This poem wrote itself over a decade ago, after a particularly “full” therapy workday, where my heart broke for a client with a very high trauma load. Words were used like a battering ram to defend against sitting still with pain and meaning. Beside a swelling heart, I had intrusive images of her as a child, desperate for her own attention. I also simply adored her in all her defences and wished she could offer herself this love that I felt for her.
Ricochet
Your words
Tumble out of your mouth
With a ricochet
Whilst all the time
You try so hard
Not to stay
With the painful moment.
We circle each other a while.
Wild gesticulations,
Eyes everywhere
But meeting mine.
Your words
And a land slide of story,
The tools you use to push past
The open heart,
To all I know
Underneath them
That is gory,
And abandoned,
And utterly sad.
“Shhh, little girl”
I want to say.
Though in years
You have advance on me.
But perhaps it was easier for me
To shed those tears
My own wounding made.
“Look, sweetheart!”
I want to say.
“There is a little girl
Stuck on a harsh rock, crying.
She needs you to take care of her.
She needs you to be still.
She needs you to rock her gently,
Back to loving herself.”
And I know you will.
When the standoff
With frightened wild horse-words has bolted,
Run out of steam,
And come back through the open gate.
When you can both invite and respond to yourself.
And when you can trust
That I really do love the little girl I see in you.
In our presentation of the poem, we deliberately wanted to stress the words to underline the meaning and reflect the verbal stream in the “Audio-scape”. Dave McKeown has built sounds using a wide range of things found around the house, including spinning coins, singing bowls and even a cigarette lighter. The images have been created and chosen with great care. It may not be comfortable viewing, but I think it reflects something of what it is like to invite someone to sit with their pain and slow down, whilst holding a loving space for them.
Sometimes, Trauma... 