You wake up in pain, again.
That thoracic disc twisting in on itself
like a corkscrew unable
to spiral back out of the pulp.
It’s work make-believing
your way through the long week,
bearing someone else’s dreams
on your employed shoulders.
You do it though. You carry on.
Live up to others’ expectations.
The proof of your worth reliant
on anyone’s truth but your own.
Lie down and rest? Breathe like a baby?
Feel what’s alive and surrender?
Not on your life. Your anthem
of suffering is a badge of honor.
Friend, you can’t even sing the blues.
Your loyalty to pain locked up
behind the bars of your rib cage.
How long can you hold that note?
15 thoughts on “Song of the Body”
You bring tears, Susan Frances! I was young with you. I was in school with you. Did I ever appreciate the wonder that you are? All my lovin’, Terry
BEAUTY FROM THE HEART, MIND, BODY AND SOUL. LOVE it Susan ❣️
Thank you, dear Judie.
You are a master of words and, more importantly, a person of empathy.
Years ago, during a writing workshop discussion, you added to someone’s comment: “pain is beautiful.” This was such a tender expression of validation, and this tenderness in your words has stayed with me in my writing and, I hope, in my relationships with others. And now again, in this poem, you are reminding me of your comment while tenderly validating another. Thank you.
My gratitude and admiration are deeper than the drifts that surround this house and my heart.
oh this poem. thank you, Susan–
Susan, this is beautiful and achingly moving. Thank you for sharing this, and thank you forever for your healing hands and heart and spirit.
A brilliant and generous poem of the body–thank you, Susan.
Oh how true
Beautiful and truly inspiring. Thank you.
Insightful. Pulsating. Honest. Grateful for the message.
Reading this as my right hip pulsates with a rhythm all its own. Years of pain disguised as numbness produces a sciatic scream no one else can hear. Susans gifts are not of this world. Homegrown, yes. Earthbound… no way. Brilliant poem. Thank you Susan.
Susan is the voice that encourages others to contemplate long embedded trauma or stuck energy. I have been the recipient of her skill and compassion. In addition to her incredible abilities as a somatic therapist, Susan brings her work to life through her reflective and penetrating poetry.
BEAUTY from the BODY, HEART, MIND AND SOUL. LOVE IT SUSAN ❣️