Here Is My Despair

“Dear friends, here is my pain, here is my sorrow, here is my despair.”
Thich Nhat Hanh

Here Is My Despair

I have told my friends I write a blog,

chronicling my despair and my sorrow.

I said I write to cope, but I did not say why,

some six years after her death, I now start

each day with tears and a poem, why,

when at last my life is sweet, I revisit pain.

I have told one friend (in truth, she is paid to listen)

that when my daughter died, I left my husband 

two days later. Friends sheltered me until 

I bought a house of my own which I said

would allow me to heal, but I spent those years

alone feeling only anger and avoiding my grief.

Now I am determined to face it. I will feel better

when I complete this poem, but I will likely not ask any friend to join me in mindful awareness. I will instead eat more than I should and shop when I need nothing because those are now my habits of despair. Tomorrow,

I walk with friends in a park having a bench

that memorializes her. Tomorrow, when we pass,

I shall say, "Dear friends, here is my pain,

here is my sorrow. Carry it with me."

There are times when suffering is so great

it needs more than one person to hold it.