In Your hands, or: Out of mine

Poetry Partners #57

‘In Your Hands’, a poem by Naa Lamiorkor Boye of ‘GemsFromASapphire’

They say sticks and stones break bones
But it felt like every single one of the 206 bones in my body shattered when you abandoned me.
I wasn't just hurt.
I experienced the kind of pain that grips your heart like a boa constrictor,
Pushing against your ribs and causing them to snap into fragments that pierce your lungs,
Preventing you from taking a single breath without sobbing.
I gave you my life.
My baby days, youthful weeks and adult years.
I gifted you my voice.
Even as I screamed over and over again.
They say pain comes before pleasure
But you pleasured me into thinking the pain wasn't there.
I handed you my emotions.
Every laughter and tear,
Anger and fear was yours.
I couldn't even sigh without worrying whether you were happy.
I treated you to my innocence.
My purity and pride were all I could boast of yet you convinced me to dish them out on silvered plates of sin.
I placed a tall glass filled with my destiny in your hands, served in your favourite way;
Ice-cold like your frozen heart.
Only for you to feast and have your fill of what was rightfully mine.
You seized and drained me, down to the final, solitary drop which you licked up gleefully.
Stiff as a board, light as a feather,
I float up into the air, painlessly suffering.
Is that a light I see or a reflection of the shiny, empty husk I call my soul?
They say, they say.
But what they say may be as far from the truth as night and day.
Whether the light is the brightness of Heaven, or the fiery pits of Hell,
I can only pray that:
'Lord, into your hands do I commit my spirit.'

• Naa Lamiorkor Boye: https://gemsfromasapphire.wordpress.com/

A haibun by ben Alexander of ‘The Skeptic’s Kaddish’

There is so much suffering that I have never personally experienced. Actually, I’ve experienced almost none at all.

I’ve never been physically or emotionally abused. I’ve never been raped. I’ve never starved. I’ve never had cancer or some other terrible disease. On the whole, my life has been blessed in all the most fundamental ways.

There are times, like now, when I only feel qualified to listen to another’s words – but not qualified to respond her in any way other than to say, “I hear you.”

in winter downpour
wet cats seek shelter; shiver
uncontrollably

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Let’s write poetry together!

When it comes to partnership, some humans can make their lives alone – it’s possible. But creatively, it’s more like painting: you can’t just use the same colours in every painting. It’s just not an option. You can’t take the same photograph every time and live with art forms with no differences.

–Ben Harper (b. 1969)

Would you like to create poetry with me and have a completed poem of yours featured here at the Skeptic’s Kaddish? I am very excited to have launched the ‘Poetry Partners’ initiative and am looking forward to meeting and creating with you… Check it out!

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List of Poetry Partners