Category: Poetry

she breaks apart in washes
under the weight of now
whispering to the songs of taize
leaning-velvet firmly in life’s vows.
CKS

Part of the season of today is being co-pilot in caretaking my parents. I find it fascinating what surfaces in this process. Emotions long thought gone, memories believed gone in the winds of time.

It is both exhausting and a gift simultaneously.

and life does not stop. I certainly cannot put the illness I live with on hold and ask it to come back another day. lol That never happens anyway; wouldn’t that be nice. Ask to be more convenient please?

Not gonna happen. and here I am today, in a flare of my illness. It is not a bad one. Not like in the past before I was on a preventative medicine where I would be hospitalized and things were very scary.

I went to outpatient infusion to receive 5 days of IV Steroids. and am now on an oral taper to step down your body from the steroids.

And how does this all relate? How does it relate to the topic of forgiveness?

With my family, I am meeting some feelings, some not ever felt, and with my copilot, I am learning I was never alone. I am sorry we both went through what we went through. The openness with which I can speak with frankness is comforting.

And within certain experiences now, I feel compassion, I feel thankful for this season I have with my parents. It is bringing me to another level of forgiveness, a rich and reality based forgiveness. I do not really have the words I am searching for but maybe you can get the idea.

The other end is related to self forgiveness and compassion. I often feel guilty for my illness. Not because anyone is trying to impose that, quite the opposite. I have such a supportive community and family and friends.

No, I do it to myself. and when my illness decides to flare, I feel guilty, and I worry about others worrying, and I begin to mentally go down some rabbit hole of “make sure this” or “make sure that” so nobody worries or is scared or now has extra hardship. Better get better and fast. You know, the absolute crap in the head kind of trash talk about oneself.

So, I step back. my meditation has been reflective in this idea of self forgiveness. My illness is a reality and it is ever present. I do not need to feel guilty. I do not need to trash talk myself inside.

I can ask and accept the extra help I need. It is hard sometimes. Part of that is just the loss of independence in the traditional since, but with that extra help, I am able to do things, to get out of bed, to get ready, to go to the park, to run errands, to go to the studio all kinds of things.

Yes, it is loss, and that is a reality, and it is not endless, and the richness of accepting help. The intimacy I get to know and grow in deep friendship, I would not have such this experience but for needing this extra help.

I meditate with what independence really means, and does it matter. Is it really just part of the illusion of wanting to do things perfectly so I can prove worth to be here and take up space.

Yesterday was quite the day. It was my birthday, and I don’t usually celebrate my birthdays much; its a long story for another time maybe.

I had a morning to lunchtime people who came over. I am working on recovering from this flare of the NMO. but very special people came. brought decorations and hung them and we wore silly glasses and party time headbands. They brought me a coffee, and flowers and presents! For those who know me it is difficult for me to do this. and to accept things like this.

It was so much fun! by the lunchtime ish I was spent. and people left and I slept and rested the rest of the day, also getting to spend some time on the phone with people I love.

It was a special day. I had so much fun laughing with these friends, my family. Bright, colorful, and smiley. the deep smile, soul-hugging kind of smile.

And I hang on to that, because I am taught to let go. to enjoy the moment as it is. And isn’t that at least part of self forgiveness, forgiveness? to be present in the moment as it is, without judgment; just being; resting in such being?

I will keep meditating. There is no one answer. And the mind, body, and soul, can answer for themselves.

paint, much love, always,
Connie Karleta Sales
a.k.a. This Crooked Little Flower

We are raw exposed
protection armor melting

to feel safe;
to feel validated;
to be able to choose enough vulnerability
not only to allow someone to fully see my pain,
also to reach out and ask for help.

Then there is the vulnerability unasked for.
Unwanted. Forced.
Leaving me feeling exposed, naked, and in terror.
Someone satiating themselves with my body.

What is it about physical pain today that leads me back in memory, in these waves of past, forced, exposed, unasked for vulnerability. And I just want to run hiding.

I stay though, because I know I am safe. I know I have learned the difference between what is forced upon me, and what I get to choose.

I know what is safe and unsafe.
I learned true intimacy.
It is beautiful and warm and I get to live it every day.
I get to choose it everyday.

Instead of desperately trying to cover myself up, I leave myself with my hand stretch out and my voice speaking in the words of “I am in pain, please help.”

It is f$%king scary. It is not the terror though of the past.

This is where this painting is birthed.
Her eyes staring out, steely and soft, and looking directly out.
Mask of hiding and covering up falling off through her words.
She sits insecure and open.

Choosing to be scared, and vulnerable at the same time.
She is tough and finding her way through.

This is what pain had to say today.
This is the Story Within Her.

paint much love, always,
Connie Karleta Sales
a.k.a. This Crooked Little Flower

I touch against no wall, she said.
Holdfast to the light,
sweeping as a
moment present.
CKS

I have started a new series called Stories Within Her. I do not know where the series will travel, evolve, end, or not end.

It is about the blending of the Now and the Then. I am curiously fascinated at how dealing with the severe physical pain of today, can bring me back to both physical and emotional pain of past experience.

I am sitting with that; meditating, praying, conversing with pain.

It is not the same. Certainly not the past. Where as once I created coping skills of self-destruction, now, I sit with the neutrality of joy. light.

Here this figure is; holding fast; and experiencing peace simultaneously.

This painting went through a lot. From 2 figures, to a portrait, to this single figure swept in light.

Her head is upright, bathing, seeking, looking, listening. She needed a moment to herself, away from yet deeply in.

Breathing. What did pain have to tell me this day? She told me to maintain that firm grip on seeking solution; also let go in the stillness of nothingness. Quiet can quiet pain. Let her soak and wash within the light.

paint much love, always,
Connie Karleta Sales
a.k.a. This Crooked Little Flower

Am I flying?
She asked.

Stillness within the hours,
Next into next,
They can move as slowly as
A trudge through sticky mud.

Buried in her arms
Of silk-numb
Weakness,
Spikes and needles
Rain down her body.

The minutes
of the clock-glow
Can’t tick fast enough.

Her pain dripping
like water-cascades
of light and thunder.

through blurred-heavy eyes
Falling into her dreams
Of flight and dance

Residing there in
Unconscious darkness

Until the eyes of the
Wide open dawn
Call back

My neck craned back across my pillow
My eyes closed
My prayer is my cringe of
“please! Let this end!

I am in pain!”
–feeling the sick in it’s relentlessness.

So, I fly
into the nothingness being
of meditation
— and prayer.

I fly into becoming
stretching through
the hardness of my muscles
washing through the fire of my nerves.

I become,
the fire.
I become
the hardness.
using it
harnessing
crying
writhing
growing —

and dawn appears.
a moment of dread and hope
sigh and surrender.

I become
I become
I become!

energy of sun
surrounding me
above, below,
by my side.

I become —
not alone;
in flight.
CKS

paint much love,
always,
Connie Karleta Sales
a.k.a. This Crooked Little Flower