it was for all of this

The chilled and violent rain touches my bare skin

The thunder shakes my bones to dust

The lightning threatens to tear the sky into two

And my world starts caving in

Everything from the innermost center to the crust

the waters start to rise,

I’m struggling to stand tall

“I don’t deserve this” I say

And for something to save me, I scream and I call

Yet my feet are being lifted

I take steps on water

I shake, I tremble, I cry

here is my rock, my Lord, my Father

the world is crashing in around me

people slip away from my fingertips, they fall

“what do I do, my God?” I ask and plead

But when it was all said and done,

“it was for all of this”, my Lord said, I stand in awe.

my sunflower dress.

Days spent running around,

My sunflower dress draping awkwardly on my small figure.

Reaching towards the sky on my yellow swing,

Naïve to the lack of ability to fly.

Everything seemed perfect,

I only worried about what thing to do next.

Wandering the extend of my yard searching for myself,

But I was just innocent, gullible, learning, lost.

I sang songs loud and off pitch,

Wishing someone would hear me,

Wishing someone would rescue me from a mess of a life.

I had become accustomed to it, so virgin to the truth.

Doors were slammed, voices screamed,

Slanderous words tossed around and threats were made.

My eyebrows furrowed, tears streamed over my cheeks

Music loud, face in pillow, silence, silence, everything’s okay.

I held my teddy bear close to my chest,

Hoping to conceal my sobs as my mother or father came to kiss my forehead.

Always hiding it well, quick to put a smile on,

I’m just fine, really, just breathe, I’m okay.

I smiled, I laughed, life was perfectly concealed.

Blossoms appeared and fell from the trees,

It rains petals; I feel the breeze and looked to the sky in awe,

Just me in my sunflower dress, oblivious to veracity.

My life spent running around,

The sunflower dress remaining merely in a photo.

I reach towards the sky as I experience life,

Far from naïve to the truth of existence.

Pain

Your breathing stops, the silence encompasses you. Your body and mind feel numb; they have for days, but even more so in this moment. You dash towards her room, incapable of thinking a single thought, for there is too much to think about. The smell of a sterile atmosphere and latex gloves, one that has become eerily comfortable, surrounds you. Your hands tremble and your face is blank.

You stop suddenly as you reach her room; you step inside for a moment and realize a mistake was made on your part. She’s gone, she’s taken her last breath and her body lays motionless, breathless, lifeless. You never got to tell her that she was the best mother a daughter could ask for, you never got to say goodbye. You didn’t dare mutter those words before, they were too real, too terrifying. That moment is now lost, never to happen again and you wish you had. You wish you had said all of those things. You step out of the room and watch as part of your family hugs each other, oblivious to your existence. You didn’t know a feud would tear you apart like this; do they even deserve the title of family? You stand there completely silent. Your heart beats fast; your eyes forget how to shed tears and your head pounds. You feel as though you’ve been kicked in the stomach, as though you’re screaming and nobody can hear you and you stand alone, a witness to the scene unfolding in front of you.

          You are speechless. This moment will never be forgotten. This feeling will forever be ingrained into your mind. This hole you sense in your heart, it will never be filled back up again. You close yourself off, not willing to be this close to anyone again. Your pain never relents. The memories and details might fade, but the gaping hole in your heart is forever present, a constant reminder of pain and the loss of a mother. You had no say in this, you constantly ask yourself why it happened, you feel pain everyday and are now stuck with the fact of life.

So was I.

Risks

as i look around i see many people. i see people laughing. father and son throw lacrosse balls back and forth, mothers walk with their baby in their arms. i see a father helping his daughter to ride her tricycle, even though she continually veers left into the grass. she falls over on her third venture into the grassy abyss and her father rushes to her side and picks her up and stops her tears. friends are out telling stories and sharing laughter. a little girl and her parents walked by and the girl greeted me and proceeded to ask me how i was doing. a couple sits on a bench and they're all smiles. as the breeze drifts through the trees, the leaves fall and it also leaves goosebumps on my skin.
things like this make me smile.
they just simply make me happy, maybe for a brief moment, but watching others experience happiness and love is awesome.

