Roots and Tendrils

by Heidi Dellaire

  © 2019 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  ISBN 978-1-54395-760-0 eBook 978-1-54395-761-7

  To those who brave the inner workings of the heart.

  Contents

  Willow

  Abandoned

  Caged

  Fire Ants

  Lessons

  Layers

  Fading Into Morning

  Lens

  Spoons

  Clean

  Wormwood

  Near Light

  Hope

  Prelude to Midwinter

  Power Outage

  Window

  Unfurl

  Flickering Light

  Roots and Tendrils

  The Observer

  Squirrel

  Heartbreak

  Heart Cleanse

  Floating

  Owl Speak

  Moonflower

  Life

  Linger

  Radiant

  Cave of Fear

  Her Alchemical Heart

  Islands in the Mist

  Muted

  Nothing Matters More Than Love

  Solstice

  Love Letter

  A Plea for Holding Heart Space

  Branches

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Abandoned

  I can’t pinpoint the exact moment I abandoned myself.

  It was after my failed relationship. As I reflect back, I think that’s about when it started. I signed up for a course in the Universal Lessons of Abandonment without the awareness I was even enrolled, and already paying dues.

  My guilt and shame surrounding my failed relationship became part of my identity. My guilt for having blown up my life, and for hurting another, stuck to me like dog shit in the crevasses of my shoe.

  In the last decade, there have been a myriad of lovers that have come into my life. All seemed like viable candidates for partnership... each one ready to love me for me. Each one ready to explore the depths of my heart and open the door for me to welcome them in.

  I lied to myself about them all.

  Each one of them ended up leaving a mark, a scar or a lesson, right down to the last narcissistic asshole. I attracted the emotionally unavailable, the self-obsessed egoist, the ghoster, the gas-lighter, and the “my trauma trumps anything else on the planet” lover. Some came to me, not just once, a few of these themes were revisited.

  There seems to be an assignment that I took on with each of them. Each one getting me closer to a passing grade. Each one ripping my heart apart. Each one hurting me and pushing me closer to myself, closer to the truth.

  I had abandoned myself.

  I looked for love outside of myself. I searched for love everywhere but where I needed to find it the most. They came as an assignment:

  look in the mirror.

  Looking in the mirror now, I know I have been here all along.

  I just needed to open my own heart to see, to see myself.

  Welcome home.

  Welcome to love.

  There comes a moment in time when

  You realize no person, place, doctrine or guru

  Is going to save you.

  Only you can save you.

  Be your own guru.

  Caged

  Your last spoken words still fill my ears,

  Reverberating as a sharp echo from the distance.

  I am a piranha.

  I am a predator.

  I am a shark.

  I am an emotional vampire.

  I see the bodies of the people I have destroyed and

  I want to wash them away so

  I don’t have to look at the pile anymore.

  I have become just that to you,

  A body on the pile washed away to ease your pain.

  Piranha, predator, shark

  I wonder what you will tell your next lover.

  Piranha, predator, shark

  Shark

  Shark

  I know what I will tell mine:

  She spat fear like venom,

  From deep behind the bars of her self-imposed prison.

  Without knowing how to love herself, it came out sideways.

  I loved her. I could feel the softness behind the wild.

  Fire Ants

  As I watch and listen, the blood leaves my hands

  no feeling in them...cold...numb.

  My body is on fire, yet I can feel the blood start to leave.

  I witness an eye exchange...recoil. I rub my hands trying to warm them, for I fear the fire ants.

  Nothing works, they are on their way. I struggle to stay seated and

  I see other hands that aren’t mine.

  The scene changes. I watch. The sounds leave and I am in the bubble. No one can hear me, no one can hear them as they march. From inside my chest, they pierce through my veins and get sucked into the chambers of my heart. From atria to ventricle they are pushed through.

  I can’t stop it now. They are on their way.

  I look again. Locked. Frozen. Bubble. Beautiful.

  I am screaming on the inside but no one else hears. Slowly they make their way and the burning starts. They march and open the capillaries of my fingers. My hands are now on fire. They are screaming to be heard.

  I want to lay them on you. Can’t you feel the heat from these hands. Locked. Don’t go. Don’t do it. Stay. The burn is unbearable. It hurts.

  The fire ants have you in their sights.

  Lessons

  It’s hard for me to let go of people,

  Even ones who are toxic to me.

  There’s a weird shame in cutting someone out of my life.

