Not Done Mourning

A series of paintings and stream-of-consciousness poems reflecting on surviving sexual violence and the long term relationship with grief that comes in the aftermath of this trauma.

 FOR SO LONG

For the time I spent

unable to mention it

even to myself

even to an empty journal

even to a silent bedroom

Lips sewn shut at the hand of the shame

the wound only festered.

Continued to poison me with a fear

I could not explain.

I am an expert at forgetting.

at suppressing.

at pushing forward.

A master of moving on.

Some call this strength,

but I’ve just now been introduced to this as trauma.

I wish I could tell you

that on the day I first spoke my truth into reality,

a miraculous light brought me to a new world of healing and peace.

But this too, would be a lie.

For now healing is a far off promised land and I’m convinced

it might not be real

each time I read about another girl

robbed of what is fundamentally her own.

For now, peace is a make-believe game.

But I am in charge.

And this time, the world can know

that each piece of debris

I clear from the rubble,

is a piece of pain I once built a home in.

And my voice

has finally

blasted it

to bits.

 R E L E A S E  

I learned this healing

has nothing to do with him.

It cannot be solved by any amount of hatred.

It cannot be concluded by any act of revenge or anger.

It will not go away without solving things for myself, by myself.

To find peace,  

with what is left.

Which is me.

And then I will be free.