 happiness can come in so many different forms: spending time with God and worshiping Him, driving down the road with the windows rolled down, feeling the breeze mess up your hair and the music matching the way you feel perfectly, winning trivial pursuit and having bragging rights for the night, watching your favorite football team with your best friends, the moment when you realize just how important your family is and falling in love when you least expect to.

 but the sun makes it's descent and hides behind the horizon and reminds me that with this happiness comes sadness. 

feelings completely lost and confused and struggling with your relationship with God and putting up a wall, making it hard for anyone to get to know you.
getting into a car crash, never wanting to drive again.
not knowing a single trivial fact and miserably losing the game, feeling completely stupid
the feeling after the end of the 4th quarter when the team you had been rooting for loses the game because an interception in the last minute
losing your mom to cancer and the world suddenly stops and everyone else around you is continuing with their lives and you're screaming, but not a single person can hear you. 
having loved someone and then it's gone, leaving you with a huge gaping hole, making it hard to trust again. 

 but trying to avoid the sadness is missing out on the happiness. you lose, the lessons are never learned. getting close to someone is fully setting yourself up to fall, but trusting them to not let you fall or catch you when you do is how it should be.

although you risk sadness, without taking the chance, without that leap of faith, you would have never have found some of the greatest happinesses in the world. life has it's ups and downs. it is not fair.

but don't let the fear of crashing keep you from driving.

the fear of feeling stupid keep you from trying

the fear of losing from playing

the fear of death from creating life

and don't let the fear of being alone keep you from loving. 

there are so many things to learn.

what's the point of life if you're too scared to live it?

I Am a Daughter and I Have Seen Weak Hands

I am a daughter and I have seen weak hands, two of them. 
Shaking as the news was delivered in the living room, 
Happy yellow walls surrounding us in December of 2001 
Gesturing as my mother tried to beat around the bush, avoiding the inevitable 
And they held tissues, and reports, our hands and their own. 
And they wiped tears, held hugs, ran through my brown curly hair and gently seized my crying 
And they were idle as my mother’s eyes witnessed needles and medicine and blood counts and pain killers and stitches and new scars, all for the first time 
And they cooked up recipes at new years, Christmas, Thanksgiving (with the classic sweet potato soufflé), Easter. 
And they ran through light brown locks, fistfuls of hair in both hands. 

I am a daughter and I have seen weak hands, two of them 
They were tired and awkward but loving and gentle 
And they kept finding more lumps, bumps, knots, tumors 
That temporarily went away because of chemo and radiation and surgery and medicines and sometimes it worked 
Occasionally, we thought it was gone for good. 
But they attempted to be strong 
They threw basketballs and softballs and held a cheerleading coach’s clipboard, reaching out to every person that they could impact. 
But they grew nervous and sweaty, and fiddled and fidgeted on the Monday after the doctors awaiting the results. 

I am a daughter and I have seen weak hands, two of them 
Throwing a line with bait out into the lake, waiting until dusk to get the large bass 
Grasping the sides of the canoe clumsily as her eyes watched her husband laugh a little as they hit a petite wave. 
But the weak hands grew weaker and held cold metal bars during MRI’s, and cat scans, and brain scans. 
And they were motionless in shock as the doctor said there would be no more chemo, for it wasn’t making a difference. 
And they were strong as the news was delivered in the den, soothing green walls surrounding us in September of 2009. 
And they were loving and calming as she wiped the tears of her daughters, her mother and her sister away from their cheeks. 
And they felt numb and weak and tingly and unfamiliar as the pain medication took over. 
And they held hands, hugs, teddy bears and blankets in the new room 
Surrounded by familiar faces that loved her so 
But time passed and they were asleep, only voices murmuring in her head 
And then they reached for loving ones so desperately 
And then they fell cold. 

I am a daughter and I have seen weak hands, strong and loving, never relenting on what they care about. 
And some day-and it is only this which sustains me 
Someday we will meet again free of pain and sorrow 
On some beautiful day where I can run into the arms of my loving mother 
I am a daughter and I have seen weak hands turn into strong, my own. 
This, I took after my mother.