane,
the particles lingered
awaiting the OA NCIS,
the eyes of those who knew.
But long since the deviant excess
the slivers lied of the present
but recalled the brutal past.
But who could know?
A simple cleaning, scrubbing,
reclaiming...could speak of abstinence
rather than dismay.

The Comfort Factor of Lies

There is never any final comfort in a lie. However closely we may have hugged a lie to our bosom, the moment we see it to be a lie, we should be wise to part with it. Those who take refuge in a lie are like those who take refuge in a flimsy storm shelter made of three-ply wood painted to look like stone. When they want the shelter most, it will let them down. ~ Leslie Weatherhead, The Will of God

I told lies because they were easier,
a pathway circumventing yelling,
a way to maintain icy silence called peace.
I told lies to look bigger (metaphorically)
and smaller – thinking they'd believe my numbers
and not their "lying" eyes. I lied easily,
naturally, sometimes when the truth worked better.
I lied to him, to the world, but mostly to myself.
When the hidden truths were augured out of me
and I finally excavated deep truths, I kept the lies
for the comfort, the commonplace, the role.
Yet little by slow I learned truth-telling,
truth owning, honesty. And the shelter, the refuge,
the security of truth opened my eyes
and welcomed me home.

The Turnabout Table is found in Slender Steps to Sanity.

A Humain God

"But, John," I said quietly, "isn't that just what you have accused God of doing when you said it was his will? Call your little boy's death the result of mass ignorance, call it mass folly, call it mass sin, if you like, call it bad drains or communal carelessness, but don't call it the will of God." Surely we cannot identify as the will of God something for which a man would be locked up in jail, or put in a criminal lunatic asylum. ~ Leslie Weatherhead, The Will of God (pp. 12-13).

God is love, not vengeance —
especially against innocents,
just because of kinship or relationship
with others to "learn a lesson."
God's reasoning scoffs at the mother
who wants the child next to hers swatted
so he'll get the message, he – her child...
God loves and even when we understand
not at all he has acted in love,
consistent with established rules
but seen through the whole lens
and not the skewed vision of those hurt,
bereaved, feeling cheated. God doesn't cheat
nor break the rules – his own rules —
when it would make him a wishy-washy God.

The Precise Extent

It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness. To the precise extent that we permit these, do we squander the hours that might have been worth while. ~ Alcoholics Anonymous (Kindle Locations 961-962)

Precise — marked by exactness,
accuracy. Extent — an area covered,
the size of scale of something.
Precise extent, imminently measurable,
exact, defined, established methodically.
An exact measure of what seems so amorphous...
the degree we permit resentment.
And that computes with the squandered hours?
How deep my resentments have been, are...
though less than in years past. Squandered hours
compute backwards, then, to the resentments.
Can I get rid of the squandering habits
or must I surpass resentments first?
Either way, each result is beneficial...
I really don't care which comes first.

False Front

My false front was so exhausting I had to make it up to myself somehow, and the one sure way to do that was to eat. ~ For Today (Kindle Locations 1870-1871).

I would have told you the easy way out
was pretending to appear what I wanted to seem.
Being who was expected, matching clothes,
looking like others, make-up when friends started,
gossiping, trying things repulsive, fitting in.
I've learned, though, that honesty is best,
easiest, most comfortable. And honesty means
not just truth telling in words, but being inside out
authentic.

Too Far

Only those willing to risk going too far can find out how far they can go. ~ T.S. Elliot

You ask me to do this
but it's too large, too foreign,
I'm not comfortable there.
You say I'm ready to sponsor?
You've got to be insane. I can't!
You want me to speak?
To lead a workshop, to carry the key...
You ask too much of me I'm sure.

Too much of me...
more than I can do.
But you're not asking
that I be in charge,
that I find it manageable.
You ask me to show up,
to stand up, to surrender...

to surrender and see
just what "I" can do.

Chosen Pain

Much of your pain is self-chosen. It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self. ~ Kahlil Gibran

Who would choose pain?
Certainly my answer is no...
but in 1997 a rotator cuff,
the misery of the injury, the surgery,
the awful triangular torture chamber
I wore for months...and my life veered,
turned toward self-care.
Then falling last year,
ambulance, emergency surgery,
a brace for months, and now
seventeen months later
through the continuing pain
I know I've grown, reached new plains,
understood more what is life,
who I am, what matters to me.
I would not have chosen mental anguish
from decades of diets, years of failure,
mountains of fat. Then I found
recovery rooms, sanity, serenity,
joy I'd never guessed could be.
Should there be more awaiting me,
requiring a trip through pain,
I'll choose that path.

