Poem: Lovers and Parents Gone

She's a soft and hollow memory,
Every breath further away.
My Missing unchanged,
but farther,
distant.
The Love hasn't changed,
but the Absence
makes it Bearable.
Somehow my heart's
Missing
of old Lovers
is intertwined with the pain
of my Parents;
Their past and present
Abuse
still Unforgiven.
This lack of Forgiveness
causes me Pain,
no matter how Justifiable
their Guilt.
Perhaps my Lovers need Forgiveness, too.
The Pain of their Absence,
The Pain of their...
Not Understanding Me Enough,
The Pain of their Not...
Loving
Me Enough.
In the end it seems
the Crime's the same;
Lover and Parent.
Not Enough Love.
The Answer?
The healing ointment balm,
Forgiveness.
Such an easy word to say,
Not always an easy thing to do.
Gods know I've been trying for years.
But blotting it out
only makes the Pain stronger,
while Facing It brings me to tears.
So tears it will be
and tears it will stay.
Until the rains of my salty waters
turn into healing.
And the Pain
recedes
into dust.

Poem: Lady Canna

A very good healer,
but I want her no more.
She's helped me many, many, times.
I would never speak badly about her.

Lately I've been having dreams,
telling me our time is over.

Hate it when Goddess tells me what to do,
though She always knows
what's best for me.
Scared to learn to Live without her,
she's been my medicine for so long...

New medicines for a different Me,
new routines for a better Now.
I love you Canna, I always will.
A thousand prayers to lessen my needs,
refound hope removing my Greeds,
the breath of Faith is all I need,
The Holy Spirit my New-Found Steed.

Maybe discomfort, for up to a week.
Maybe I'll find that it's harder to sleep.
Maybe I wont know just what I should eat.

To put up with it all, for the Greatest of Goods.
I'm liking the looks of my new neighborhood.

The Goddess will help me
every way that she can,
so when my life ends,
will be like it began.

List: The 12 Steps of Egotists Anonymous (EA)

1. We admitted we were powerless over the Laws of Nature - that we could not control everything in the Universe.

2. We came to believe that Powers greater than ourselves could control everything we could not.

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of those Greater Powers.

4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

5. Admitted to the Greater Powers, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

6. Were entirely ready to have the Greater Powers remove all our defects of character.

7. Humbly asked the Greater Powers to remove our shortcomings.

8. Made a list of all persons, animals, plants, ghosts, and corporations we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

9. Made direct amends to such entities wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

11. Sought through prayer, meditation, magick, divination, and service to others, to improve our conscious contact with the Greater Powers as we understood them, praying only for increased knowledge of their will for us and the power to carry that out.

12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to others, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Poem: To Home Again

I've been here before,
though it's never the same.
Hopes mingling with Fears,
Gratitude mixing with Anger,
Pride dancing with Shame.

Oh! That it would last!

To maintain my Faith,
so quickly forgotten,
so solid when it Lives.
So very empty when it's gone.
The most beautiful things can happen within it.
But also intolerable frustrations of pain.

To know that my
Patience,
so formidable a weapon.
Endurance,
like mountains to streams.
To hang on
Humility,
fastened to
Faith.
Walk blindly,
but happy,
to home.