2004-01-16 - 8:57 p.m.

And a woman spoke, saying, "Tell us of Pain."

And he said:

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.

Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain.

And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life, your pain would not seem less wondrous than your joy;

And you would accept the seasons of your heart, even as you have always accepted the seasons that pass over your fields.

And you would watch with serenity through the winters of your grief.

Much of your pain is self-chosen.

It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self.

Therefore trust the physician, and drink his remedy in silence and tranquillity:

For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by the tender hand of the Unseen,

And the cup he brings, though it burn your lips, has been fashioned of the clay which the Potter has moistened with His own sacred tears.

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and so tonight I know pain, and if I were disciplined I'd sit and watch it move inside me and discover more about myself, but i do not wish for discipline tonight, I wish to linger in this pain, soak in it, rot in it...let it consume. I don't want to be strong in my pain tonight. I don't want to close my eyes and see the children I once knew as almost my own, the life I lived oblivious and happy.

Why after 4 years do you come back to take more from me? Did you not take enough when your sceming further eroded my trust in all people and tore two precious children from my arms?

All these things I'd locked away in their safe little compartment, safely stowed in the past and you have to come back and take more and unlock the chest of long ago memories so that I might shed more tears for them?

The Wise One says let anger take you here, do not allow yourself to dwell in grief and sorrow but embrace the strength of your anger and rebel against the memories that threaten your tranquility. I am not a creature of anger....it is fleeting only within me. What lies within is a soft and tender child who cannot stop the hurt tonight.