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Apr 13 · 232
The Forest Inside
Heidi Franke Apr 13
The Forest Inside
Out of the darkness
I claw and rise to see
There is a forest inside.
The green surrounds me.
The sun's rays splatter
Me awake to my open body.
I let in the light
I lean into the forest
With the trees holding me up
- as I tilt to fall
Reinforcing my stand I forgot
- I was a part of.

The green has grown so strong
Like the blood that sweeps away
Inside of me to a rivers tune.
I don't want to leave this place,
Fearing it will be taken beyond
Or that it was never mine.
Reinventing this woodland
That has always been inside.
The pine, the wind through the branches, the owl winks.
It has always been here with me
Compelled to germinate
Waiting for my return.
I lift up my head and the sky
- Is so blue.
Recovery from PTSD
#darkness #green #forest #trees #blood #river #owl
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Apr 13 · 173
False Statues Will Crumble
Heidi Franke Apr 13
False Statues Will Crumble
A mountain from a range,
Of such everlasting granite.
Carved over ages,
Shook from under footing
Like statues who will
Not wilt or crumble
Only to manifest
Into the space around it
Reminding me that as weak
As I feel, Inside of me is a similar
Persistence that won't be moved
By the capricious whim of man and imbecilic masses who follow.
I will seize your sharp shank and excavators trying to make me into something I am not.
I am a woman with equal rights
And dignity far beyond your pompous attempts to roil this robust range down. Your false statues will crumble when the mirror knocks at your midnight door. Here, look at yourself.
Abortion is healthcare. Women's rights are human rights. Keep abortion legal.
#abortion #rights #mountains #human #mirror #persist
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Mar 15 · 419
The Grief Train
Heidi Franke Mar 15
The Grief Train
This wasn't the train. It scooped you up to a different destination. Birds of splendor followed along
Out the window
Winding in your path of grief. Be ready for the station waiting
To greet your sorrow.

The platform is not clear. The mist hides the light then becomes a flow of water you can reach and touch. Become aware of the grief but don't move towards it. See it instead in the palm of your hand. Dip into the water cupped in your hands to cleanse your sorrow.

You will have times of freedom. Embrace all feelings. Let them fall into the stream of water. You will lighten. You will see more color as the mist dissappears.

You will see the light between the leaves of the trees. The sounds of song birds lifting you up with messages for you alone.
#grief #train #water #mist #feelings #sorrow #song #bird #tree #light
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Mar 5 · 273
Pulp
Heidi Franke Mar 5
Pulp
I felt it
When I spoke
To the judge,
For my son,
Years of shell work
Encasing fear and sanity, cracked with each glance, falling away. Everyone listening.
I was left lost
Like a snail losing it's shell
Mushy and vulnerable
A Pulpy mess.

Was it enough
That I said
Or too much.
So much was left out
The Russian Roulette admission
The thoughts of jumping 15 floors from his hotel
So many letters making up words and paragraphs upon paragraphs
of 15 years.
Throwing out a gun
Into the city trash.

How could I be anything more than a mother
Who let the saving flatten her out of existence. Incoherence and pulp.
Will it be discarded
All that effort
To keep him alive
At my expense.
Is that what mothers do?
I'll never get to return. Life doesn't
Let you.
Speaking to judge on behalf of mentally ill son's crimes.
#crime #pulp #judge #mother #son #vulnerable #mentally #ill #gun
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Feb 5 · 338
Sentencing
Heidi Franke Feb 5
Sentencing
Today my son
Is to be sentenced
To prison. He
Lives 23 hours a day
In a jail cell, he will move on
Steeling courage few of us
Ever have to experience.
Consider your luck.
His mental illness
never to be a crime.
Will there be light for a prism?
Where he can turn to
Other pathways
Less dark and Forge
Himself into the open
Blue sky and all the rainbows
From here on out.
On the outside we are blind
On the inside some
Are given true sight.
I cry for a rotten system
In mental health care
We own. You might
Want to pull up some buckets
For all mothers tears
Knowing the best we have
Is incarceration. How is that
America? Tired of blaming anyone but yourself?
A son is to be sentenced this Monday morning. Prison transfer on Wednesday.
#prison #jail #light #sight #prism #rainbow #ourside #inside
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Feb 2 · 591
The Twenty Fourth Hour
Heidi Franke Feb 2
The Twenty Fourth Hour
He was in his cell
Twenty three hours a day
Never was he an animal
Yet treated as such

The echoes off the walls, bounce
The metal doors that clang, bang
Endless boredom after
All the books are read
He paces his eight feet

Gray dulls the senses
Lack of color, lack of life
He saw a bug inside
The other day, alive
Looking up at him
Another form of life, different,almost brand new
His voice filled with hope through the Pauses

