NOEMAYA

Here’s my winning poem at a local poetry contest. So grateful to the organizers and judges to honor me with their choice. This poem is about the transformative power of love and vulnerability, and it is inspired by the ongoing healing love I experience in my relationship with my wife.

The highest mountain, piercing the sky

Loftiest views, yet most naked and dry

Stood high but alone

That was the tale of my throne

Until she showed up, the spirit of water, of life and reflection

In the mirror of her eyes, I saw my beauty and my pride

In the mirror of her heart, I saw fossils and the life that had died

I saw through the cracks, traces of an old life

Arrested developments and abandoned strife

Covered by the cold of snow

Was the aching heart of my darkness

For that’s all I knew

To hide and to spiral into numbness

The cry of an aching heart became louder than the pride of a faking part

She showed me all that I was

And I saw all that I could be

She stayed all the seasons and loved the deepening fissures

Torn out of her own flesh, a threefold gift she gave

“Here are the three Cs so you can see you for yourself,” said she

She gave me curiosity, so that I can be open to the pain of the mountain

She gave me courage, so that I can go to the depths and discover my roots

She gave me compassion, so that I can love what I find

My seasons got worst, and yet she stayed

The wounds in the flesh brought tears and resignation, and yet she stayed

A fire started burning me from the inside

Hellish eruptions into the sky and on the outside

And yet she stayed, withstood all the heat, all the hurt

She didn’t have a body like mine rising to the sky

She had roots of equal magnitude running deep into the ground

Grounded she was, in the mother earth and its abundant love

Her magic that was, abundant love

That’s how she stayed, that’s how she kept shining

Now I am no more just a big rock

Now my aching cracks hold life-giving streams

My skirt is a prairie for the dance of colors

With all the life in me, my love stands higher than my peak

Fire still erupts out of me, and that’s ok!

To stay out of the way is to accept what comes your way, she said that’s the way

No more I desire to be perfect, for now I am whole under love’s sway

Love is a triangle, said she, the three Cs its sides

All that you seek outside, it’s already seeking you from the inside

The lost keys of paradise are to be found in the hell of your darkness

Don’t run after perfection, realize your wholeness

Until she showed up, I didn’t know this is the way:

That when love is, everything is ok!