Hope

I hope the way I love.
There is nothing passive or bloodless
in how I express both.

Maybe it comes
from living too deeply, too long,
in stories where someone said,

“This could— 
  should 
  be better.”

When my throat is choked,
from sobbing or screaming,
hope is the thing
that makes me gulp

just one more clean breath
and gives me strength to crawl
towards better
“what if’s”.


Liner Notes for This Groove: This poem is linked to Poets and Storytellers United's Friday Writings.

22 comments:

  1. Thank goodness it was the thing retained in Pandora's Box.

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    1. Thank goodness indeed. It's the seed for something better to be possible, if we choose to build on it.

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  2. I think we're going to need all the hope and determination we can get, as we go along in this Kali Yuga. (Look it up! I'm not a Hindu nor a Krishna devotee, but it does seem to fit.)

    I don't think there is anything passive or bloodless about you altogether – I'm very glad to say!

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    1. In some of the witchy circles I travel in, they are calling this Tower Time (after the Tower card in the tarot). It's hard to disagree with that assessment. But after the Tower comes The Star, and if there is a strong enough will to live up to the Star's promise, something stronger can come out of it.

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  3. Hope and love are not hope and love if there isn't the passion and want. So right you are.

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    1. Absolutely! They seem to be key components, at least to me.

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  4. As long as there is breath, there is hope, despite a world where so many of us live passively rather than passionately.

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    1. The passiveness is a bit of a mystery to me, because there are always opportunities to choose some sort of action. Hopelessness is characterized by inaction, so since hope is its opposite how could it not be moved to act?

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  5. There are many what-ifs worth striving for. May your crawling toward even one of them be rewarded with success!

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    1. I have a few really promising ones...thanks for the well wishes!

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  6. Hope is, indeed, a breath of fresh air. I think that few things do better at keeping us going than the self knowledge that things could be better. Hoping like we love sounds like a very good thing to me.

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    1. That knowledge has been the fuel for a lot of fires, personally speaking.

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  7. it's okay if you ask yourself 'what if', because you know yourself better (at least most of the time).

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    1. Being honest with oneself is sometimes a bit of a trick, but I've gotten to the point where I realize lying to myself never solved anything either (and usually made things worse).

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  8. Another heartfelt and powerful poem, Rommy. Hope is much needed these days.

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    1. Thanks, Khaya. I definitely agree. Without the fuel that hope provides I cannot see things getting better. We have to have hope that some good is still possible before we can perform the actions to make it so. Hope isn't airy-fairy. Done right, it's a foundation.

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  9. I use the "If" as a self examination tool. Too frequently, I confess.

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    1. Ah, but a lot of people don't bother with self-examination, so you are a step ahead of the game!

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  10. I would like to be better at hope! Beautiful poem!

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  11. In my "stuck" time of living, this gives hope. Thanks, Rommy.

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