It rained and the summer was hot
They were released for the hour
Choices that are made in that precious time
He went outside where there is only the cement
Laid on his back, spread his arms like an eagle, like an offering
Letting the rain Fall onto him,
just so He could feel Something
Sharing the experiences between a mother and son. The son is incacerated. Too many non violent people are imprisoned for far too long.
#prison #jail #rain #hope #cage #time #gray #boredom #animal
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Dec 2023 · 848
Without Warning
Heidi Franke Dec 2023
Without Warning
After he died
Without warning,
I planted a tree
Announcing
Just as suddenly
The Serviceberry
To the others
In the garden
Each bud of a branch
  welcomed by the fresh earth
And dormant bulbs yet to burst
The Aspen as role model
Hastily, deeply
she was added
As quickly as he left
In pursuit of
Recouping buoyancy after starving for oxygen.
Consoling under her generous shade
Begging for silence of sufferings and
deep sorrows

Three years have passed
Has it been that long
There they are,
our memories,
in the control room
That cling, stab like a blade
Taking over the clock
A contagion of disorder
That eats away
like acid
Explicitly unwanted  
Clarity of that night
Frozen in time,
like the winter
  it happened.
Time ended without warning
Deaths metronome gave birth.

Uneven disbursement
Over one thousand days
Since
Asking why,
Why?
Why!
Prone and exhausted.
Drowned in tears that forged
A lake of salt
Why then
Do we not float?
What's holding us up?
And another thing,
Where does the wind
Go when its gone?
It dispatches
   without warning
Whirling in circles,
Catching conditions
Why am I
not so
shaken then?


The Serviceberry has yet
To bare fruit in its
Short life to fifty
Holding steady,
Enduring the rooting road
In the pragmatic ground
Surrounded by leaves from seasons
As messengers of compassion, companionship
At the foot of her trunk
An offering
Once again in winter, here we are
Sleeping until the sun
Bleeds more time
Why does three years
Feel so heavy and capricious
As if it were just yesterday


Will the depth of sorrow remain
After she blooms and feeds
The hungry birds,
Over 35 species,
Who love her nectar
Caring for the offspring
Obscure, neglected and hungry
Giving back, keeping the healed
From further storms of
Sudden causes
As he did for his flock
Harbored in what the doctor
Ordered.
Tender
Loving
Care

Will heartache be replaced
By forgiveness?
Like the passing bus
That descends the hill
Into a valley of green hearts
Picking up new passengers
Loving another
Forgetting the importance
Of yesterdays bus ticket that
Flew out the window
Arriving without intention
To its destination
Neutralizing the anger
That came without warning
Glancing out the window
Towards tomorrow
As the birds songs
Are sung
The unintentional death and road of recovery.
#sorrow #death #regret #without #warning #foregiveness #birds #tree #loving #anger
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Dec 2023 · 373
What If The Opposite Were True
Heidi Franke Dec 2023
What If The Opposite Were True
There are no limitations. You
Receive help that
You never accepted.
It now encircles you.
By an outstretched hand.
No one bites it off.
Acceptance received.

The sun directly investigates
Any unwillingness
To not accept change. Bringing a pinch of new light.

Who would you have to be
Stepping into the
Other side?
Finding you are truly good enough.
That any other connection
From limiting beliefs
Unravels, like opening a pomegranate. One seed thinks it's all alone,
not seeing all the others encased in their own restrictions.
What if it were the perfect time? The full ripe fruit.

You are the right age! This is the perfect time!

What if the opposite were true?
What would you do? Even if a part of you did not believe it?

Bathe hence your confining insistences.
What is in your skyline? Your oceans horizon?
Supplied with new resources, a deliberate inventory, of unrestricted beliefs, if the opposite were true?
Then who would you have to be
To make it unmistakable?
Who would I want to be
If the opposite were true? Now, only now, as a matter of time.
Reflections on a learned patterned of thinking, leading to a false self identity.
#opposite #truth #now #unmistakable #confining #growth #self #ideas #unrestricted #limiting
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Dec 2023 · 1.9k
Rain Synapse
Heidi Franke Dec 2023
Rain Synapse
Riding the air
In dark morning
A steady current of rain
Descends
Upon everything
The fir tree
The house roof
My dogs fur
The empty Ash tree
The fallen leaves
Brown, red, yellow, orange
The bird feeder catches the water As does the bird bath
The puddles
The street
The cement
My head

My ears hear each
Multitude of patterned drops
In apparent chaos
Reminds me of the brain
The synapses in my brain
Circuitry, each drop a connection from
Dendrite to dentride
Messages of the unknown
Of falling to earth
Of vulnerable life
Unprotected.

The unhoused, in the cool soaked air of December. Will you remain blessed?
Will you spread your joy in the patter of rain to those who bare the rain in their skin, on their dampened clothes? Adding a chill.
Will today you find some without a home
Bringing tarps, blankets, source of heat, to those who listen
To the same rain
While they shiver
And you stay in your glow with your tidy wood burning fireplace. Stay comfortable? Risk giving for giving sake. What floods of love can you share in December rather than giving to
Your precious family, the left overs, the excesses
And give to charity that make each day another day for breath in rain from the heavens. I choose the rain. I could be the one in
The open now, soaking as I pen these words.

