Category Archives: healing

Choice Point

It is a miracle! The blog “mechanism” allowed me to copy/paste from Word and post this poem! I forgot my past frustration and difficulties and started to put this poem in, then remembered that “It” hadn’t been allowing me to put even one letter from Word into this blog. Oh, do it anyway. Then!! Amazing!! It worked!!

Which means that I can again—easily—share my work on this blog. That light you see is the big smile on my face. As if the Universe is again aligned on my behalf. Silly, I know, but still…

I have been sharing this recent poem with friends, so I am sharing it with you too. As always, many things were swirling around that influenced this piece. Mary Jane is an interior designer (and lovely person) who is interested in healthy environments. I got to know her at the perfect time right before we were going to paint our house. Stephenie Meyer is the author of the very popular Twilight series, which I began reading when William Bloom, recommended them in an email newsletter and then my daughter asked me to read them with her. I already had the first book on my shelf. You know how sometimes you buy a book then it takes a while to actually read it? (Once I started, I gobbled all four of them up.) And finally, I noticed that I had recently met a number of men who were divorced and who struggled with that. This poem is dedicated to them. Of course it could be about any life-altering event.

10/17/09

From Mary Jane and Stephenie Meyer

For Ira, Bob, Geary and Eric

Something that shatters
pre-existing life structure
stretching out to the foreseeable future.

No restoration
of equilibrium
or the familiar,

the details
don’t matter:
a choice point where

all is divided into
before…and after
and darkness is the dominant color,

the decisive end…of what was,
the promising beginning…of what is:

verdant, vivid vibration,
riot of sensation,
vibrant colors of all description,

almost beyond bearing.

You get to the point
where you say this
lightening bolt that struck me

was the best thing
that ever happened.

Margaret Dubay Mikus
© 2009

Breast Health Month…Every Month

October is Breast Cancer Awareness month. I prefer a focus on Breast Health rather than cancer. Let us examine our breasts with love rather than fear as a natural part of taking good care of ourselves. Let us listen to our bodies easily, before they have to scream to be heard over the daily cacophony of life, often taking care of others first.

Twice I have had breast cancer, in 1996 and in 2007. I learned a great deal about healing body, mind, emotions, and spirit. And each time I was cracked open–in a good way–breaking through old defenses, encouraging me to bloom. Even my relationships were healed. Writing saved me, allowing me to access inner wisdom about my healing process. This poetic journal, begun after healing from MS in 1995, continues still.

Here is poem I wrote last week. When I read it to him today, my voice teacher encouraged me to post it as part of this special month.

10/12/09

From the Stars

Here I am
naked before you,
all scars, weakness,
vulnerability revealed

as beautiful.

Steely resolve,
stubborn determination,
hard-won power

as foundation.

Unashamed,
unassuming,
hiding nothing
I might once have deemed

unacceptable.

Something to be said for
enduring, growing,
transforming, transcending.

Every wrinkle
tells a story
of care or neglect.

every scar a tale
of chance or choice,
guilt, healing, awareness, or regret.

I can tell you
have come from the stars
just to see

life here in action.
Here I am.

Margaret Dubay Mikus
Copyright 2009

Remodeling

A poem written 9/5/9

Remodeling as a Transformative Device

(Better than Illness)

Every summer for a long time,
or often anyway,
illness has caught me—
serious enough to warrant
immediate concern
life-threatening even.

And all time was then divided
into before the diagnosis
and after it, life wiped
away as I had known it,
what had seemed important
became less than trivial.

Amnesia set in
about how things had been
and I couldn’t get back
to “normal.”
The process of healing
took the time it took

and the lessons came
and some stuck;.
some left until
the next time.
And on and on it went
with help coming at key moments.

I learned how to ask and receive.
I learned how to balance in chaos.
How to laugh at darkness.
How to let myself feel
and even cry in the presence of others.
And I wrote it all down:

the insights, the quest, the stories
that seemed to give meaning
to suffering, to healing.
Was there no other way
to transformation than
ripping off my skin

again and again?
Then, this summer:
remodeling—Let everything be different
than it had been. Let clutter
be cleared, past failures forgiven,
all belongings spread out,
nothing where it had been.

Ask: If I were moving,
would I keep this?
And as dusty carpet went out
and clean wood floors went in,
light came too, gleaming.
Kitchen cabinets refaced in rich cherry,

Santa Cecelia (patron saint of creativity)
and the name of our chosen granite from Brazil.
All that was worn and shabby
made new again.
Moving on without moving away.
Color, space, clean air,

promise, possibility, openness.
We can’t find our way back
to what was…
even it we wanted to.
Old habits are breaking
like how high to reach to answer the phone

or where to locate a pair of scissors or stamp or fork,
nothing is where it was,
all part of the 17 or 39 or whatever number
of changes in the environment to sustain
healing changes in me.

And the rest of the family?
Well, they are in the thick and thin of it too.
If they can be nourished
by all this,
if they can learn to function
without the usual foundation,

if they can be surrounded by and
immersed in energy for where they are going…
all the better.

Margaret Dubay Mikus
Copyright 2009

May Reflection and New Poem

It has been a super-busy May: my birthday, travel to Michigan to see our families on Mother’s Day weekend, our daughter’s college graduation, and our 35th wedding anniversary. I read recent poems at a spirituality group and facilitated a world peace meditation with them. I was (unexpectedly) asked to be on a local cable TV show on using poetry for healing and comfort. What fun! I had three colds (unusual) and I continued doing deep healing work with a goal of being more consistently healthy, with more peace, calm and clarity in my life. I learned a new breathing technique which I practiced daily.

As the month went on, I had thoughts and poems I wanted to post, but the time passed. I did put my name and copyright on all my blog photos and replaced all the unmarked ones.

This recent poem was written as part of my healing work. It was inspired by talking with my friend, Geary Davis, who moderates a spiritual gathering every Thursday evening.

5/28/09

Put Down the Sword of Self-wounding

(after talking to Geary about a ritual to ease pain)

Put down the sword
of self-destruction
and self-immolation,

of self-defeat, self-demolition,
and self-defacing. Stop
stabbing myself in the vulnerable gut

in remorse, guilt, grief, and regret
at what I could not
control or plan or shape.

Melt that sword
into the ploughshare
that carves the furrows

into which I place
the seeds I have been holding back.
Let forgiveness

flood the field,
let love shine upon them,
let the earth be fertile and loam-rich,

and bountiful harvest my just reward.
After all the lifetimes
of all the dark and light alike

let my new life
result from a conscious new choice:
to put down the sword.

No more self-blame
self-criticism or self-judging,
no more crimson shame,

no more self-harsh words,
no more self-unkindness,
no more self-disrespect,

or screaming at myself
at perceived imperfections
or unbearable failings.

Only forgiveness
to the bone of things
to the bottom and top of memory,

forgiveness heaped
on forgiveness, eaten
at a great feast of forgiveness.

And when sated,
love as dessert and
as the main course ever after.

Margaret Dubay Mikus
© 2009

Note: definition of immolate
1) To kill as a sacrifice
2) To kill (oneself) by fire
3) To destroy
The American Heritage Dictionary, 3rd edition, 1992