  Aren’t we supposed to love everyone?

  Isn’t that my job?

  I am a fixer after all.

  It’s hard for me to let go of people,

  Even ones who are toxic to me.

  They stick a little harder than most.

  They get to me.

  They get to me in my core.

  They bring out the parts of me I dislike.

  It’s hard for me to let go of people,

  Even ones who are toxic to me.

  There is something in them that I love.

  There is something in them that I hate.

  They reflect the parts of me I still need to work on.

  I can’t do this with them in my life.

  Now, it’s becoming less hard for me to let go of people.

  I am learning to let go of the toxic ones,

  and I am loving myself in the process.

  Layers

  The loud boom of metal trap doors clanging open startles me,

  As I feel myself release to you.

  I have been walking alone in a depth of quiet

  Yet here you are enveloped in the same quiet

  Here we lie silenced by our gaze

  Layer by layer, in our vulnerable nakedness, we reveal all to the other.

  I try to catalog all that you show me in this deep gaze.

  I won’t remember it all.

  I want to see it again,

  Will I get a second reveal?

  Fading Into Morning

  Midnight passes

  Minutes into hours tick away at my heart -

  Faster and faster they go

  My han
ds touch you as they always do

  But tonight, all is voltaic

  The moon softly pours in on top of us...I feel your pull

  Lips and skin afire

  Electric arcs of light between us

  I can’t get enough of you

  I can’t breathe you in fast enough

  My heart stays with you tonight.

  Wakefulness overcomes me

  The moon descends

  I watch it fall from the sky

  Light begins to take her place

  My soul becomes weary

  For I dread what comes next

  “I love you”, I hear

  And my heart snaps like a brittle twig

  It’s not enough in the last electric hours before morning

  My spirit fades with the diminishing light of the moon.

  Lens

  We are caught up in the story we tell ourselves

  We can’t see beyond our own anecdote.

  We set rigid parameters around the lens we look through-

  Spouting off about someone else

  To everyone else

  Making up a story

  Only seen through our self-limiting beliefs-

  A narrow lens.

  Check yourself.

  Check your story.

  The beauty of storytelling- you can change the narrative.

  Open the lens and look with love instead of fear.

  Fear tends to talk too much.

  When you ask the universe for signs,

  Don’t ignore them when they show up.

  Spoons

  We created this game before we met.

  Who would be the inside spoon, who would be the outside spoon?

  It was a game of longing, a way to be close

  Shortening the distance across the airwaves.

  Each night we would end our call with the question,

  Inside spoon or outside spoon?

  You would choose inside spoon every time, even after we actually met.

  I acquiesced, and you never knew

  How much I wanted to be the inside spoon.

  How much I wanted to be held by you.

  Later I would realize you are not a spoon at all.

  You are a knife.

  Double-edged like a razor and ready to slice

  Anyone who got too close to your heart.

  There was no getting close to you from either the inside or the outside

  Without feeling the presence of the blade in wait.

  This is how the game has ended.

  Clean

  The humid air wraps around me with its denseness as I walk down

  the front steps.

  My bare feet touch the warm pavement and I look up into the night sky.

  The encroaching full moon looms overhead.

  As I stare at her luminescence,

  drops from heaven begin to dampen my face.

  The drops are warm and loving,

  The type of rain that invites you to bathe in her arms.

  The type of rain that begs you to let it all go.

  The type of rain that, as it drips down your face from your wet hair says,

  “Don’t worry. Everything will be okay.

  Let me wash you clean from it all.

  You don’t have to do anything but stand here.

  I will shower you in the teardrops of the universe.

  I will shower you with the love of the world.

  I will wash away all the ugliness placed upon your soft heart.”

  I point my face to the sky and let the rain wash me clean.

  Near Light

  The light became a gift

  A print, an imprint, a beautiful scene

  I’ve given it two names;

  The Shattering and

  Let the Light In

  Depending on who looks

  Who feels

  And who lets go

  It can take on either of the two

  With the shattering, comes the letting of light

  The cracking open from the deep well

  To be shattered…shattered like tempered glass

  We all bask in the want to share our freedom

  Freedom to be seen

  Freedom to be heard

  Freedom to be understood

  We want to share that freedom with another soul

  Do you dare enough to be this brave?