Hoping words of love, neutrality, non-judgement and altruism be the "church" we reside in. Drop by drop.
Over a hundred different sounds of rain brought to earth by gravity, in my receiving ears, and the tiny sparkles of light reflected upon the  light from the street lamp shining upon concrete saturated by this extended morning rain.
Sunday. Sitting under my porch with coffee in hand, dog at my side. Dry from this music of rain. Thinking of the homeless. Now mustering the strength and courage to buy Starbucks growlers full of coffee for about thirty and driving around town once again finding cold people shivering. Time to order that coffee and give warm to some as best I can in my limited way. Looking for costs of pull over rain coats. My gifts to my children this year is to give what I would give them to others less fortunate. Be neutral in your thinking. Be rid of judgements of self and others. More love, less hate.
#rain #homeless #giving #synapses #gift #fall #winter #cement #cold #coffee
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Nov 2023 · 958
Feeling Needed
Heidi Franke Nov 2023
Feeling Needed
It started when people stopped bathing
Or showering.

Every day before they went to work or after their 5 mile run.  People just stopped stepping into their tubs
Or showers
To turn the faucet handles that activated
Cold and hot water to fall from the plumbing.

They gradually
Lost interest in hygiene. Personal cleanliness was ghosted.

Everything else mattered to them,  until it didn't.  Getting their kids to school on time mattered, finishing the work project by deadline mattered, visiting relatives in Montana mattered, driving to the store for groceries mattered, until it didn't. Simply ceasing soap and water on flesh.

They just stopped bathing. It's not that they were afraid of water. If near the ocean they would still run and swim in the waves,
Or jump into the pool at the Hilton. No they weren't afraid of water.
It was something else
So slow
And insidious that it was hardly noticed at first.

The domesticated animals picked up on the phenomena first.
They became anxious. They scurried, tried vocalizing. They sensed a lack of intention from their care givers. They sensed a lack of worthiness inside of their humans. The animals began to wonder about their own well being.
What was their future?

Once you start with a variation from normal,  from routine,  from tradition,  the pendulum swings.
The people didn't realize what was happening. Then it slowly dawned on them over time.
They didn't feel needed.
But kept it a secret. The secret necrosed from the inside
Out. They forgot that connecting to one another
Was vital to survival. Their silence could be deadly.
An idea came to mind how in depression one stops caring about certain things. What if everyone did?
#bathing #intention #animal #human #needed #feelings #soap #water #secret #silence
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Nov 2023 · 1.1k
Forecasting Change
Heidi Franke Nov 2023
Forecasting Change
The forecast on the radio
I didn't need.
I felt it coming
In and through the threads of my light sweater
Tickling my skin so my arms embraced
One another.

The barometer falling
As are the remaining Ash leaves
Of yellow, like canaries rushing about
Certainly saying goodbye
To the past
As they must
When the wind picks up.

Hurling chilly
whips of wind
down
The East canyon
Announcing its arrival
I think of my warmest coat
And how long I'll have to wear it
As I sit on the porch in my shivering
Bare feet listening for what is to come
The seasons change
How will I?
Contemplating arrival of winter storm, the loss of one season to another. Will I make changes?
#cold #winter #wind #forecast #change #barometer #shiver #yellow #feet #coat
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Oct 2023 · 1.2k
They Say
Heidi Franke Oct 2023
They Say
To heal,
Journal they say
Like a worm in the dirt
Of my front lawn
Sliding, pushing through
Air pockets
Arduous, unending crawl
No words come
To mind
Where can I breathe

To heal,
Journal they say
Words don't come easy
They fly up like
Torn pages of a book
Riffed, stolen letters of some name
In the nameless wind
Grasping what isn't there,
A cynical continuing void

To heal,
Journal they say
My hands become deaf and blind
The pages curl and mold
Pen and paper inventing before I have begun
All I have is the deep
The deepest inside
That comes here
Traversing incredulity, while I
cry

To heal, they say
#journal #heal #worm #book #words #breathe #crawl #dirt #wind #torn
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Oct 2023 · 793
Yesterday
Heidi Franke Oct 2023
Yesterday
Not drowning today

In remorse from yesterday

Draining self-hatred
#yesterday #remorse #regret #drowning
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Oct 2023 · 1.4k
Silent Stars
Heidi Franke Oct 2023
Silent Stars
Silent stars reside
In the blue milieu
Continuing their stellar constancy by day.
They are there like my love,
silent, unpretentious, patient and kind. Trace your finger along the sky, like a constellation connecting the dots of your name to a safe, congenial and forgiving place to call home.

Maybe your name will meet with mine in the night when the stars return, walking across the expanse of loving kindness that is within your reach. See you tonight dearest one. Just look up.
#silent #stars #sky #night #finger
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Sep 2023 · 866
Stargazing with The Tao
Heidi Franke Sep 2023
Stargazing with The Tao
I woke early
Enough to meet the stars
Like diamonds in a mine
Or apples on a tree that never fall
They weren't there for me or you
They just are.
A man coughed
Walking up the sidewalk
In the dawn
As he passed by my house, startled me
While stargazing.
I am reminded
There is now,
then and there
I am reminded to let things flow
To Let things go
As the wave does
When encountering the ocean, disappearing into it.
What today is your humility looking to?
#stars #zen #tao #humility #apple #today
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Sep 2023 · 985
One More Before I Go
Heidi Franke Sep 2023
One More Before I Go
One more before I go.
Into the wilderness of parts and dreams. A happy send off in the cool morning.

