On Being a Wife

1.

Elisabeth Sonrel

You have found my spirit self,
in dreams she appears to you -
beautiful, mature, keeper of
profound wisdom.

Yet I love that you do not
become trapped by appearances
even in the material world,
that you love me because
you have heard my Venus laugh,
seen the rare joyful spark
in my un-made-up eyes.

You truly make me feel like
a delicate flower,
living fragrance and grace.
So you hear me singing,
whispering, melting into a space
where I know I am loved,
deeply.

2.
The wife's strength is in persuasion
instead of violent tears, cruel words,
in a gentle concern and an earnest
yearning to understand
what exactly is the magic spell
that breaks the hypnotism
of his dark side, penetrates
through the gloom and into
the imprisoned light.
You are not here to change him -
you are here to awaken
his courage, his honour, his faith in life
by your soft, vulnerable trust in him.

Max Nonnenbruch

No one can be closer to him
than his wife
no one else can be allowed
to see his depths, heartbreak, pain.
Wives, listen:
This must not go beyond you.
You are the sacred keeper of his
difficult life, of his tears
that the world can never know even exist.

In some marriages,
the woman, the feminine
has lost her sacredness
in masculine toil, gossip, bitterness,
smoldering resentment, an abyss between
where two hearts should meet.

Wives, listen:
Do not air his dirty laundry.

That is where you
perhaps unintentionally but so tragically
throw into the wind his strength,
compassion, trust, faith, love in you and his life.
In one little moment, you put in motion
a destruction of what
was built with such labour.
Do not destroy the heart of the one you love.
Be a muse, a kind sacred spirit of hope,
a whisperer of better things to come,
an endless space of understanding,
perfuming the once so bleak a path of his
with forgiveness, joy.

Meltdowns

I surrender.
I fall into myself,
diminish, lose my ugly colours,
let all vain thoughts and plans
evaporate.
I inhabit this body,
solid, heavy with grief.
I have not the strength to pray
for all the things I want and think
I should get;
I can only whisper,
'Let it not be.
Tell me what to do.
Please carry this burden.'
What false loves there are
for people, things, doings and goings,
it doesn't matter.
I don't want it.
My only love
is for him.

That a new love and light could
still spark from
the agonising disaster of the
foolishness of years of sleep,
irresponsibility, indifference
is a miracle
or a terrible, crushing irony.
Whatever I try so desperately
to grasp, it doesn't matter.
I can only love him,
hold space for him,
try to be strong, hoping
it will saturate him,
give away all the suffering,
saying, whatever you're going to
take away from me, it doesn't matter.
It was you who gave it to me, it is you
who have the power to take it from me.

The Disappearing Girl

I am invisible.
My breathing is soundless,
my steps silent,
my feet small.
I clutch my things close to me,
trying not to take up space.
I don't speak, or if I do,
my voice is quiet, controlled, melodious.
I feel comfortable finding my way
in the dark, oh no, no need to turn on
the lights for me, I'm good like this thanks.

John Bauer

I don't leave messes or stains behind,
I clean up any evidence of my presence.
Everything in its place, I haven't
moved a thing, haven't been here.
I cannot be surprised, always alert,
I've lost my ability to scream.
No need for food or sleep,
(I'm too restless to sleep anyway)
people like me don't require that.

Don't think about me, just preferably
forget all about me.
That way I am comfortable,
as if I did not exist.

But even an invisible girl like me
cannot forever hide from the fire within.
Suppress it, pretend, run away
but when someone blows on the flames,
there we are, everything burns -
mind, heart and body.

Then you appear,
and there's a bonfire.
Now what do I do?
Whatever you give me,
will be consumed in the fire,
it cannot be satisfied,
and I burn with it,
my whole life of trying to be ice,
gone in an instant,
all the years thinking I was in control,
gone.

Either I give in and everything burns,
you, me, the whole house,
all disappearing in the fire,
or I deny everything.
Either way, I must not touch you, I must stay away.
But there is a third choice -
the Goddess can rescue me.
Only She has the water to quench the fire.
I must stand still, the fire tries to burn me,
but I must not believe it, must not allow it,
I must give space for the water to work,
for my Mother to work.
Be quick my Mother,
there is not much time.

