Loss and Gain: What You Are Missing Now & How Writing About It Helps

On this day, Good Friday, I have few words, and I almost wondered if I would have anything to share with you here. In the space of waiting for the good I know is coming (and the good already here), I am grateful for His peace that settles upon me and in me. My heart is quieted. I am not in a state of disturbance or irritation. I am not fearful or worried. My heart aches for the world--and I pray, asking how He wants me to respond.

This dialogue with God unfolds throughout these days, and I know immediately whether or not I am keeping my eyes focused on God. Writing what I think and feel is heightening my awareness of my heart. I process, in paragraphs and poems, the loss and gain of this strange time, due to COVID-19: social distancing from people we love; feeling financial strain; choosing to surrender, over and over, what we cannot control.

Will you consider with me this week what you feel you have lost (emotionally, relationally, financially, physically) and/or what you feel you have gained? What has been hard? What are you learning? What is surprising for you? What is disappointing or difficult to bear? What are you surrendering? What are you picking up?

As you write, don't worry about having answers to your questions. Write the questions. Write the observations. Write the moments that have stretched you. Write the emotions that describe the status of your heart.

Below is one of the poems I wrote this week that has helped me surrender the weight of what I have been feeling.

The Good Mad Kind

What do you do upon waking

and realize the whole world has gone mad?

You wonder if you misread the signs—

one moment after another pressing in too close

so there is little space

that deep exhale

between one interaction and another:

mind and heart colliding

with a silent crash where

injuries are the invisible kind

until they are not,

manifesting in noise unnatural

the roar of machines and arguments to

improve/advance

bob/weave

push/prove

until the best parts of us

the desire for all things

beautiful and good

stays hidden and must pause.

Consider the possibility of finding

these things within us all along.

Can we bear it? The stopping

to see it,

the magnificence of light

on your face,

the fresh air after rain,

the song of your voice

in the silence crying, crying out

in wonder at being loved

without doing a thing to prove

we are worth being here?

Please join in (in the comments below) and share your experience of writing recently—whether your writing has been in the form of a poem or in a paragraph(s) of thoughts. We would love to learn from you and connect with you here. Another place to connect is in the private Facebook page for Loop Poetry Project. Click right here to join the sweet community there.

Bless you, this Good Friday, dear friends,

Jennifer