I will be back in a new form perhaps, a more rounded crown of a tree, after years of pruning.
A "wild and precious life" with untold horrors, spoken dreams, and wandering caravans of thought.

In yellow abodes loving kindness which is yours. Maybe it will seep in like a root gives to it's leaves. Traveling through twisted currents. It's fragile rose petals. Short lived. But remembered.
It's almost mid September and the Julia Child rose bush pushes out it's last rose for this year. A year of waiting, trauma, wandering untethered.
#rose #yellow #before #go #horrors #loving #kindness #trees #leaves #petals
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Sep 2023 · 2.2k
Globe of Light
Heidi Franke Sep 2023
Globe of Light
The sunshine melts in from the dark.
The summer sunflowers start their  morning yellow glow.
From the dark of nights despair and suffering.
The light of questioning wakes up,
I begin to ask why the pain?

Did I, or do I have the capacity to be optimistic of my will? Over matters of the past?

Shame, denial, self- soothing, trying to escape emotional pain through all varieties of addictive responses to life.

Understanding this new target for my heart, mind, and body gives me optimism of the will while
knowing
there will always be suffering.

I ask myself, what is my capacity? As the light rises in the morning I feel more air to breathe in.
Aware of the air inside of me whether in dark or light, carries some vessel of hope
to help ward off the strength of suffering.

I am not the wave. I am the ocean. The womb. Conceptualize
the possibilities in this morning dry landscape,
before abandonment. Conceptualize having what you need. Ease and compassion enters. Possibilities move through with ease and healing is within reach.

The capacity to heal needs warmth like the morning globe of light.
Reflecting on addiction with conversation between Deepak Chopra and Gabore Mate
#addiction #suffering #healing #light #air #sunflower #hope #trauma #optimistic
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Apr 2023 · 871
Held
Heidi Franke Apr 2023
Held
Held like this
A cupped hand of water
held still
that not a drop
enters gravity's pull.

Held like this
The hens egg.
Rounded palms together
without allowance of pressure
that would crush the shell.
Frail possessions.

These are days she remembers beyond all vicissitudes she faced.
Not jagged. Not stewing or careless.

This untainted moment
of protection
for something that will give back.

A drop of water
becomes a cup that was
dry as a bone.
The egg becomes
a breakfast feast
weary of starvation.

Hold life like this. Prudent,
tender and earnest.
These times she keeps
for consideration.
#egg #earnest #hold #water #prudent #tender #vicissitudes #life #fragile
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Apr 2023 · 1.7k
The Shower
Heidi Franke Apr 2023
The Shower
He called in for a shower after being alone on the streets for a week.

Is that time enough
to get ***** for a shower
   as a man nearly twenty-six
in years.
She could turn him away
like her father’s sister
might have and did.
From time to time.

It all depended on how many times in a week,
month, or year
he would show up without a call.
Without knowing he still existed.

Somehow, his presence and
absence
were a mixed blessing.
His presence was like a merry-go-round
that goes against the earth’s pull.
Like a brazen thorn
stuck into your shoe.
Unpredictable.
Vacuum-like.
******* all the ***** things in.
Taking everything in its sight
and power and making
everything contort
to his reality.
Where he and only he resided.
Would she open the door for him?

What she does know
is that she might risk speaking
in a bright happy voice
of a mother
so gladsome to see her son.
Welcoming him in.
Rather than turning him away
because of his inconvenience.
Grief is inconvenient.
That is one thing she knows.
Notes on helping a mentally ill adult child. Copyright 2023 @ Highwireart
#mental #illness #shower #brazen #thorn #vacuum #reality #unpredictable #contort #door
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Apr 2023 · 82
The Leftovers
Heidi Franke Apr 2023
The Leftovers
The Leftovers  or   (The Ones Who Survive)

Recipe: ****** *** Pie
The dope, the spoon,
In gutter water
Why did he die, not she

When does it end
Those who survive
Left out to cool
With no friend

Fiends and friends of addicts
Mystify us,  who do not understand
What makes them keep shooting
Into veins of foreign land

They join by ignorance or associate
A friendship they say more strong
Then that of a parent or a childs love
This couldn't be more wrong

The twine of codependency
Makes fools of us all
When one of them dies
Pleading for answers while wishing the other would fall

These are the Leftovers, the suffering addict
With their mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, friends
Who may have saved and tried before
Their pain and shame more severe if you pretend
You are not an ingredient
No less a fiend if sober
If you don't show up
To soothe the pain of being a leftover

Recipe: ****** *** Pie
The dope, the spoon,
In gutter water
Replaced by methadone

When does it end
Those who survive
Left out to cool
With no friend
****** Addiction Fiend Friend Survive Leftovers Dope Family Gutter Methadone Spoon Vein
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Apr 2023 · 97
Estranged
Heidi Franke Apr 2023
Estranged
Nothing is familiar
I have no place
A stone in a field of grass
the wind bends the grass
the stone looks around
nothing is familiar only the ground

Nothing is familiar
Where did I go
what is to be done
Lost in the avenues and avenues of my  Mind
There is no strength to pick up the stone and throw it away
It would just be in another field of grass
Estranged

Nothing is familiar
not even who I am
unknown
The painted landscape has no shape, where should I put the tree
no familiarity
Scanning the clothes on the rack
I used to know they were me
I am no one now
Nothing is familiar in this estrangement
Unknown Lost Unfamilar Sorrow Familiarity Landscape Stone Grass Me Mind Wind Retirement Estranged
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Apr 2023 · 1.2k
Don't Relent
Heidi Franke Apr 2023
Don't Relent
Start with self.
The others can wait.

