Cloudthings

Mar 02, 2009 ⭐ View statistics (Premium feature)

The freedom still to care for you

Your translation etched on me a very ugly scar

I wish I could dissect from me the places where you are

Everywhere you touched me has a bruise I cannot face

I think I’m free, but when I look, you’re smiling from that place

You just laughed when I enquired, I’d forgiven such a lot,

You felt you were justified, now this is all we've got

I should have laughed

I should have screamed

I should have turned and fled

I guess I needed that to free me from the place I was misled

Ridiculous, those stories that you hadn’t time to call

How you spent some of that time showed no integrity at all

It’s ok, I need to know, these things you show me now

Remind me where I saw in you a noble man somehow?

Everything communicates, even blatant lack of it

I guess I should be grateful now to see the back of it

But early in the morning, the sunrise kissed my face

Reminding me that being free requires a greater grace

So I offer amnesty, and don't judge what you deserve

What matters here if you come near, my conscience must not swerve

And opened to the possibility that you may be redeemed

My generosity supplied more goodness than it seemed

No one ever really knows inside another heart

My own fault for trusting you right from the very start

In any case, it’s freedom now that I must love the most

The freedom from your cruelty and from your taunting ghost

The freedom to be choosing with another who is true

The freedom to still care for me - and still to care for you

— Cloudthings, Mar 02, 2009

About This Poem

About the Author

Region, Country: Australia, regional Victoria, AUS

Favorite Poets: So many... Rumi, Spike Milligan, Keats. Many of the Neopoet clan, past & present. A myriad of song writers, Dylan, Jackson Browne, Lior, & I must add the poetic influence of painters, sculptors & creators across the world... Life really, especially the sky.

Critiques

Geezer

17 years 3 months ago

freedom to care

you made me remember a used to be friend whom i still think of frequently and wish that he would see the error of his ways. i know that there is a good person under all the things that have come between us. one line of your poem stumbles just a little and i think that "then confessing how you helped her write that thing, i am appalled." could be improved by adding the word "really" so that it reads "i really am appalled" no insult intended,but use your spell-check. you write very strongly and i am looking forward to seeing more of your stuff. be my friend? thanks a lot, geezer.

Cloudthings

17 years 3 months ago

Giving up being "right"

Thanks Geezer, appreciate your comments & am not at all insulted about the spellcheck note... I can sometimes just splay on the page, let the stuff spill out, & I have noticed, whatever editing font they use here, I find it harder to pick up typo's, but usually catch them in the preview with the different font... I should compose in word & spellcheck before I paste... But I am a devil for spontaneity & improvisation, I will make more effort. As for the changes, ta. I tried on a few changes including your suggestion: "then confessing how you’d helped her write that thing, I really am appalled" "then confessing how you’d helped her write that thing, I truly am appalled" "then confessing how you’d helped her write that thing, leaving me appalled" in the end I prefer it simple since it was the shock of the discovery (not the action, but the deception) that had me so deeply wounded, it was a slip of a confession, & even my response shocked me, it felt more raw left more simple... but it is an ugly & cumbersome line & I might look at changing it... however it was an ugly & cumbersome experience...? As for your "used to be friend", I am always an advocate for forgiveness & redemption wherever we can manage it. It is often the most difficult thing to do & yet our hearts are drawn to jewels in others, these hearts that pull us to them, it is tricky to know & to discern the worth of another heart, I try to give the benefit of the doubt & perhaps have stepped wrongly into trust more than once, but as I said to Lissamine... "Tis better to have loved & lost than never to have loved" that daggy old addage carries such truth for me, & if there is any truth in the love between you it is (I think) worthy of redemption. What would happen if you contacted your friend & didn't look for an apology? Offering friendship & care & enquiry instead I wonder... I remember the words of a a seminar leader once that will always stay with me ... she was discussing how so many people are so bent on being right that they will sacrifice love to be right, then she said "The hardest thing to do for love is to give up being right... especially when you are". Anni I wish to walk gracefully..... so as not to spill water.

Cloudthings

17 years 3 months ago

Changed a few lines completely - reads & feels better I think

Ta Geezer, I have changed a few things here now, I think it reads better & it certainly feels better... I didn't find any spelling mistakes & so must have missed any you saw, can you pin them for me, I obviously have a blind spot somewhere. Anni "Out beyond the ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I will meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about ideas, language, and even the phrase, "each other" doesn't make any sense."

Barbara Writes

17 years 3 months ago

Freedom

Great concept freedom giving up, giving in. enjoyed the flow and images ~~~~~~~~~ Be whoever you are At all times, and Remember that Because of this, people will Always Respect, and Admire you ©2008Leonard Respectfully Yours, Barbara

Cloudthings

17 years 3 months ago

What lands, butterfly gentle, to our open hands is all we really

Thanks Barbara In the end we must give up everything, all we have is what lands in our open hands, butterfly gentle & light... I am constantly humbled by the answers that arrive thus to my heart. Simple isn't it really, love is only ever true when it is offered up... Any desire, or holding onto it finds it morphed into a lesser sentiment somehow or worse. I am at my best when I remember these things, when I am living them & suddenly I remember these wings are mine as well. Pain still occurs, & longing, but truth can be a soothing stroke even when it severs what we desire. I only wish I would remember this sooner, it is the access out of suffering I think. Anni "Out beyond the ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I will meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about ideas, language, and even the phrase, "each other" doesn't make any sense."

Edevold

17 years 3 months ago

your generosity

"My generosity supplied more goodness than it seemed" Too many men make the mistake of not even being aware of the "goodness" and love energy that can simply be absorbed from a womans feminine presence .

Cloudthings

17 years 3 months ago

Ta for bringing a little faith to the picture

Hmmm just now I might agree with you... but perhaps it's not just men... though right now it feels like that (forgive me), I think it's because they are looking for "oposition", they perceive any discomfort as a conflict, rather than coming to it with care (or dare I say love) & seeing there is just pain that might have been soothed... I DO think women are better at offering generosity, but my perspective is skewed, so I am not certain... All I know is, in this context at least, it seems it wouldn't matter how much humility or forgiveness or courage to take responsibility for one's own actions I (women?) might show, if the other is only looking for what they themselves have to offer (opositional stance) then that's all they will see. It's so sad, too often we pick out of a circumstance the thing we already have an expectation we will find (because of our history), if we gave up our closed down & too often stingy & negative expectations we might see the picture is far more lovely & full of possibility (I KNOW this to be true, have done it myself). So often beauty & love is killed off through this sad insistance on being "right" which shuts down any other possibility. Anyway, ta for your observation, I am glad of the chance to explore it. & it brings me more faith that there ARE men who don't do that. Are you saying you don't? I am assuming that. So great if that's true, & thank you. Anni "Out beyond the ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I will meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about ideas, language, and even the phrase, "each other" doesn't make any sense."