Grabbing Hold of Willingness

When I have the willingness to admit I don't have the willingness, that's when my program works. ~ Jim H

There's praying for willingness,
for willingness to be willing,
for willingness to be willing to be willing...
but one step more is not having willingness
to admit the lack of willingness.
Independence, a strength, a goal
to be grasped, instilled in a child
from the potty training to learners permit...
Dependence, weakness to be shunned,
impotence to be snubbed,
childishness to be grown from.
Yet dependence and willingness,
fealty and obedience —
odious as they may feel —
are the only path with merit
when I give up and crave
the magic of recovery.

Intellectual Healing

My father and his cousin
reminisced some 80 years,
speaking of their Grandpa's mules,
his bass voice, life on the farm.
I scribbled notes,
history from unlikely men.
Then through their tales
I met the man; his life
and mine came to a turn.
 
Faith healing. As calm
as telling of apologies
to mules. Impossible?
These men weren't fools.
And they believed.
They believed.
Specific words, details.
A severed toe attached.
Even a bleeding mule cured —
by telephone, no less.

*ERROR*ERROR*
*DOES NOT COMPUTE*
I believe in healing,
long ago, far away,
but not in my blood.
Not so calm, so sure.
Now I know my thoughts
were flawed,  my God too small.
He can use me and mine
if we but stand aside.

 

Okay

Many people settle for “okay.” ~ Voices of Recovery (Kindle Location 2146).

Had I had okay when I got here,
I've not have come here,
not have sought recovery,
not  have known a lacking.

Had I stopped at okay in the rooms
I'd have been comforted,
felt worthy, assumed I'd reached there
through innate talents, self-worth.

Had I realized how far beyond okay
stood waiting for me, promised to me,
guaranteed if I managed to follow
twelve simple steps, I'd have missed living
which would not have been okay.

No Fixed Plan

“A good traveler has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving.” ~  Lao Tzu

If I were running things,
I'd have a destination,
a plan, an idea of the trip
maybe vague, but at least a clue.
Planning my life, I'd set out goals,
know what would happen,
have an idea how soon.
But I've given up control,
surrendered the wheel.
I'm just along for the trip,
waiting for guidance
from the one with the plan
that I cannot see.

Bidding

Grant me strength, as I go out from here, to do Your bidding. ~ 7th Step Prayer

Do you want employees to do their job
or their employer's bidding?
A master bids, a sovereign, a ruler.
Bidding fits with homage, with tribute,
with adulation – worship.
So negative, so impotent, so feeble...
To whom do you owe that kind of devotion?
To whom do you yield your strength,
your will, your mind, your soul?
Is there a Creator out there
to whom you can plead,
Grant me strength, as I go out from here,
to do Your bidding?

Trusting God

O thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war's desolation.

Blest with vict'ry and peace, may the Heav'n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave! ~ Frances Scott Key

I can't understand God,
know how he manages
my life, much less a universe
of two. I can't do more than listen,
follow, and repeat. But I know
my penchant for independence
stands me in poor stead,
that reliance on God, dependence,
works best for me and all around.

Chocolate's Power

The answer for me is never chocolate.
I know, for I applied it liberally
more than half-a-hundred years,
it failing to deliver one iota of comfort
of any lasting sense, as some lalent legacy.
Instead I learned how miserably
the drastically altered little bean
can harm me, numb me, isolate me,
discomfit me, engorge me, sicken me.
Through it all despite my sufferance
one richly worthy lesson stands preeminent:
Whatever the question or issue may be
I can without a thought or passing glance
rule out chocolate as contributing
a shred to the proper resolution.

Alien

“Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.” This, to me, was the true “action” Step. It required asking the power outside of myself to change me, to make me something alien to myself. ~ Voices of Recovery (Kindle Locations 2084-2087).