Thoughts are just passing clouds for which to meditate.
Observe the world as the observer, not the taker or receiver.

Judges are for benches. Do not sit alone.
   Stand and walk into the songs of birds.
   Free within your self called home.
#relent #judge #judged #judgment #bird #song #walk #stand #observe #meditate
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Jul 2022 · 1.0k
The Illness
Heidi Franke Jul 2022
The Illness
The Illness

You spend exponentially
All services of every cell in your body
For years
To keep an ill one alive

Possible prolonged moments of happiness and hope
trickle in
Between the hospitalizations

Your spending is what you find out
He doesn’t trust.

What one finds out
Is ones unprepared-ness
My son wants to claim his life
For himself, to which could be his end or not.

Like the breaking egg, beak first
Or sunlight cracking through trees
Where light comes out and gives birth
With uneven decisions
Will I live?
And what IS living with a chronic diease like?

What he believes is not that he doesn’t trust you,
He just wants to trust himself.
What other choice in the insanity defense is there
That would be as human, then giving freedom of choice to him.
Illness Trust Paranoia
#illness #trust #insanity
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Jul 2022 · 794
Only In Your Mind
Heidi Franke Jul 2022
Only In Your Mind
Everywhere you go
Every where you are promised
Every where you land
Is not for a slab of steel
But are places you imagined to be
Only in your mind

You are where you want to go
You are where you lead
You are all the broken plans
Intended to lift you high above the land
You are air, as light as your intentions
As strong a wind, as your heart can stand

For there you are
Three times over
Where you must be
As you wait on this drifting sand
There may be another path
Just wait long enough
To take a stand
Homeless Addiction Mental Illness
#homelessness #addiction #mental #illness
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Jul 2022 · 2.8k
Greasy Life of Diamonds
Heidi Franke Jul 2022
Greasy Life of Diamonds
Helping a child with a mental illness and co-occurring disorder such as substance abuse disorder. Our little diamonds who grow up with a broken mind.

Diamonds are in the rough. How long does it take to mine a diamond?

If you as a parent do not have any tools, you will have bloodied hands and feet  and never will you get to where your child can shine without the addictive source.

Diamonds are found in many ways, but to communicate with the diamond, the ore around it is crushed and milled.

Diamonds repel water, but are drawn to grease.

Expect to get down and ***** when helping your addict, but DO NOT, go into the pit. You will be of no help once you are in.
#diamonds #travel #homeless #sand #mentalillness #Addiction
#diamonds #wandering #addiction #homeless #travel
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May 2022 · 1.0k
The Eye Of an Iris
Heidi Franke May 2022
The Eye Of an Iris
I will stay for today

Tomorrow has me
Already

I know not where I go, hence

I hope for splendor

And the spark off a

sparrows wing.
#iris #hope #sparrow #nature
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May 2022 · 388
Stylus
Heidi Franke May 2022
Stylus
Feeling like a stylus on a premium LP
Can't lift up to slow or slide it
Be slow, be quick, be ready
Scratching is not an option

Feeling this way again
Second-hand turntable
Treated as a diamond or replaceable

The stylus feels old
Not sure if the sound is reaching you
Enough to bring you
Out alive
Scratching is not an option
Trying to save my son from his brain disease, mental illness.
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Oct 2021 · 2.1k
Soft and Brave
Heidi Franke Oct 2021
Soft and Brave
Soft, slow and Brave
She Raged.
Walking forward with fear in one hand, love
In the other.
She let love
Lead the way
Soft, slow and Brave.
Part of the idea: the fear and love in a different hand are taken from meditation from Sarah Blondin. The rest is what I am dealing with. The sludge of depression, fear, and panic. Like tar pits.
#rage #soft #slow #brave #fear #love #walking
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Oct 2021 · 2.8k
Where Stars Reside
Heidi Franke Oct 2021
Where Stars Reside
Silent stars reside
In the blue milieu
Continuing their stellar constancy by day.
They are there like my love,
silent, unpretentious, patient and kind.

Trace your finger along the sky, connecting the dots of your name to a safe, congenial and forgiving place to call home. Maybe your name will meet with mine in the night when the stars return, walking across the expanse of loving kindness that is within your reach.

