In the murky depths of muck and mire
hope flickers in hearts
courageous enough to believe;
sending out ripples in the waters
like a domino effect rewound.
Insignificant seedlings to the cruel eye
filled with light and promise
as yet unseen turned
Fragile sprouts in healing green
reaching up and out
to rest hopes on the water front,
as if to console one another -
we are not alone.

Against all odds, bean of India,
Keep going –
Power through the sluggish resistance
Of this darkened plane.
Though life seems lost in loneliness
Listen closely,
Hear the Whispering rumours of life beyond the deep
Of basking in light and life
beneath the welcoming heat
of a dancing sun.

A triumphant act of faith indeed,
to content oneself with growing,
never really knowing
what lies beyond the darkness.
I weep for you
with joy, O little pocket of hope
as you propel yourself forward -
such strength, such courage
for one who as yet knows not
of that rosey happiness,
that snow white purity
that lies beneath your shell.

I stand in awe of you;
You with your absurd elegant beauty
tracing your journey
accepting it as part of yourself
embracing who you once were.
The original rags to riches tale;
Roots in putrid, ravenous foundations
yet you yourself remain unstained.
The journey every bit as beautiful
as your glorious destination –

a testimony to your essential self.
I see you take up your stance
Front and centre, finally ready
to declare yourself to the world.
Budding beauty of new life
awake! open your eyes, your heart,
you dont have to hide anymore
the world is missing who you are.

And time births healing and growth.
Every flower blooms at her own pace;
Tentatively unfolding - delicate and fragile still
with gentle colours begging will I do?
Caught up in a lighter life
becoming bolder, blessed, nurtured
blooming bright, opened out
hello world, here I am.
Your wary days drowned, you claim your space,
Fill your space,
Make it your own.

The ethereal splendour of your gentle petals
Succeeded only by the loveliness within,
As you build up your legacy of hope
So wonder will not be lost in the falling petals
but made more beautiful still
in the healing gifts,
in nourishing others,
in the gifts you give of yourself
back to the world.

Ten thousand nights have laid themselves down before me
and I have played the princess in the tower oh so well.
The perfect aryan child tucked up behind veils of delusional dream,
to sleep to wander into places where damsels save themselves.
And in such splendor the masks do fall like autumn leaves,
crisp and changed - each fallen and forgotten under foot.
But hair grew much too fast beneath garments as mole hills became mountains
and irony of ironies I caught my goldie locks in a leaf covered bear trap-
ensnared in biting pain I did wait for my knight and trusty steed -
but my prince was the villain; a scenario I was unprepared for
lost in delusion while he mawled my once ivory skin,
till it bled; my blood irreparably tarnished by his seed.
And the nights kept falling one by one,
slowly to their knees or else dying a savage death by blade or flame -
and for my part I have lived them.
Unprepared for such madness, armed only with fairytales
I have fought a battle I never could win.
And the people came. I let them in, wove threads of trust, only
to taste the milk of human kindness and choke on its bitterness.
And so I shrank from the world like the tortoise to its shell
and I climbed my tower, bolted the door - I cut my hair short.
So I sit by a tiny window with animal-kind to kiss my scars.
People grab at me but I am out of reach and there I shall stay
some day the Prince shall come and from now on I will trust only in Him.

This Dalian prison feels eternal! I stretch across the bounds of matter:
A child frozen in time, an adult melting into darkness, a spirit riding the back of the wind,
and the child drives the adult to an excruciating distraction.
She pierces the heart with her screams, she will not be ignored.
I abandoned her once in the wilderness, she was damaged goods and it was life or death —
She lay weak and broken and beyond saving
I couldnt take her with me, because she looked at me with my own eyes


Except hers shone with tears and bled the loss of innocence and told all our secrets.
My conscious mind buried her there in the woods, she didnt resist.
I held her responsible for all of it, and she didnt even challenge that.
How could she let that happen to us? Fist and boot, **** and *****, *** and ****, and she stopped fighting.
It took me years but one day I felt her move and knew she was alive.
Her eyes bore into me pleading me to take her back; asking me to love her.


I was afraid of her at first; of her wounds and weakness and wanting.
Her fingertips grazed mine; and the our two parts became whole
with a collosal iron clang forcing out echoes of screams cried long ago,
and they were hers and mine. We fitted into each other like russian dolls,
not neatly but with a post-war stagnant silence and scent of blood spilling still.
I tried to be with her, but her need was great —
And I knew she wanted all of me and that meant I must embrace all of her.


She wouldnt be ignored anymore, and was brutal in her attention seeking.
She forced me into her memories, our memories and left me to live what she endured.
She tried to make me see that she saved me, us, herself, but I couldnt understand
How she could torment me this way; relentlessly; painfully; vividly:
I wondered if she was taking revenge on me,
that her ghost was rattling her chains, binding me with them, drowning us both.
And for a long time the two of us tore our body apart and gave way to the weight of madness.


She vomited rainbows inside me and danced me along the cliff edge.
I breathed the whole weight of my darkest days into her till she choked,
as if I thought I could somehow **** her with toxins.
She took up blades and cut my flesh and grew more and more savage with each stroke.
And my body, our body became a war-torn country, the battleground
on which we played out the assaults of our reunion.
One day she regressed to a foetus, ******, transparent and whimpering like a wounded dog.


I saw her then, she was entirely helpless, she gave up to save us both,
And I’d been blaming her all these years, and all she wanted was to be loved —
Spending her days behind masks and dying inside,
And I had wished her dead, pretended she was dead and she let me live.
She bound and gagged herself and selflessly gave herself up for me,
And I wasted the life she gave me, repeating mistakes,
Full of bitter resentment, burning up joy like oil and wallowing in it.


I wanted still to force her out.
But throughout the years she remained and she kept me me and fighting still —
The strength that surrendered her to brutal assault,
is the same strength that keeps me drawing breath into my lungs when the darkness comes.
The waif soaked in ***** and drenched in ***** clamped to my leg
was the same cherub who lay down and endured so that there might be life.


I regret I still blamed her, but I did so with great discomfort.
  

I imagine a time when we might be able to embrace in the light —
We are of course one and the same, ourself in different times.
I know now you cannot love with half a heart or smile with half a mouth.
She is the colour, and I am the canvas,
together we could make something beautiful and bright.
And Im listening to her cries now, sometimes I stroke her hair,
Perhaps one day I will hold her tight - then there will be love, light and life.