Something alien to myself,
beyond any semblance of comfort,
foreign – speaking language
I not only don't know
but never heard, I'm sure...
If I'm turning it over, letting go,
the old familiar is enemy, is wrong,
is anathema. The unknown,
uncomfortable, unearthly is right.
Something not from me,
never of me, seemingly incompatible
my only hope of peace, of harmony,|
of wholeness, of humanity.
My role is only willingness,
release, surrender, deference
to the power that can make me whole
and blend the alien with my essence.

Outwardly Pious, Inwardly Stubborn

Outwardly pious, inwardly stubborn. We appear righteous when we obey enough cultural traditions and verbally reject cultural taboos. ~ Jo Helen Cox

We follow the rules
until they rule us,
become monarchs
with a life of their own
and stand in the stead of God.
We come to believe ritual
stands holy, needing no source,
no basis, no anchor nor harbor.
We forget to remember the truth,
the good, the grace once honored
by rules, once having meaning,
contributing to understanding,
to renewal, to life. We worship the rules
and neglect the sacred, leaving it
neglected, forgotten, ignored.

The Four-Way Test

Of the things we think, say or do
1. Is it the TRUTH?
2. Is it FAIR to all concerned?
3. Will it build GOODWILL and BETTER FRIENDSHIPS?
4. Will it be BENEFICIAL to all concerned? ~ The Rotary Four-Way Test, Rotary International

We constructively review our day.
Have we been dishonest?
Are our motives self-seeking?
Do we owe an apology?
Were we kind and loving to all?
What could we have done for others,
what pack into the stream of life?
We must be kind to all, including ourselves,
for to do otherwise would diminish
our usefulness to all.

Status Quo

Just think how happy you would be if you lost everything you have right now, and then got it back again. ~ Frances Rodman

The Rotary program on Zambia —
touching, but I'd seen it.
Different hemisphere, other countries,
but a Nicaraguan dump,
a Mexican wheelchair distribution...
Kaylee came with me, sat absorbing,
touched. Two weeks later said
how wealthy she felt, having food,
not fearing high odds of childbirth death.
We sit here longing for bigger, better
but having that already. Jealousy,
envy, desire for prestige, comfort, ease...
and we don't even see what we have.

Look at Me

Look at you,
once miserable like me,
now happy, peaceful,
full of serenity.
Look at God! He's not at all
like I learned at Mother's knee,
he's real, he cares,
he knows what's best for me.
Look at those I've hated, feared,
who wrecked my life for years.
They didn't mean to tear me up,
it's how my needs
interfered with theirs.
Look at me,
pitiful wretch
afraid of being me.
I'm now becoming
what I'd longed to be.

Connected

Isolated in addiction, in fear, in resentment,
in the fog of stupor, we reach desperation,
each in our own way, but sooner or later,
with firm decision or floundering
for some string of hope, for any steady stone.finally we reach out, tentatively, timidly,
and find when we can connect with another,
no matter how precarious the communication,
and we find a kinship, no matter how odd it feels,
where connections can be spliced together
and with that tenuous tie, we stand no longer alone
but united in trust and hope...

Definition of Hope

The real definition of hope is it's an earnest expectation of good. ~ David S

Hope doesn't mean wanting a result
but demanding to continue the behavior
causing the undesired present.
Hope isn't a wish list, awaiting God's checks.
No person is your last hope.
Hope resides in the hear and now,
not in tomorrow or years to come.
Hope is not wishes that reality change,
not idle longing. Hope cannot be abandoned
when events play out other than our plans.
Hope stands in living, in being, in loving
and changes only the person in whose soul
God's goodness and our recognition of this truth
is all the hope we could ever need.

Drop the Thought

Never think of pain or danger or enemies a moment longer than is necessary to fight them. ~ Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged (from Myra Dean)

A nonsense song of my youth,
You will feel no pain
as we drive you insane
so stay on the sunny side of life.
Not meant for analysis,
a vehicle for knock-knock jokes,
but what does it say? How can it be,
insanity without pain? An oxymoron?
A lie? Sketching one driven to addiction?
Keep on the sunny side doesn't mean
to yield to insanity but to run from it,
to see good, not dwell on evil
hoarded from yesterday,
borrowed from tomorrow.
To reach the sunny side,
the path is clear, leading away
from anger, resentment, lunacy,
walking straight to the sunny side,
to peace, to joy.