See you tonight dearest one. Just look up.
#stars #day #night #love #names #sky #blue #loving #kindness
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Aug 2021 · 1.5k
The Human Appetite
Heidi Franke Aug 2021
The Human Appetite
The human appetite
To **** the pain
to not experience any
dis-
comfort

The human appetite
to run a-way
far, away
are
seeds planted from our
footsteps

The more we run
the bigger the
plant
the hungrier
we get
the greater the ruin
in our run

Don't avoid
the burdens of
engaging lost plans,
or others.
Other Wise, the human
starves its self
in a marathon
by sealing off mouths.

Alimentary,
Leaving one, you, her, they,
them,  in the
hunger cycle
to feed
then crushed
left void

Elementary words
     don't avoid
pain.
It requires a handshake
a' la carte,
Indulge.
   remedy is in
the crash diet.
Come home now.
It's time for dinner.
#pain #suffering #forgiveness #human #appetite #dinner #home
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May 2020 · 298
Stylus
Heidi Franke May 2020
Stylus
Feeling like a stylus on a premium LP
Can't lift up too slow or slide it
Fragile bone dust
Be slow, be quick, be ready
Scratching is not an option

Feeling this way again
Second-hand turntable
Treated as a diamond or replaceable
How is it, my friend

The stylus feels old
Not sure if the sound is reaching you
Enough to bring you
Out alive, on my knees
Scratching is not an option
He is admitted again. Suicidal last night. Waiting to hear back. This time, no visitation because of C19. Feeling so much on edge like the moment I would try to pick up the stylus arm from the turntable of my favorite vinyl LP
#stylus #scratch #old #new #diamond #save
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Apr 2020 · 225
The Only One
Heidi Franke Apr 2020
The Only One
I wanted to divorce you
This minute, today
You bring me no joy
Covid or not
In the same instant
I thought of my grandson
Only 8, the same age I told my son
Of that. It set his mind in flames
Almost jumped from the roof
So, boom, I grounded myself
For innocence
Come on, just infect all expectations
Get it over with
Be the only one.
Loss of job hours, due to Covid, more hours shrinking, brainless husband wit minimal emotional intelligence. Waiting for unemployment, shrieking inside because my 86 y.o. mother keeps going to the ******* store. Just waiting for the sun to circle back again wondering who will be the first to go.
#covid #divorce #one #expectations #lonely
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Apr 2020 · 316
His Car
Heidi Franke Apr 2020
His Car
I almost took a hammer to my husband's car today
I was gardening and stopped by his wrapped-cloth car
So carefully cared for
more than I.
I thought, what if I took a hammer to his car
Would I just pound a few
Or hit it so many times it looked like a speckled egg the next time he drove
It was just a thought.
#car #hammer #husband #anger #hate #marriage
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Feb 2020 · 207
Mother o' Mother
Heidi Franke Feb 2020
Mother o' Mother
The liver
Is a mother
It takes in the bad stuff
of the body
    (the **** that no other *****
No other person wants)
Clean things up
Sometimes, the liver fails
But, it can grow new tissue too
Mother's are resilient
So, ya see,
"it is always something"
Written during my son's mental health crisis. Reminding myself there is always a way to turn something around into a positive. Usually.
#mother #son #liver #body #***** #failure #resilient
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Jan 2020 · 206
Carving for Love
Heidi Franke Jan 2020
Carving for Love
How to leave out hate
Say less and stand out far more
Carve your words with love
Less is more in many instances. Watch your thoughts. Who commands your thoughts? The media, the church, the neighbors, the parents, the past, or is it possible just you.
#care #love #think #thoughts #media #church #neighbors #parents #past #you
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Dec 2019 · 439
Sinking
Heidi Franke Dec 2019
Sinking
Please me here
Take from her there
Give to him always
Without a dare

I am sinking.
A terrible Christmas day
#sinking #give #take #husband #christmas
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Sep 2019 · 168
Dead Enders
Heidi Franke Sep 2019
Dead Enders
Dead Enders

Places we have been to
Places we compare to
Travel light years
In circles around us
Over time
Around and around we go
Spiraling through the self-disparaging
Thoughts we hack ourselves into
Until,  Sense-less
Dead enders.

So, unthread,
Unthread,
Unthread.

Unwind
Before your prospects
Leave this space.
Around and around we go.
Transcenders.
Dead end unwind transcend travel self
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Aug 2019 · 504
Suicide Ideation's Hunger
Heidi Franke Aug 2019
Suicide Ideation's Hunger
The human appetite
To **** the pain
to not experience any
dis-
comfort

The human appetite
to run a-way
far,                      away
are
seeds planted from our
footsteps

The more we run
the bigger the
plant,     thump!  says despair
the hungrier
we get
the greater the ruin
in our run

Don't avoid
the burdens of
engaging lost plans, find again
your A,B,C's, a friendly classmate, your sister
or others.
Other Wise,
the human
starves its self
in a marathon
by sealing off mouths.

