Day 26 - Mariner Janes

poem of peace
 
 
“It's so hard to forget pain, but it's even harder to remember sweetness. We have no scar to show for happiness. We learn so little from peace.”
― Chuck Palahniuk, Diary
 
 
i look at my wrist

with the long perpendicular scar

it seems like a suicide attempt

but was really from childhood at play with friends

the glass window gave way

and i stood astonished in the kitchen

watching the blood flow from my arm

thinking oh no i’ve really ruined this birthday party

and years later

wondering on the collision of blood and joy

and all the times in my life they’ve met

the birth of my children

my daughter laughing in the bathroom over her nosebleed

the skinned knee of playground glee

the period that finally arrives

and etch into my mind a little memento mori

not of fear or of terror

but to remind me

that joy deserves a good scar

that must be written instead on the brain

and to perceive and receive the pain of others

with gratitude and warmth

as much as the joy

to find the peace in a moment

in a cloudless sky

in a blank, open page

in the thunderous silence of the forest

in the graffiti in the alley that reads

ALLIE I LOVE YOU CALL ME COME FIND ME

in the absence of a photograph of a breeze that cut just right when it was so hot i talk to my children of peace and understanding

and look in their eyes and at their hands

i text my dead father with regularity

asking questions on the world i don’t understand

i look to the future with open eyes clouded with age

and ask my children to carry on
​
for me and for us

Mariner Janes, Vancouver, BC