“I do not ask the wounded person how he feels, I myself become the wounded person.”
― Walt Whitman, Song of Myself
I heard your pain
not a sob, not a scream
but a throbbing stomach clenching ball
It hurt yet I knew that to remove it
would be selfish
It would be to remove something from the
very heart of you
so I sat there
feeling it with you
Offering the solace
that you were not alone…
When I see someone hurting, the strongest temptation is to do something, anything that will take away their pain. In sympathy, it is so easy to say to someone “It’s alright and try to make it better somehow. That may work for pain that is merely physical but not so much when it comes to wounds of the heart or spirit. Some lessons can only be learned by going through it. It hurts to see someone hurting but can be a very selfish act to try to make them feel better without addressing what has caused the pain in the first place and what lesson they have attracted. Sometimes the best thing we can do instead is to let them know we are there hurting besides them…
Blessings, G
Click on images to see full-sized:
Forest Conquest by G A Rosenberg
Aerial View of a Spinning Peacock by G A Rosenberg
Forest Conquest by G A Rosenberg 