Alimentary,
Leaving one, you, her, they,
them,
in the
hunger cycle
to feed
then.  crushed
left over a lean-to void,
And endless hunger

Elementary words
     Don't avoid
pain.
          I L.o.v.e and Y.o.u
It requires a handshake
a' la carte,
Indulge in
nutrient rich
Appetites
The elementary
   remedy is not in
the crash diet.
Come home now.
Ring a bell
Your table is set
I am here
It's time for dinner.
I lost my brother to suicide. Our thoughts control our actions. Contain, refresh, reset your thoughts to avoid getting hungry to end your pain. Pain can lead to dessert if you stay the course and call out for help. Please never give up.
#suicide #ideation #hunger #pain #love #appetite #feed #thought #dinner #school
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Aug 2019 · 514
A Day for Lions Will Come
Heidi Franke Aug 2019
A Day for Lions Will Come
Tiny lion laid so low
Who cut your mane
Your glow
The brain-land took, synapses struck
then
lost you
and it your-self and soul

The savanna called home
smacked of a foreign land
we found you hidden and weaving
your paw-full feet
scratching
telescoping
your way through the
streets of castaways, vines, and fists
Catching you then in its
paltry honeycomb

What are those points of neurons
fabricating in your mind
feeding fears
with gesturing claws
devising and fantasizing
luring my felis Leo, oh sick cat
take our love
struggling to bridge the gaps

Companions you lost
drifting through the dust
of the city cement
and ****** watered drugs
in veins
used by demons
who take the souls of lions
are now in their own generation, generating
their continued demise
away from you in your living trust

Your crown of tresses matted in tassels,
we searched the grass and pavements
we feared you were lost.
adrift,
missing and gone.
Years past,
treatments were tried
you emerged
the clearing did rise
you could now greet the day
to the love songs you hear
sing them for you,
you are the love
     whose worth is waiting
Lead on

You
Your Highness, watching upon your hill
breathe slow
linger a bit
recognize the worth of time
know there is a strength
in delay
anticipate dear one
the sun rises
Standy by,
for the afterglow

Master through life
do not succumb
your homeland,
waiting
as new companions take shape
As long as there are
plenty of tomorrows  
upon tomorrows
to a pick a friend,
a quarrel,
a dandelion.
accept hope,
A day for Lions will come.
A poem, revised today, which I wrote 5 years ago after my teenage son entered into a serious mental illness and use of drugs. He was homeless. He attempted suicide. He is now, at age 24, finding safe spaces in his life and mind, and no longer homeless. He is alive. He is happy, but as we all do, still struggles from time to time.
#lion #leo #bipolar #mental #illness #day #hope #savanna #brain #cat
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Jun 2019 · 430
Wherever You Go
Heidi Franke Jun 2019
Wherever You Go
Believe what you know.
And may all
the better angels
follow you
        wherever you go
For all those who suffer from cerebral palsy
#angels #believe #wherever #go #cerebral #palsy
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Apr 2019 · 820
Chair
Heidi Franke Apr 2019
Chair
So many vacancies.
Vapid halls and streets.
No air. No hearts.
Vacant lands and souls.
Be a hand.
Be a thread.
Be a source.
Be love.
Be the patience.
The light . . .
     the empty chair.
Where you can invite someone to sit
Spend time.
Where each other can
fill up the world again.
Willingly wise, adopting time.
Fractures will fade
Patches of hope emerge
Color of
Grass
will grow again.
Sweet fragrant spring grass.
Practicing progress
For each season
A seat for everyone.
#grass #hope #chair #green #time #wise #willingly #love #patience #source
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Aug 2018 · 7.7k
Rage-Light
Heidi Franke Aug 2018
Rage-Light
Head can now explode
But my hair rises black
Higher than this
Feeling inside like
I am,
         Screaming
         the sound could send waves
In new directions.  
Capture or let go...
They both make me feel
          Insane
Unable to do anything else
The roar is paralyzing me
Get me into the black hole
       already
I need the other side
Rage-Light, flashing
      You would be blind by now
But I see too much
       Scratching out your eyes.
This one written about the chaos felt inside when trying to help a mentally ill loved one who still can not see and the broken, broken system for treating our seriously mentally ill in America.
#rage #light #scratch #blind #paralyze #black #hole #roar #sound #waves
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Apr 2018 · 505
Birth
Heidi Franke Apr 2018
Birth
Millions of coins
Tossed into the air
then time stopped.
And began again, slowly
while all the sides
turned and flipped
side to the other side
The wind churned and
the coins landed one
way or the
other.

Birth was given
when they landed
In the order
that chance gave them
Until they stopped spinning.
The rain came
The water broke
the baby was born.
One way or another
How was the landing?
Chance and choice
Flipping coins again today.
#birth #chance #choice #coins #air #wind #water
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Apr 2018 · 632
A Hero's Face
Heidi Franke Apr 2018
A Hero's Face
A Hero's face rises above the
bandage on his head.
Why do men need this sort of hero?
An innocent.
A flower of spring.
Do you not see the sunrise each morning?
Where is your lost soul?
In the ages of history,
learn thee not?
The face of a young boy, wrapped in a white body bag, killed from fighting in Syria from the WhiteHelmet's twitter page.
#syria #whitehelmets #war #soul #innocent #boy #children #history #peace #sunrise
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Apr 2018 · 857
I Accept The Call
Heidi Franke Apr 2018
I Accept The Call
I Accept The Call

Collect call from Salt Lake County jail
If you accept,
Press 7.
Seven is a lucky number.
Not feeling lucky today
He is in jail again
For violation
Of Mental Health Court.
I accept the call.

