Panache

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A Little Chunk of Me

Recovery's the goal,
progress presumed,
yet expecting perfection
jerks me back to disease.
An ever shrinking chunk 
of me remains unrepentant,
unreachable, unloveable, ugly.
Others enter these roomsobnoxious, argumentative,
angry, unloveable.
Love, though, knows no bounds,
reaches across to unlovely.When I let myself love these,
only then can I love that chunk
of me.

What Does Archie Teach Edith?

She learns to do what she agrees promptly
encouraged by his disappointment
expressed as anger when she slips.
She learns to get her worth from inside,
independent of his appraisal of her.
She learns discretion as to where lines
must be drawn, where they don't belong,
how to be available to be an us.
She learns the concept of servant leadership
doing what he expects, knowing
she doesn't owe but can give without benefit
of gratitude as payment, acknowledgement.
She learns to tolerate opinions she doesn't share,
to think through why she doesn't,
to hold her counsel, confident
she's not called on to explain.
She learns she can't change him
by telling him how to be, by reasoning,
by doing everything possible for him,
to let him know she cares, by seeking praise,
gratitude, a kind word, her daddy saying
at each meal's end, "Very good, Mz. B."
She learns to do what she didn't think she could
because he asks, because if she doesn't
it won't be done, because she can't stand
to disappoint him. She learns she can't avoid
disappointing him, that it doesn't matter
when she can't make him happy,
can't change him, that what he does,
what he thinks, what he says
is none of her business but that hers
is.

Sail the Course

It was the goal for years and years.
If I weighed a hundred forty
I'd be cured, healthy, normal...
fit in. But it didn't work, long time.
Oh, I'd catch a strong breeze at times,
sail on it like a catamaran. But winds calm,
weight-loss stalls, and the doldrums appear
and like a yacht becalmed I'd drift back,
toward the cliffs of binges, of sugar highs,
of who-cares-I-deserve-it days.
But boats sail where you want to go
when you set your course, use your tools,
patiently take the next right step,
get rid of the interruptions,
and sail the course. And get there,
maybe not fast, but you've come as you should
and chances are you learned enough along the way
to stay there, to be there, to hold on to
the healthy body weight.

Photo by Hilarmont

Feel the Love

A stranger, I walked into the rooms,

scared, hurting, terrified to come,

expecting failure in due course,

like immediately. It felt different,

though, warmer, like hope lurked,

flirting around my chair. Like love —

and I grew to believe you really did

love me despite what I was.

Months later, light flickered on as I

watched my clone come in, scared,

hurting, terrified, expecting the worst.

Finally I knew it, felt it, that love

for her wasn't in spite of her but truly.

We love the hurting animals we were,

seeing them, loving them, as they come,

for they are us, they are what we are —

they're loved.

 

 

 

The Gift or the Wrappings?

Silk cocoons tediously
unwound yield strong fiber.
Protected promised glory, 
though, does not survive.
We try to save appearances,
protect armored covering
we've constructed to withstand
life's onslaught. Keeping up
appearances, though, maintains
the worthless shell, leaves 
promised life beyond 
the worm's world 
impossible.

I'll NEVER Tell!!

No! No! No! No! No!

Not now, not ever!
I've told you muck
to nauseate a buzzard!
I've dredged up all
the sins, the shame,
the crimes, the wrongs
since when I was a tot,
you've got enough to sentence
me to life some ten times over.
What more can you want?
Some things just can't be whispered,
can never pass from a sinner's
guilty heart, just fester there and rot
to make a living hell. It's my secret,
my burden, my shame
and I'll not infect you with it.
For me? You'll take it for ME?
You're lying, you prurient freak!
For me? You need my
take-to-the-grave secret
to keep me from an early grave?

Sought and Found

I found him! I win!

Clever, how hidden

he was, out in the open

where I thought I'd looked

but like those puzzles

when words are secluded

in random letters in

plain sight but darned near

impossible to spot!

You told me I wasn't looking

for the God of my childhood

or that of the TV preacher

but could make up my own

and sure enough

when I knew what

I wanted to find

there he was,

waiting for me,

rooting for me.

The Greatest Possession

Cling to the thought that, in God's hands, the dark past is the greatest possession you have — the key to life and happiness for others. (Alcoholics Anonymous, page 124)

 

Humiliation, shame, rage —

hurling dung on the hopes of family,

treacherous dealing with friends,

debauchery, self-contempt.

My pain, my agony, my hopelessness.

Talk about magic, about being born again.

How deep is God's grace to go so far

in rescuing me as to give such scum value,

but even more, to make it priceless?

