trauma

January 22, 2025

/ HJ / Leave a comment

i’d love to be a
“yes and”
find the funnest stream
go with the flow
and see whatever happens
happening
kind of person

but raising myself from the time i was
approximately 11
gave me some sort of
perfectionistic
type-a-personality
care and careful
self-preservation
overly cautious
kind of vibe constantly fighting against my
natural chaotic state

and hey

maybe it’s the opposite

maybe my natural state is more type-a
and the immediacy of seeing how
life is fleeting
gave me the drive to try to
induce chaos and joy in my life

but whichever way the truth lies
the sentiment still stands:
i have one part of me in chaos
and one part of me trying for strict alignment
and the two parts are forever fighting
inside my mind/my heart/my body/my soul
and rather than tempering each to a
reasonable level, they simply
stop
all action in either direction
and so i am neither cautious nor chaotic
i am simply

stuck.

January 5, 2025

/ HJ / Leave a comment

“meanwhile
back on the farm…”

why do singular lessons stand out to me
when whole years disappear
in my sieve of a memory?

i can barely remember the good times
and only moments of the bad
and probably just what i made monologues of memories
is what still comes back to me
even after i’ve long since let go of that story in my repertoire

[what would it be like to have the memory
i was born with, instead of the memory
i was traumatized to have?]

November 10, 2024

/ HJ / Leave a comment

are these truly my only two states?

so invigorated
because of immediate trauma
and helping my community
and working so well
in crisis

and

depressed and sullen and scared
and just hunkering down
for nap after sleep after nap
until i don’t know where the years went?

i want something
in
between

October 4, 2024

/ HJ / Leave a comment

meander into my life
and i’ll appreciate you forever/
meander out and i’ll still
talk about you
lovingly
from time to time to time/
force your way in, and i’ll find space
in my heart
for everything you have to say
and everything you represent/
but force your way out
and i’ll never ever ever ever
ever ever forgive you

~~~

the trauma and angst is heavy this morning
and yet it feels brighter
and happier
than mornings have been
lately

~~~

capture the light of life
in poetry
and maybe
life will capture you
and kiss you
and place you back
gently
into the light

April 10, 2024

/ HJ / Leave a comment

i feel like i have
whatever’s opposite of taking things
for granted

like i hold things as too precious
so as to prepare myself for the day
they are gone

[neither of these approaches
really help with
living in the moment though]

February 17, 2024

/ HJ / Leave a comment

maybe
one upon a time
i was happy
i was healed
i was a child without trauma
but now
i gotta
know it
own it
be it
and maybe work towards
getting back to the child we all
once were

[but why
can i not
think of children
without thinking of
every
single
child
killed by israel]

[i really can’t think of anything anymore
without finding a parallel
to the tragedy
in Palestine]

February 21, 2023

/ HJ / Leave a comment

the concept of community scares me

and i know the ancestors of this land
would balk
at that self-assessment

but i bet white supremacy would smile

feeling/being only beholden to oneself
makes for
either
one great bootstraps story
or
one of many that the upper-crust doesn’t have to deal with
other than as
stepping stones

but i was born and raised in this society
that values individuality above all else
and insists that, even within social standing
that place is precarious at best
(imagine entire books/movies/tv episodes
about a whole friend group
turning against you
for no reason other than
they can)
so to be solidly a part of a posse
you should be the one holding
all the power

that isn’t sustainable
that isn’t healthy
that isn’t the way humanity should be

but

i’ve lived it

multiple times

so please, caretakers of turtle island
i feel whispering in my flailing mind
from time to time,
forgive me as i resist the concept of community
and rely on only myself
and my spouse
for literally everything–
i’m only doing what i was taught
for the first 30 or so years of my life
and experienced from others
taught the same way…

my heart is vulnerable
but quite willing
to learn

October 24, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

i wonder
if my mother
would have been great
at getting my pronouns
right

would she have stood up for me
at family gatherings
corrected people
when i wasn’t near
would she have been
the ally
i needed
to come out
with a bang
instead of this subtle
exhausting
whispered
coming out
over
and over
and over
again
every time
a ‘she’ is uttered
or a ‘ladies’ is announced
or any of those microaggressions
my gender dysphoria
insists
are actual aggression

i don’t know
i wish i knew
but i really don’t

she was an ally of all queer folks she knew
(I know 100% she’d have been to my wedding
would have celebrated like the world was ending
when she knew mine was just beginning
because that’s just the way she was)
but gender is somehow harder
and the in-between confuses even the best
of allies
and i don’t want to put her up on a pedestal
nor do i want to underestimate her devotion
to a me she never got to see

i only knew her for eleven and three quarters years
and i have memories of less
she is both the person i was closest to
and the biggest mystery of my life

and i just wish
i could guess
what it would be like
to have her
stand up
for me

August 27, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

a memory
failing me
at every opportunity

or

is it protecting me?
is it saving me from the agony
of solid knowledge
and pain?

because

isn’t that what a trauma response is?
just the brain and/or body
trying their hardest
to save the heart
from hurt?