Influence

I don't want to do some of the things I used to do – eat poorly, speak harshly, or have a short fuse. They have lost their appeal. As much influence as I know I will have on this little boy's life, he already has an amazing hold on mine. ~ Maurene Gibbons

Our greatest gift
to the children we raise
has nothing to do with wealth,
has little to do with education,
is simple (though often very hard)
and natural. Just love them.
Just want what's best for them,
in life, in us, in the world...
peace, joy, meaning, purpose.
And even tiny infants for their part
can give those back to us,
for they reflect what they receive.

Transformed

Damaged people, here —
stripped by life, by fear.
Hurting people gathered,
a tumultuous, broken herd.
Dangerous folk assembled,
no spark of hope to kindle,
despairing, maimed,

at wits' end, insane.

Beloved people here,

relieved of guilt and fear.

Healing people gathered,

a tumultuous, joyful herd.

Dangerous folk assembled,

for love found hope to kindle,

despair is slain,

hope and life reclaimed.

Losing Separation

Losing separation – what others call a near miss. ~ radio description of two Delta airplanes

I've lost separation many times.
They call it co-dependent these days.
I've lived to please, sought above all else
to build a life where others cared,
where they knew my value, where I mattered.
Where they said thank you. Or just noticed.
I've quit being me, knowing what I thought,
feeling my own feelings adopting his instead.
I've lost separation before and thus I know
how excellent, how great a blessing, how good
having separation can be.

I Believe

Meditation's not daunting

called conversation, what it is.

A trusted adviser, an old friend,

sharing life, frustrations,

thoughts – but listen.

Not like Aunt Molly's calls – I nod

into the phone, or wander off.

It doesn't matter.

God hears me, can you believe?

I hear God and I believe.

Fog

Fog is a scary thing...but fog is only a temporary distraction along the roadway called life...happens, never lasts. ~ Jimmy Naylor

Sometimes I can't see the way through,
can't make out the path, find the steps.
Sometimes vision fails, experience stands mute,
intuition isn't. Thought and vision fogs.
To ignore invokes failure, embarrassment,
humiliation, consequences.
To yield feels cowardly, wimpish,
inept, weak. Yet wisdom lies in patience,
in waiting for vision, in seeking sight.
Time is an ally, a teacher, a guide.
The path can be seen, and time heals.

A Time to Cry

A stiff upper lip, act like a man,
don't let them see you cry.
Chin up! Play up and play the game.
Don't be a baby. Be a man!
Men are expected
with unreadable face,
and women under glass ceilings
take up the pose.
Emotions, though, serve a purpose.
To grieve, to cry, to seek solace
is natural, healthy, wise.
Keep a stiff upper lip? Maybe,
but it's hard to sooth the soul
by stuffing your face stiff-lipped.
Better to shed a tear
than garner pounds to shed.

After

Fury, violence, distress, turbulence.
The world swirls, jerking objects,
fierce and carnal. Storms rage.
And after, calm. Damage assessment,
sorting good from among the bad,
inventory taken. And it is over
illogical as that may feel from the midst,
but everything ends. All cannot be mended,
some holes will always remain, but it ends.
Life goes on, and good appears
among the dregs. Rebuilding begins
while memories tarry.

Same Thinking

"We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them." ~ Albert Einstein

This time I'll get it right,
have the willpower,
walk the tightrope,
exercise, just barely eat,
enough to get by but to lose,
to lose the weight, to show them...
This time I'll make them happy,
show them I have what it takes,
impress them, receive accolades,
be the star. It's never worked,
these decades past, but this time...
This time I'll give up, admit I can't,
turn it over, surrender...and win.

Post Hatred

When I examine my dislike of certain individuals, I am startled to find that the characteristics I am least tolerant of are those I hate in myself. ~ For Today (Kindle Locations 1545-1546).

I hear catty comments,
tsk-tsk in my head
though I know my mastery
of the art. Trivialize folk
who are bigoted...
and those lacking in education.
I well know the truth of despising
my own faults when seen in others,
ignoring them in me. But now,
even those folks I've hated
seem just human, trying to get by.
It appears when you taught me
I didn't have to hate myself
I lost the art of vilifying you.

Next?

