Drawers

By Carol E. Crain, written August 1, 2011

Throughout my life
I’ve had drawers of emotions –
Emotions I had to stuff,
Put away, not show,
And lock them up.

Then as I lived life later,
I was able to open the drawers
And look at the contents
Little by little – piece by piece.

The drawers are being emptied
more each year.
Some of the things I kept,
And thought I always would,
I see no use for keeping now.
I’m doing a kind of sorting,
Re-filing and re-thinking
About the purpose for keeping
Each memory . . .

Each painful experience
Letting some of them go
Isn’t like saying,
“This didn’t really happen to me –
This wasn’t really done to me,
This didn’t really affect me –
Or wreck me or wrack me,
Rock me or wound me!”

In time, I have seen
That letting some of the drawers’ contents go
Frees me, relieves me, heals me -
To make room for other positive
Experiences in my life.

Some memories are like old blankets
That keep me warm and comfort me.
Those I keep.

Other things in the drawers
Bring up sadnesses and pain,
Loss and damaged emotions.

What to keep? What to let go?
The Lord is helping me know.
Some things I redefine,
Rather than discard.

I look at them with the new light
I have gained through years
Of looking within, without,
With various lights shone
on my drawers’ contents.

Sometimes a spot-light glares.
Other times a soft-veiled light
Shows the finer details,
Rather than glaring, searing pain.

Sometimes I choose to keep
The drawer closed –
Contents kept in the dark,
Because I feel too frail
And not up to looking
At all that’s inside.

Sometimes when someone else’s pain
Is evident enough, I’ve opened my
Drawer and shared certain artifacts
In order to help them be set free
From part of their pain.

As I do, the Lord makes it worth it
To me to share my rips and tears,
My fears and rage and vehicles
Of healing.

Sometimes I want to be all fixed instantaneously healed and whole
And yet, I realize I learn
From the step-by-step journey
More so than if I’d been
Catapulted into instant perfection.

I do value the process, the
Gradual unveiling, un-layering,
Arranging and re-arranging,
Tears and expressed rage,
Sadness for loss and making
Peace with what is left –
What remains.

Sometimes, who I am now
Seems so intertwined
With who I was then.
I find it hard to separate Myself
From that child,
That teen, that person in her
Twenties and thirties.
I can’t really separate myself
into then and now.

I don’t have to be void of
Memories of them
In order to let the Lord
Give me peace now.

I don’t have to have the past
Surgically removed and discarded
In order to feel renewed
And able to be free to embrace now.

I don’t have to gut my life from then
In order to renovate my heart –
Remodel my mind . . .
Renew my spirit now.

As I look back, I’m empowered
To look ahead.
Only as I look back can I
Look ahead.

I don’t have to have amnesia
About my past memories
In order to create new,
Better ones.

Can anyone really understand
All the facets of my being?
No, I can’t expect them to.
They don’t live inside me.
They haven’t witnessed
My days and nights.

Only Jesus and I were there
When each memory was made,
When each rip and tear took place.
He was also there as the stitching
Took place.

He is the ultimate alteration King.
At times, I felt like my
Life’s tapestry was unraveling
And being reworked.
The back of the tapestry has
A variety of threads and knots,
But the scene on the front
Has been forming for almost
Sixty-four years.

The final stitches won’t be finished
Until the last day I’m here
On this earth.

When I see the Lord, I’ll have
A new tapestry of total perfection –
His picture of my life will be
What it was finally meant to be.
I’ll be who He created me to be.