dedicated today to all of us who are learning and re-learning self-care….
love song for my organs
(by ire’ne lara silva)
.
this is a song i didn’t know
needed singing needed singing
.
a song for each morning
a song for each night
.
offered with awareness
offered with gratitude
.
decades have passed i did not
know your colors your shapes
.
the work you do have done
or what you needed from me
.
now i know this song needs singing
i will sing it everywhere i go
.
i name you now breathe softly
upon you hold you tenderly within
.
kidneys
.
you are not forgotten never
you are cherished and i am grateful
.
i bring you rainwater and riverwater
i bring you flowers tiny blue flowers
.
i bring you these my two hands filled
with sun light with starlight
.
i sing you strong sing you whole
and thank you for filtering my blood
.
heart
.
be strong little heart as strong as you
have ever been you are my life
.
when i am still i hear your beating
feel it in my chest hold you close
.
in a dance that will not pause while
we are living i envision the flow of blood
.
flowing to you flowing from you moving easily
moving swiftly through wide open blood vessels
.
pancreas
.
you have been sleeping little warrior
it is time to wake time to speak again
.
i will bring you morning serenades
cascading flower petals and trilling birdsong
.
you fought the rising glucose hordes fought
until you were spent until you could not go on
.
years now i have lived on foreign insulin
always approximate subject to wild swings
.
of not enough too much almost in time
i long for your fine tuned calibration
.
i see you rising i hear you murmuring
words spoken at dawn i greet you
.
liver
.
lean i dream you lean see you lean and dark
brow furrowed ferociously inspired sculptor
.
ferociously creating ferociously shaping each
work of art as if it were the first time the only time
.
as if you were recreating the ocean the stars every minute
you are not a factory not an assembly line
.
i bring you milk thistle i bring you flax seed in thanks
you are re-creating my life your art is my life
.
nerves
.
you tell me stories without you there are no stories
without them i would know nothing understand nothing
.
of the world within or the world without
you are the carriers of lightning of moonlight
.
you tell me i am alive you tell me i am safe
because of you the exquisite the tender of my life
.
and also the pain and also the hurt the sharp the ache
but tell me stories i will always be listening
.
skin
.
hot breath tender touch running bare-fleshed in the rain
the warmth of the sun the chill of winter days the wind
.
my boundaries my beginnings my endings my whole
life the whole world written on my skin my skin sings
.
i will bring you gifts in thanks jojoba aloe avocado sweet
almond oil cocoa butter calendula shea butter and lanolin
.
eyes
.
for me everything begins with you I could spend days staring
at the sky day or night or morning or fog or thunderstorm
.
so much sweetness in looking at green leaves bright colors
loved faces blossoms rivers rainfall sunshine long roads
.
in my memories everything begins with what you’ve given me
i remember my life in a million images you brought me
.
and all the words of my life all the books of my life
for all the flames and the moonlight all my gratitude
.
gratitude
.
kidneys.…heart….pancreas….nerves
liver….skin….eyes….all my body
.
please forgive any harm
i have caused you
.
thank you for this day for
every day you have given me
.
now i know this song needs singing
i will sing it everywhere i go
.
i name you now breathe softly
upon you hold you tenderly within
Beautiful ode to your organs, to life itself.
ire’ne,
Your poem is so beautiful and piercing in it’s truth. Thank you for sharing it.
Gloria >