Our next function is to grow in understanding and effectiveness. ~ Alcoholics Anonymous (Kindle Location 1167)

A wise woman, my college Sunday school teacher,
spoke with disdain of those repeatedly born again
when they stopped there, never "grew up."
Kind of like doing the 1-2-3-oops, 1-2-3-oops,
repeating, repeating, never moving to step 4.
There comes a time when we've been through,
worked the steps, run the course. It's then we decide:
do we sit on our laurels, play the old-timer, spew advice?
Or do we keep on going, like moving through mountains,
the next peak after the last after the one before that,
higher, better, more startling, more glorious
as we realize it's the steps but more – it's love,
it's honesty, it's keeping on growing up...always.

The Most Help

Often we can help each other most by leaving each other alone; at other times we need the hand-grasp and the word of cheer. ~ Elbert Hubbard

"Rescue the perishing,
care for the dying,
snatch them in pity
from sin and the grave..."
Rescue is us, we co-dependents,
we know-it-alls, we rescuers.
Just do as we say, and you'll thrive,
let me guide you, decide for you,
advise you, dictate your steps.
But no, not any more.
I gave up that role, for no reason...
except I miserably failed
in guiding lives of my fellows,
my spouse, my kin...
Now, I guide my life
by listening to my Power,
leaving yours to you and yours.
I can't rescue you, no matter how I try —
and boy have I tried —
I can merely live mine, love you,
and believe you can...until you know how.

Extravagance

Are these extravagant promises? We think not. ~  Alcoholics Anonymous: the "Big Book" (Kindle Locations 1163-1164).

Without restraint, extravagance.
Spreading wealth with reckless abandon...
We come to rooms or recovery hungering,
thirsting, longing for an illusive dream,
a pot of gold with no rainbow in sight,
even within imagination. We come bedeviled.
Human relationships, emotional control,
misery, depression, gainful employment,
feeling useless, fearful, unhappy, unable to help
even those we care most about... Bedeviled.
Then, moving blindly through the steps,
just doing the next act shown us,
we stumble into a magic place,
a hidden hoard of gold, that rainbow's end
drowning in the extravagance of peace, self-respect,
freedom, happiness, serenity, the value of our past...
We find a cache of God's extravagance,
and know he planned forever our finding it.

Freedom

I've worked for self control

these decades long,

achieving goals, though many slipped

from fingertips, Chimera

never there to snare.

Since as a tyke I first declared,

"I do it for me. Leave me alone!"

freedom meant self-control,

my journey closely held.

So now I meet a bunch of drunks

who years before my birth

rewrote the rules, set self aside,

and taught a simple rule.

Freedom I yearn for cannot come

from all my earnest work.

Instead, to finally reach the goal

I get get free from me.

The Chimera was, according to Greek mythology, a monstrous fire-breathing female and male creature of Lycia in Asia Minor, composed of the parts of three animals — a lion, a snake and a goat. The term chimera has come to describe any mythical or fictional animal with parts taken from various animals, or to describe concepts perceived as wildly imaginative or implausible.

God's Forgiveness

After making our review we ask God’s forgiveness and inquire what corrective measures should be taken. ~ Alcoholics Anonymous (Kindle Locations 1188-1189).

How do you tell God you're sorry?
I guess the traditional word is "confession."
But I hear in my head fifty-plus-year-old words
"Don't be sorry, don't do it."
In the same way I didn't want Daddy miffed,
to stand chastised before God stings.
I don't want to have been a disappointment,
to have let God down, to have failed to ask for —
or to follow if I got around to requesting —
the directives of the next right step.
But like hiding truths from parents or friends
who know me well hides nothing, but instead
builds a wall – God well knows but wants my nod,
my word, my concession of the wrong
to keep the pathways clear from me to God.

Not in their Steps

Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise men of old. Seek what they sought. ~ Matsuo Munefusa

You think if you eat my food plan,
you'll recover. But I've seen you eat...
When a piece of bread rests on my plate
it means nothing to me. I may eat it,
might not...I don't need it,
it doesn't call my name. But you...
I've watched you, seen you eat bread,
then grab mine when we stand to leave.
Trigger foods differ. Our needs differ,
the character defects, resentments...
You can't find your recovery in my footsteps...
only in taking the twelve steps for yourself.

