Art Heals a Broken Heart (#3)

Art always heals a broken heart. It doesn't take the pain away, but in the words of some great musician, "at least you get a good song out of it." I remember after a college girlfriend dumped me, I went out in the woods and played the sax - the vibrations carried my feelings of longing out to all the trees and birds. In a way, this was more beautiful than anything I was able to express in the relationship.

Every time my heart is broken, it spills out love. No destination, no recipient. Sometimes it reaches out to friends; sometimes it becomes a beautiful melody or a poem. I think heartbreak is our most profound emotion as human beings - everyone from Shakespeare to the Beatles wrote about it.

Time heals all, they say. Today it's been four months, and lately I've been feeling like I'm almost over it. One thing that helped me was finding this poem this week. It's from March 2004, when I watched a deep love melt away with the spring snow. It reminded me that I've been through this a few times before.

Tail End of Winter

Tail end of winter
sun baking away the last
patches of snow,
the yellow, mangled grass
still lying twisted, numb, lifeless.
Tail end of winter,
snow disappearing,
but I am still flat and frozen.

Tail end of winter,
and I remember that first fluffy white...
You reached out your window
to touch it, scoop it up,
stuff it down my shirt
shrieking, tackling,
melting into wrestling and kissing.

That powder had come too soon.
Not winter yet...
But we were warm
in that pinewood bed I'd helped you build
last summer.

Now that powder is ice,
hardened
from repeated warming and freezing.

It's not that we could read each other's minds,
but deep in your belly you felt my need,
and your sharp jabs of fear jarred me.
We always knew.
Even before I called you that night, I knew.
A cold blackness ate away my guts.
I called Granny right then to tell her
of the death I would hear later that night
lurking in your sweet words.

Tail end of winter -
In a week or two, the sun and rain
will nurse back the suffering grass.
Maybe the robins
will stand in the bare branches
whistling that song
to lift me from my stupor.

Tail end of winter.
I thought the snow was over -
But through a blinding storm of slippery white
I survive the trip home
to be jolted by your name in my mailbox.
I am too weak tonight -
exhausted, hungry, chilled to the bone.

But the next day...
Flakes still flutter down mostly alone.
My breath slows,
my hand almost steady as I tear in.
Your narrow black line on the page
lifts and falls.

Tail end of winter,
tail end of everything together.
Tail end of those conversations,
those memories,
tail end of the warm glow
when we held each other.
Tail end of the unknown future -
of those dreams of sharing dishes,
daughters and sons,
doctoral dissertations.

Now the sun melts it all,
the snow, dirt and sand
running together.
Sterile, frozen blocks of mud
becoming pungent squish
smelling of life.

The rain came last night.
Not enough.
Just a light pattering on the roof.
When the thunderstorm comes,
I'll run outside
to be washed
by those heavy drops.

For me, the deep medicine is in the last stanza. I'll run outside to be washed by those heavy drops. I intentionally used nature as a metaphor for my inner process, and the thunderstorm is the cleanse I so desperately wanted.

I still remember "that night" when I called. Wednesday, January 14, 2004. At about 3:00 pm, I was walking between buildings at work and got a huge intuitive hit that she was going to leave me. I had to sit on a rock for a moment to regain my equilibrium. At that moment (I found out later), she had a moment of panic while in the shower, and made her decision. I was never to see her again. My guts knew before I even talked to her.

I'll remember January 10, 2009 as well. I didn't write any poems this time, but maybe I didn't need to. Or maybe I haven't gotten around to it yet. So I will write one now:

Finishing

I step into my office
to find my canning jar
and my necklace inside the jar
and on the lid a yellow Post-It
that reads "Aaron" -

Your handwriting.
That same little optimistic lift off the final "n"
which always made me happy before

You've given back the last things
I left at your apartment,
as if to say
all small details are back in place,
all the books balanced
down to the penny.

We both know
only a few weeks ago,
there were no balance sheets.
We shrugged off huge sums, and
I would have given away
most of what I owned
for a life with you.

But now,
now it comes down to
a jar with a yellow note
that says "Aaron" in that familiar script
which no longer comforts me.

I wonder about
all the deep things
we'll never give back.

Well, it's not quite the release I got from the 2004 poem, but not bad for a 30 minute "Rough Sketch." Today it's been four months, and all I can do is be patient with myself and wait for the river's slow current to carry me around the next bend.