Keep Receiving

Lie still and keep receiving. ~ Debbie Moot

As long as the modem works, the signal comes in
and when computers call on it, information flows.
The system asks to connect, or at least agrees
since the power's out there, constantly offered,
just ask. Sometimes, though, a password is needed,
making a trustworthy connection, private, no interlopers.
Ask and you'll receive it. Other places it's free, just come,
stay, draw power.

We've got a modem built into us from the start
and we belong to the network whether we know or not.
No password, no encryption, no exclusion.
But most of the time we need to ask
for we're not puppets, we are in control
until we yield authority and find more power
than we could ever believe. The power is there,
ours for receiving. Just listen. Just lie back.
Receive. And keep receiving.

What I Already Know

It is impossible to begin to learn that which one thinks one already knows. Epictetus

They say you can't be too dumb (though usually more courteously)
but you can be too smart to understand the Twelve Steps,
to get recovery. It's not true, though. Intelligence is not an issue.
But the conviction you're smart...smarter than the others in the rooms,
than the ones talking to you...than those who wrote the literature...
the conviction you already know everything stops your getting it.
It's easy to say the attitude...the arrogance...is real superiority
but far too often it's low self-esteem hidden. And a need to use
intelligence, education, luck of advancement...to hide the fear,
the shame, the need to appear superior, the the way we feel.
And eventually we come to believe the act, the persona, we've adopted
and refuse to listen to the source of hope and peace being offered.

A Hostage Mess

I write down poetry prompts when I hear them, store them sometimes for years. This one I actually used before on March 9, 2014.

Don't take a hostage you're not willing to shoot. ~ Congressman Mike Conaway

And then what? I practiced law with two men.
Bill flew (quite successfully!) by the seat of his pants,
knew where the library was — because the coffee was there
and he'd cut a donut with his cattleman's knife,
eat a third...come back twice more and get a third...
nobody else would touch them. Was that forethought?
Claiming his whole donut, knowing what others would do?
Bryan would take a new client, know generally what they had,
research that question and two more what-if's
on each potential branch before the first meeting with clients...
forethought, ready to follow the conversation's contingencies.
What decisions will you make today? Are you ready for what-if's?
Don't take a hostage you're not willing to shoot.
A friend calls, asks you to speak at an event. You hate to speak.
But it's six weeks away. You say maybe. You say it again
for five weeks. Your friend's in a jam if you don't appear.
Don't take a hostage you're not willing to shoot.
Find a puppy, clean it up, feed it, love it...you have no pet deposit
nor cash to post one, can't afford to lose the apartment.
Don't take a hostage you're not willing to shoot.
You sign a contract to perform a service but change your mind,
lose interest in that, want to put your time on a new passion
so you procrastinate. And work on the new. And procrastinate
until it's a day before you are to deliver the contracted service.
Don't take a hostage you're not willing to shoot.
Don't build amends you're going to have to make. Live responsibly.

Miracles

We get what we expect, so “expect a miracle.” We are all miracles. ~ Voices of Recovery (Kindle Locations 1626-1627).

Expectations run low after years of failure,
of disappointment, of abysmal self-esteem.
And we get what we expect. More disappointments,
more failures, more proving what we knew we were.
But when we change what we expect, 
even if it's expecting what our sponsor says
is the future, and, filled with skepticism,
we claim it or the desire to claim it or the wish
to believe it could be true. We may do absurd
repetitions, telling ourselves we're special,
we're pretty, we're able, we're talented...
and after a while they become not recitations
but statements, our own beliefs, and
more than that...they become the truth!

Destiny

Where there’s blue lights, just read me my rights ~ lyrics, Justin Michael Weaver, Kip Moore

It's inevitable. We know it is,
for we come in angry, dejected,
knowing failure is inevitable.
We can't lick this habit, this compulsion,
this addiction to food. This obsession.
The urge will come again, will take over,
and we'll eat again, binge all night,
drive from one window to the next
getting treats, moving on so the clerk
won't thing badly of us. We come in
failures. Experienced, expert failures.

We find hope, people like us,
really! When we thought we were unique,
oddities of nature, freaks. But we meet us,
but us, recovered. Us with hope, with joy,
laughing at the behavior that drove us crazy.
We do meet our destiny in the rooms of recovery.
But it's different, better, more that we could hope...
we're not destined to a lifetime of misery!

Be Still and Know

Massive storm, the street a river,
rain abated but lightning, thunder linger.
Power out, candles, batteries, darkness.
God. Time, excuses gone, just us.
Why does it have to come to this
to pull me to contemplate, to visit,
to sit and await guidance?
Gratitude for rain, for safety,
for often ignored devices...
willing to be willing, to remember
without the necessity of resetting
all the clocks.

