Category Archives: healing

39–“How to Not Feel a Failure” from “Frazzle”

On Rt. 60, Heading into the Sunset, by M D Mikus, Copyright 2016

“…How to remember grace and be grateful?
How to be patient and trust…
enough?”

From Poem 39, “How to Not Feel a Failure,” in my book, Thrown Again into the Frazzle Machine: Poems of Grace, Hope, and Healing. Listen to poem here: https://youtu.be/BC2X7WMQmT8

You’ve probably had days (or longer) when you were most aware of not succeeding at what you most desired, had focused all your energy on. For me, on this particular day writing this poem, it was all the healing that had not happened, all the “failures.” I was not thinking about all the problems I no longer had, the MS being gone, cancer not a factor, being able to walk easily…and on and on. All problems that at one time were my primary longing. No, I was most aware of all the healing working its way into my attention, what was yet to resolve. And now, from this vantage point, 7 years later, most big problems of that time are gone. It is good to remember…

For more poem videos from “Frazzle”

THROWN AGAIN into the FRAZZLE MACHINE: Poems of Grace, Hope, and Healing

37–“Where We Are in the Story” from “Frazzle”

Heavy Snow–Before Tree Breaks by M D Mikus, Copyright 2015

“…The top of the uterus is thick
as if just beginning to hold promise,

the bottom thinned to almost nothing
appropriate for her years.

What to say about this
top/bottom dichotomy…”

From “Where We Are in the Story?” in my book, “Thrown Again in the Frazzle Machine: Poems of Grace, Hope, and Healing.” Listen to the entire poem here: https://youtu.be/VnKSdeVNB1U

We are shaped by what happens to us, and what we do with that. Out of hardship may come an awareness of strength and endurance. We may learn to appreciate and be grateful when life goes more smoothly. We may develop compassion for others going through the same challenges and for ourselves when darkness comes again. As my sister said to me tonight, we are only aware of light in the darkness.

My mother was a nurse and when we were growing up she used medical terms to call parts of the body by their proper names. I have a Ph.D. in Microbiology and am familiar with using scientific language. These things, (and many others), are woven into the way I write. You can see the science influence more in some poems, like this one, than in others. The language is matter–of-fact and lacks any squeamishness, one facet of telling the story.

For more poem videos from “Frazzle”

THROWN AGAIN into the FRAZZLE MACHINE: Poems of Grace, Hope, and Healing

36–” Perfectly Imperfect” from “Frazzle”

Change Manifest, California Shore by M D Mikus, Copyright 2013

“It is hard to be
out of sync with my body.
The body speaks and
I don’t listen,

I try but
don’t entirely succeed
to remember healing
is a process…”

From poem 36, “Perfectly Imperfect,” in my book, Thrown Again into the Frazzle Machine: Poems of Grace, Hope, and Healing.  Listen here: https://youtu.be/x5pfX7iigzs

Although I am in some ways the same, I am also different now from the woman who wrote these poems 7 years ago, however revealing and personal. I made it through the times described in the book, to the “other side.” The nature of healing and transformation, of course, is that you are changed at the end. When reading these poems for you now, I inhabit them (and her), open my heart, and deliver. With a bit of distance, I perceive things I was not able to see then. But I am aware of the changes, even the way I write has changed.

I began a poetic journal after healing from multiple sclerosis 21 years ago. My creativity was “cracked open.” The poems act as a kind of truer memory, the details and emotions of an event written down at the time are not subject to the fogginess of remembering things only in my head. If you’ve ever compared recollections of growing up with your siblings, you know what I mean.

For more poem videos from “Frazzle”

THROWN AGAIN into the FRAZZLE MACHINE: Poems of Grace, Hope, and Healing

35–“Here I Am” from “Frazzle”

California Beach Seaweed by M D Mikus, Copyright 2013

“…where hard things bob up
from the ocean of minutes and it could
be just innocuous clumps of seaweed

just brush off…or it could be
a landmine adrift, set off by casual touch….”

From poem 36, “Here I Am,” in my book, Thrown Again into the Frazzle Machine: Poems of Grace, Hope, and Healing. Listen here: https://youtu.be/LosxbOXrvyU

I wrote this poem seven years ago at a very different time, but it seems like I wrote it for today. Trying to avoid the darkness of anxiety feels very familiar. You?

For more poem videos from the “Frazzle” series

33–“Soon Enough” from “Frazzle”

Sun-Soaked Gerber Daisy by M D Mikus, Copyright 2016

“…as if I could
plan my time to feel

as if you did not
understand, but…

you have never faced
such circumstance.…”

From poem 33, in Thrown Again into the Frazzle Machine: Poems of Grace, Hope, and Healing. Listen to the entire poem here: https://youtu.be/XKPl1u3gySk

I will say only this: It is essential to be kind…to ourselves and those around us. And be as generous as you can. It is for our own good. Who do we want to be?

For more poem videos from “Frazzle”