  I write this for me

  I write this for you

  I write this for everyone

  For we all go through a shattering

  A cracking open

  A letting in of light,

  Which becomes a gift

  A print, an imprint, a beautiful scene

  Hope

  As the sun peaks over the tops,

  The trees form a crystalline palace of light

  Glistening, beaming, shimmering light

  There it sits on the horizon –Hope

  We’ve been told we shouldn’t have it

  Hope seems elusive at times

  Yet we hang onto it

  Grasping at hope for want of a better tomorrow

  Stickiness hides behind Hope

  A longing for something that may not come

  And with Hope comes Fear

  Fear that things may get worse, fear of getting hurt.

  Is that true?

  What do I believe?

  What do you believe?

  What lies behind or beyond Hope?

  Hope turns to Optimism as I let Fear go

  Stitch sadness to the wind and let it fly

  Crepuscular rays of light announce the gloaming

  A new year’s moon is on the rise

  My intentions are set

  I meet you where you are with an open heart

  You can’t expect the mind

  to do the

  heart’s work.

  Prelude to Midwinter

  The silence of this room overwhelms me

  A vacuum of time

  Hearing only the resonant sound of my blood moving

  Beat by beat through my body

  Air pushing through my lungs

  My senses awaken, for I can see in this darkness

  Light

  Brilliant shades of indigo and violet ebb between us

  Your back faces me

  Trusting

  Feeling the heat surge from within me

  My hands seek you out

  Searching for that place that hums

  And here, in this prelude to midwinter, I am caught

  Time slows

  Flesh and bone dissolve

  Leaving only the essence of you

  The flame in my core escapes through my hands

  Drawn like a magnet

  With gentle hands ablaze

  My light connects with yours

  This room now fills with sound

  Air releasing from your being

  I inhale the encapsulating light

  Sleep can come now

  For the night is no longer dark

  Peace instills, while waiting for day to break.

  Power Outage

  As the power flickers and finally fades, I have time to just sit in the dark.

  It seems as though I have been sitting in the dark for a while now-

  hiding, falling in and out, regrouping, waiting,

  and trying to control my surroundings.

  With a power outage and a blaring car alarm to shock my senses,

  I am left to agree.

  There are things that one can’t control.

  Yes, I can influence them with the choices I make, but I can’t control fate.

  So, what happens next?

  Do I continue to hide, fall in or out, regroup, or wait?

  If the choice were truly mine, I would come out of hiding, fall deeply in, settle, and finally...finally live freely.

  Night Vision


  for David

  Every Wednesday I join your Special Ops Team.

  You hand me a pair of night vision goggles.

  I whisper, “Rest easy. I’ll take watch”.

  I don my eyewear to survey the scene.

  You clutch the wall naked and afraid.

  I wrap you tightly in a blanket of love

  and whisper again,

  “Rest easy. I’ll take watch”.

  For the next 5400 seconds, I pour love into the battlefield.

  I touch the tip of the sniper’s silencer and bless the one who pulls the trigger and the one who will receive the hit.

  I descend from the nights sky with the paratroopers

  to ensure soft landing.

  I keep a watchful eye on the serpent approaching Michael’s sword.

  I ignite his shield in a blaze of red to protect the fallen.

  I see you stir as you hear the repetitive hum of the

  Black Hawk on approach.

  I remind you as you turn from the wall, “Rest easy. I’ll take watch”.

  Every Wednesday, I soften the battlefield.

  Every Wednesday, I don my night vision.

  Every Wednesday, I carry the load on my back for 5400 seconds.

  Every Wednesday, I join your Special Ops Team.

  Every Wednesday, I become the Watchman.

  Window

  A window in its crudest form is an opening in a door or wall that allows the passage of light & if not sealed the passage of air and sound.

  One look at the window to the mountain and I am transported to my spirit self. I’m taking flight on the wings of a hawk catching speed as I hurl towards the window to your soul.

  Wind tunnels create a deafening sound as I gain speed towards the entrance. And as I enter, all goes quiet and I am greeted by a mountain shrouded in cloud. A circling of geese protects the view to the snow-covered crag. They represent the journey of the great quest. Your spirit form dwells behind these wispy clouds creating order in chaos. I envision you atop this mountain in seated meditation…waiting.

  Hazy shimmers of light are cast through the clouds as my winged form approaches. The screeching cry of my hawk asks for entrance. All becomes clear. Dreams and visions flash before me. Movement, sound, light, emotion. Your stories move so fast before my bird’s eye that nothing and everything stays all at once.