The clouds are white,
the snow, the mist, the snow,
white upon white upon white.
It is mist looking back,
mist we are walking into,
the world seems intangible.
But your face -
strong, calm, almost grim.
My most familiar face,
my most beloved face,
and oh the grief that I feel
at the old age your burden has wrought on it.
This wet, heavy, unforgiving light
reveals all your pain
but oh how I love seeing your face so clearly.

My horrible folly
of contempt, resentment
for your perceived weakness
at my weakest hour.
Yet when I stop wanting, trying,
fall into myself,
am at your mercy,
you are infinite care and gentleness

like I were a rice paper flower,
a bud on a cherry tree,

Willy Pogány

a lost, scared willow bird

I am not worth
of being treated
like a delicate, soft being
knowing the cold pride and arrogance
that taint me.
Yet you do.

You seem solid now, and I can
cling onto your arm
as much as I dare
but what if after that next
bend in the road
I were alone, again?
Like you stepped off the train and I
am carried along with a tremendous,
unstoppable momentum,
hurtling to where the memory of
each other must be lost forever.

Is this the defining moment?
Or is it this? Or that?
Where is the brink and how do we
know we've stepped off it?

The pain of walking from mist to mist
where the answers are only pinpricks of light
like fireflies or almost forgotten hopeful dreams.
Here my strength cannot depend on your brilliance,
my peace cannot lean on your awakening.
Oh Eternal Mother, it is true!
I must let him go!
If I yearn to be the ocean and the tree
that support him,
I must let him
and when we are apart
and when I sing
from my austere loneliness,
it is in him that the strength grows
and me, who learns to love better.

Maxfield Parrish

Just like the new snow hides, smooths out,
beatifies the dead earth,
so do the thoughts, imaginings, days, stories,
silences, denial, more and more moments
where you feel bright and I stop crying,
make us forget our impending fate
(hopefully yet undecided)

Maybe the heart needs breaks
not to be quite crushed under the pressure,
or maybe we subtly, secretly tell ourselves
it is ok, just to escape the agony.

How does one get tired of praying?
Why does one regard one's feelings
as the highest authority?

Let not the seeds in me resist dying
because the trees and flowers of peace and beauty
will then never grow.
Let me ease into and relax into
facing the darkness,
because if I keep it away,
the light can't come close either.

The awe and honour
of my broken, shattered, crumbled presence
saving your life.
If my brokenness has lifted you up,
(in secret ways I will never know)
what may my strength do?

Marianne Stokes

If this harmony, sweetness, unity
has come about by accident, through sleep,
what may our willpower do?

Every breath, moment, intent
has to be for the sake of love
there is no alternative,
we do not speak of it,
because it is death.

The strife that is in the rest
the emptiness that is full
of doors to higher regions,
of imperceptible fragrance,
impregnated with possibilities -
yet we are so small and weak
and that space is just a blink,
a breath, a thought, an atom,
narrow and invisible
but the only way to Love.

We fight together
through the torment
we sink together into deep spaces
of compassion, forgiveness
through seeing each other's sadness, uneven fragments
we flow into that silence
soft, rushing with the melody
of our efforts to surrender,
destroy our evil
and the inner slavery and arrive
to a wilderness between us
that is as pure as the first snow.

The Fire That Does Not Taint

A golden sky of dawn

the creation breathes in

but our struggles go unseen

by all except the Goddess.

The fight for purity,

detachment but love

dying to something primitive

that by all accounts looks like love,

but is poison and bitterness in disguise.

Under the pressure, a light appears

the more overdue, the stronger

is the invisible hand, holy presence like

a silvery, comforting veil

or moonlight making the air around me

luminous in the dark night,

snow crystals glittering like

the new understanding in my heart.

Arthur Rackham,
Sangreal

The mind is powerless facing these mysteries

the mystery of the agony of repentance,

losing hope but not ceasing to look

for a stronger faith

as if the heart will not allow

my grasp of the light to loosen

just like it won't allow the breath,

the blood, the body to cease.

My mysterious Mother

Mother of Angels,

Mother of the Universe,

Mother of Creation

infusing this black, defiled body

bringing to life the ancient fire

in my atoms, the fire that leads

to immortality

in the sacred darkness and prayer

you appear, you guide me

I cannot take my mind or heart away from you

or the dangers will come too close to endure.

How easy to deny everything - evil and love,

but let me find a way of flowing

through the grip of evil

and into the pure spaces

where I may find love

that burns and consumes like the secret eternal fire

that does not taint.