Here is another section of Kim Rosen’s book, “Saved by a Poem” that I loved.
“Have you ever had the experience of a friendship or a romance where it seemed like life had finally brought you the perfect person, whose tastes and beliefs and dreams matched yours, whom you were so connected with that you didn’t even have to speak? And then, after a month or three of this Eden, you inevitably began to realize your differences. It turned out that when it came right down to it, he didn’t actually share the same beliefs as you, and what matter most to you made him very nervous. Maybe she seemed to like your kind of music in the beginning, but later admitted it gave her the creeps. Suddenly one morning you wake up, look your beloved in the face and say, “Who are you? You weren’t like this when we fell in love!”
At this point, the difference is sometimes too great to survive. You separate from each other. Or you deaden the aliveness of the relationship, relegating your togetherness to what small corner of the connection does not rock the boat.
If you hand in there without fleeing or numbing your heart you may discover more about who you really are than you ever imagined. Your beliefs may be shaken and your masks may crumble. You might discover a connection with your partner that is not contingent on harmony and agreement.
The same is true of a relationship with a poem. If you are willing to get curious about what is triggering your judgments instead of abandoning the poem or changing it to fit your comfort zone, you may find that the very lines that give you trouble hold the key to undiscovered layers of your own nature.
Gina’s favorite poem was from Rilke’s Book of Hours. She carried it on a tattered index card in her purse and often pulled it out to read to friends. She was excited about deepening her relationship with it and came to my workshop with the intention of doing so.
But as she began the process, she balked. Suddenly she decided she didn’t like the poem anymore. Another poem, Robert Frost’s “West-running Brook,” got very attractive to her. “The whole song of that poem is rushing through me,” she said. “I can’t concentrate on the Rilke.” She felt torn, drawn to the Frost poem but trapped by her commitment to the Rilke, even though she was no longer in love with it.
She could have been describing a romantic struggle. She admitted that this feeling of being torn was a familiar refrain in her life, played out again and again in her relationships with men: as soon as the time came to do the work of going deeper, someone else showed up who became very compelling.
I asked Gina where she was stuck in the Rilke poem. She pointed to the lines “Each thing -/ each stone, blossom, child-/ is held in place.”
“Was that your experience as a child?” I asked.
“No. I didn’t feel held. Each stone, blossom, child is not held in place,” she whimpered. “The poem is lying!” She and I both knew this was a deeply buried voice, drawn to surface by the poem.
“Why did you originally love this poem?” I asked her.
“Because I so long to be held like that. I long for that feeling of being safe on earth. But right now, I don’t believe in it.” She was choking back sobs. “I was so alone as a child. My great uncle abused me and nobody knew. I felt like I was living behind an invisible shield. My mom didn’t notice because she was so self-involved and distracted. I ended up taking care of her, hoping I could make her strong enough to take care of me.”
Gina was rocking back and forth, her own arms wrapped tightly around her.
“To really make this poem your own,” I said to her, “you may need to let yourself go through these feelings. Are you willing?”
Reluctantly Gina began to repeat the line over and over. At first we could barely hear her. But as she allowed the waves of pain to come to surface, her voice became stronger.
“It’s true, I have such a longing to be ‘held in place’ by something bigger than me,” she whispered. “I want to know what Rilke felt when he wrote this line.”
“So I invite you to be ‘held in place’ by your commitment to this poem. Don’t get distracted like your mother did. Don’t go off to another poem. Hold yourself right here, as a healing to the unheld one within you.”
Even through her tears, Gina knew that this poem was the exact medicine she needed to heal the heartbroken child who was so disillusioned by what had happened to her. She had unconsciously prescribed it for herself. Now it was drawing out a trauma that had been buried since she was very young. And even as this poem opened Gina’s wound, it gave her the perfect balm to heal it.
Kim Rosen
The line I love is I ended up taking care of her, hoping I could make her strong enough to take care of me.
This is the ditch that most abused victims fall into, where they are diligently caring for people in order for them to eventually become strong enough to take care of us, become our heroes, bring us the love we know is there IF only they were strong enough to show it.
Imagine the little one trying to take care of the adult, while the child needs to be held in place by someone bigger.
The world is a scary place where you the child is the caretaker.
Love this book….
She speaks of the poems first settling in the mind being memorized, then moving into the heart and then unearthing feelings deep within, speaking the soul’s language.
During my journey I too felt that I would get things first in my head, then my heart would recognize it, and then finally my soul resounded in knowing.
She calls this knowing them by heart.
I feel I am knowing life by soul.
I M Perfect lady 