Jail for mothers of sons
In jail, I imagine being like
Steel wombs, without the mother.

There are no pillows
No pleasant toiletries
No longer do I worry about
How long the refrigerator door
Has been open while he looks for
"Something to eat" in his bag of commissary.

There is no mama's kitchen.
No sofa to pine on.
Your laments only echoing
off cement.
What is your excuse this time
For violating the rules
At your new mothers home
You must know by now
There are no soft goodnight words
Just the stained metal
Slamming closed

May you keep your sanity
While doing your time
And remember the words
Radical acceptance
Practice balancing your
Emotional, rational
and wise mind
Maintain focus and resolve
To never, never, never give up.
I'll take that call now
I accept.
#jail #mental #health #illness #accept #calling #mother #home #son #call
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Mar 2018 · 478
The Day After Your Death
Heidi Franke Mar 2018
The Day After Your Death
The day after your
death it snowed again. I thought it was spring.
The cosmos created crystals of water as it received you.
Welcomed as another star
to the vastness we here
on earth can not know
but with our feeble telescopes.

This day after your death
I want to protect anyone else
from leaving. I want to cling to
every thing I know. Yet my tears
are evidence of everything I do not
understand and never will. You are the mystery
now John, my brother.

My mind will not
absorb your death as readily as my heart.
My heart seems to hold and let go
because it needs to, in order to survive.
My mind wants to greet my heart
but it just keeps snowing. Dreams
of despair.

You lived your recovery
like a man none other that I have seen. Lend us your strength, courage and wisdom
while in our sorrow. Fortune allowed us to witness
all your strengths.

You shared your weaknesses
so readily. I am stronger because of you.

If you are there please comfort those who have less strength. You were a pillar for so many. We still want to lean on you.
I feel so weak now
the day after your death.
#death #brother #sister #grieving #grief #overdose #stars #snow #addiction
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Mar 2018 · 526
Get Back To Constant
Heidi Franke Mar 2018
Get Back To Constant
Who are you today?

I am
hurt by the fact
you can deceive and love so perfectly
at the same
time
Frightened
by your sublime.

Who are you today?

I know not
who you are any longer.
I do not know which person
I would be talking to
or living with.

Get back to the spirited,
kind and trustworthy constant
that you
once were
before you strayed off
Before your dis-ease
You have a Constant
Like a star,
a knowing
Unwavering
        Please find him
And hold on
as if your life
Depended
on it.
There are two sides with bipolar illness, yet inside is the pure child where a constancy resides.
#mental #illness #bipolar #schizoaffective #constant #trust #identity #fright #deceive
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Mar 2018 · 429
Many Things
Heidi Franke Mar 2018
Many Things
Many things going on around you.
Clothes hang on chairs, littered
Like valves of the heart hang
By cords in diastole
Waiting for blood
What do you care about?

I have too many clothes.
#clothes #heart #blood #diastole #plethora #too #many #things #love #defeat
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Mar 2018 · 1.6k
Bigger
Heidi Franke Mar 2018
Bigger
I thought
my thoughts
were bigger than anyone's.
Maybe I was bigger than anyone.

This served to isolate me
from the fact that I am small, not bigger and I am okay
with that.

When did it begin? Why would I need this mechanism of living?
Did it start at birth? Or when my cat died in our house fire?
Maybe...
When I lost my father to his mental illness? When he was taken away?
Maybe the ****?
When the trauma set in?

If I am a mass of cells, a living organism,
vulnerable to this world of others.
I need protection. There was none when little. Children need protection.

I developed my bigger-self by watching others. I learned to protect.

I learned to heal. I learned to forgive, but always, my thoughts
were bigger than yours. You didn't recognize so I appeared
aloof, angry, bitter, warming, smarter, friendly, volatile, politically correct, patient, intense, stubborn, caring, wistful, shattered and put together again. I was all over the map. I couldn't find my waypoint, until now.

This is life's way. Our vehicle is our thoughts.

I am not bigger in thought, in action or in self. I am tired of running away, of blaming, of being ashamed.

I no longer need protection other than from myself.

I am now relaxing in the part I could not have been taught. The idea that even experiences, over and over and over again, would teach me my lesson. You ask why people keep repeating
mistakes. This is our allotment. The price each of us pays.

It is my thoughts that save me now, wondering about my son, his illness, about my predicament
after years of hard work, unabashedly independent, procuring mindfulness, deliberating the Buddhist way, meditating on thoughts,
through a maze of my twelve steps
that I now for this moment am alone in.  My thoughts deconstructed. More connected, but not bigger.

My shoulders drop, my face unfurrows, my heart slows, a tear begins if I let it. I am released. I will not suffer further.

How can I tell you, I am not bigger any longer and I am at peace.
#bigger #thought #life #organism #heal #forgive #vehicle #buddhism #mindfulness #angry
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— The End —