Molding a Mind

One date six decades ago
shaped my life, my thinking, my future.
The day a nine-year-old me
moved from the only home I knew,
from friends, playmates, Brownies,
church buddies to a small town
so small the other fourth graders
had been together three years
and everybody seemed to know
all the people and remember every name...
but me. I got there at summer's start
and commiserated,
the attitude calcifying
and on graduation
with leadership positions
in many organizations,
I felt unloved, unfriended,
alone. And I had learned
to compensate with food,
sugar!, and self-pity.
But there's hope for the hopeless
when you learn to sort it out
and end the reliance on crutches.

The Bane of Excess

Excess kills the very qualities I seek in anything, be it possessions, activities or food. ~  For Today (Kindle Location 2440).

I know how to quit a stupid game, be it Angry Birds
or Spider Sol, Shisen or Sudoku, crossword puzzles,
or blackjack, Candy Crush or tic-tac-toe.
Play it ad nauseam, again and again and again.
Maybe they named it revulsion therapy but long before
when people picked up stones or sticks and threw them,
when they threw lots or dice or any ancient game
they knew the concept. Enough is enough is enough
and your favorite activity can become torture per se.I know how to quit bingeing without a program,
without intent, without hope. After a while
there can even be another bowl of ice cream
sitting at the bottom of the carton (probably the third)
and the thought of putting it in your mouth brings pain.
And I know in the past I would feel that way
and after I finished it, despite hating the act,
I'd stop, there being nothing left to inhale.
We have twenty-nine typewriters, seventeen eagles,
and before I gave them away about fifty elephants.
I've still got them but the joy is gone. I kept the best
and like them for who they remind me of,
but too much finally makes the wanting abate.
I am serially compulsive, it's who I am.
But it's not how I have to act. I can choose
to do the next right thing, to act like an adult,
to be sane for the moment. When I do,
I can enjoy a grape, a five-minute game,
a beautiful object or something that makes me smile
and the insanity can remain at bay.

Sobriety

“God willing, we … may never again have to deal with drinking, but we have to deal with sobriety every day.” ~ Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition (Kindle Locations 6456-6457)

They call them dry drunks,
the ones not working a program
but holding on to an alcohol-free life
by white knuckling, by peer pressure,
by that frayed willpower they couldn't hold
but now it's better, with a few of the tools,
with camaraderie, or by substituting
another addiction or other behavior,
not better, just different. And it's slippery,
tenuous, hard to hold.
But unless that's the problem,
it's not the problem.

Living sobriety, no matter what the addiction,
that's the issue. Finding the promises true,
learning to love yourself and others,
accepting responsibility for self and nobody else,
living life to the fullest, that's the issue.
And unless you can find that, you'll fall back,
be stuck in the mire...or act like a bear,
be miserable inside and a carrier of that
to all who meet you. But when you get past,
when you do find recovery, then that's glorious,
a life beyond our wildest dreams,
peace and joy.

No Laurels

...in OA there are no laurels. ~ Voices of Recovery (Kindle Location 1544).

Imagine resting on laurels.
If resting is sitting, balance
would be difficult, prickly,
or would crush the leaves
to future compost components.
If resting is leaning,
how many laurels are required?
Too many to rest...more to acquire.
Laurels are useless, tangible vanity,
false security, nascent narcissism.
Laurels are worthless for the honoree,
good for prideful ego, for show,
for proving you're worthy
when that's not the way to prove it...
just be worthy, do the next right thing
and it's true. Laurels are worthless
for the admirer, longing for,
feeling less than, wanting to earn tokens
to show off. Resting on laurels
does no good. Just stomp on them
and let the composting begin.

How Willing?

Will cannot be quenched against its will. ~ Dante Alighieri

I tell you right now, I'm willing!!!
Just like Peter was willing
to confront the people as he warmed himself
at the fire while the master he swore to serve
was in trial...and Peter said he didn't know him. 

I tell you right now, I'm willing!!!
Just like Judas was willing to follow Jesus anywhere
but took a few coins and told them where and how
they could capture his master without a crowd
to get in the way.

I tell you right now, I'm willing!!!
Just like the rich young man who came to Jesus
and told him he'd done everything right
since he was a young child and asked what more
but turned away because Jesus asked
more than he could give up.

I tell you right now, I'm willing!!!
God, let it be the truth, and if I'm not
then make me willing and if I won't be that
then make me willing to be willing.
Here I am, Lord, use me...I think...