An Antidote to Shame

This is a love poem to a way of witnessing that is an antidote to shame.

You come like a quenching rain 

on ground so dry its brittleness is a harsh bark, 

a ragged ache, 

an ugly wrenching.

You come from beyond time, 

from the place before the pain gripped 

and cut across the expanse of life, 

as though it were there right from the very beginning, 

crippling, 

all there ever was.

You come like generosity at last,

like tenderness and permission 

and a leaning in, 

towards what is small 

and screaming inside.

You come like a thousand arms hugging 

the split off atrocities 

I house in my bones and in my blood.

They all sing now in the warmth of this regard,

their unsung songs of forgotten power 

and formidable beauty.

I tremble and quake in the strength of them

stretching inside of me.

The fullness of me, 

awkward and teetering on the edge 

of a deeper wholeness 

than I had known was possible before. 

What will I do now, with all this budding grist?

How will I move now, that I am walking closer to myself?

You come like a mirror of care, 

teaching me to expand and to receive 

that which shame made small and forbidden.

You come like a dark matter of love

filling all the spaces between 

the obtuse injuries.

Healing scar tissue, 

recalibrating cellular potential, 

to an orientation of fiercely embedded belonging. 

Interiority blooms in the wake of this witness.

My voice resounds inside now

with the intonation of this teaching,

of this gracious humour of cherishing,

this profundity of kindness.

Thank you

Thank you

Thank you 

Deepest gratitude to David Bedrick’s profound work on Unshaming. 🌿🙏🏼🌿