Not Cocky

We are neither cocky nor are we afraid. That is how we react so long as we keep in fit spiritual condition. ~ Alcoholics Anonymous (Kindle Location 1175)

Cocky seems far from what I remember,
coming to realize insanity, helplessness,
an unmanageable life. But still, in retrospect
I see those days it fit. The second day
of that diet to end them all, or that grand day
when the scale rewarded efforts —
before I rewarded myself for the success
with apple fritter or such...
Yes, when fear didn't control,
I'd strut, the world under tight rein,
sure of self and willpower.
But now cocky doesn't work
for there's no self-pride.
Whatever I am, anything I can
is the work of a Power
working through me.

Tentative Tentacles

Maybe my job is to bloom,
but how? Do you know
what you're asking?
You want me to step out,
to expose myself to ridicule,
to ask people to look at me,
not avert their eyes...
I figure you're right,
but you don't understand...
But then again, maybe,
just ask for a glance, not a stare.
Perhaps I can do it little by slow,
like getting wet a centimeter at a time,
extending my tentacles, but tiny ones,
just to feel the water...

This Wall

It's Styrofoam, you know.

The wall between you and me.

I used to think it solid,

to believe it impenetrable.

Born on the wrong side,

I didn't fit in, a stranger among you.

You showed me, though, the confusion,

the optical illusion. Nobody else knew

I saw it, but you'd seen it too,

had lived with it. Who could have known?

Now I can move it, shove it aside

when I need to, but you understand,

know sometimes I need it,

sometimes comfort comes

from being alone
since it's not lonesome anymore
on my side of the wall.

Finding Humility

...a poor self-image keeps us in bondage to self and thus makes it impossible for us to find true humility. ~ The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions of Overeaters Anonymous (Kindle Location 718).

Thinking myself useless, ugly, a failure
can't make me humble?
How much humble can a body be?
But humble doesn't mean humiliated,
and that state clashes right well
with humility, so if humble I'm to be
I have to come to have some respect
for who it is God made when I appeared.

Rightsized

RIGHTSIZE - transitive verb
: to reduce (as a workforce) to an optimal size
- intransitive verb
: to undergo a reduction to an optimal size (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/rightsize)

I've been larger than life,
a mouse not worth noticing,
microscopic, germ-sized, nothing.
From my mountaintop
I stood ready to rule the world
then with a whoosh unnoticeable,
zilch, zero.
Then neither giant nor insect
recovery happened, and made me right,
life size.

Procrastination

“Any action, no matter how small, will help us to overcome deadly procrastination.” ~ The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions of Overeaters Anonymous, p. 31

Sloth in five syllables.
Chronic low-intensity fear.
Sluggardly, lazy, at a snail's pace...
Put off and put off and put off.
I hate my proctastination
but hold it close to me,
practice it, perfect it
by repetition, by diligence,
by training my responses.
I want to get things done,
to accomplish something,
to be meaningful,
do God's will for my life.
But it's so hard. I want to.
And I will.
Maybe tomorrow...

Everything

I've tried it all...well, pretty much.
Decades of gorging myself
on all the sweets I could find.
I hear these days of new products,
combinations of flavors brand new
and it can feel I've a need to see,
to experience, to taste the delicacies,
but I know, really, it's not so different.
After all, the taste doesn't matter.
Had I sat down to all the pastries,
all the confectioneries, all the frozen treats
available, then or now, I'd stuff them in
so fast I'd never really taste the difference.
So really, I've tried them all. I know the flavors.
And the one I choose is the one I have,
the luxury of no sugar, of sane choices,
of food for life with no need to live
for food.

Not Necessary

Who is it I cannot live without?
Nobody. Surely I value people,
relish time with them,
can't imagine not having them...
love them with all my heart.
But need need not linger,
has no place in health.
Only my higher power's will
and the power to carry out my role.
I clean my side of the street,
do what I can to ease others'
without control, without strings,
having no hope of self-fulfillment
through others' eyes or acts.
So long as I need no other
I stand at my proper place,
free to relish other people,
individually and collectively
standing on my higher power only.

The End of the World

What's to happen at the end of the world?
What precursors, indicators, evidence?
A bang or a whimper, man-made or natural?
Will it feel like the end of the world?
Will I worry about it, dread it, fear it,
party like an idiot for nothing else matters?
All sorts of people have notions what will be
this putative end time, this doomsday,
the great finality. But probably it's not
a public disgrace, a divorce, an embarrassment...
the only thing that's the end of the world
is the end of the world.