What it is like - the storm

what is here after the storm

is stillness

a peace

a calm

a settled-ness

a deep rest within the body

deep long breaths

inhales

like it can finally receive

the air

exhale

and it can finally release

it reaches my heart

and come back

soothing

it feels

what is it like after the storm

the storm

the sand blew

in large circles

the hot air

burnt the skin

the sound so loud

it muted the screams

chaos

spreading its wings

within, without

like hell had unleashed

itself

like darkness had entered the house

old pain coming out

deformed, distorted, crippled

like a rotten corpse

everything everybody wanted to forget

the dead rose from the ground

tormenting

the ones who looked away

wanted better days

but something wasn't done

it came back to show its face again

even uglier than before

like it just wouldn't leave us alone

until

we had released it from within

where it lived

had a home

since the time we decided to look away and forget

we said we would move on

we would not think,

not mention its name

while it lived in our veins

imprinted

the memories

the pain

onto the cells

onto our bones

a part of us

rejected

denied to be seen or felt

it roared again

asking us to look again

at what we looked away from

to face it

look at it straight on

right in its eyes

the demons we thought we had left behind

there were screeches

a past that no longer existed came back to life

fully alive it was

calling our names one by one

no one spared

no one left out

it was there for us all

to free us

and to be freed

for the curse to be lifted

for the monster to become light

it needed us

to release

all that was held

down under the skin

it came to free us

to bear the unbearable

to allow the pain to take over

to express itself

to be the space we could never be for ourselves

for it to move through the body

to give voice to the screams of the heart

to weep, sob and let the tears fall

because it was a lot

the storm

it wasn't a curse

but a curse wanting to release itself

through the anger and the resistance

we had to come sit with what we felt

for all the stones to melt

to hold that part of us

held in the arms of love

the antidote to this hell

the storm

it initiated a fiery journey

from the flames of the outside to the deep scars within

it pushed us into ourselves

and showed the unpleasant truths and facts

the storm

it came to knock us off

unguarded, unbothered

free minded we were

a threat nowhere in sight

and then it appeared

putting us in shock

reacting

an attack, a fight

a mountain of emotions

feelings so unpleasant

the storm

it had a name

but it felt like it was calling our name

like a mirror

reflecting an image

it brought me closer to myself

even though it was not what I wanted

it showed me the parts of me

that I didn't want to see,

know or even remember

I did not want to feel what the parts had felt

what those aspects of myself had seen,

witnessed, remembered

I had abandoned, divorced and disconnected from that pain

from those chapters of my life

but the storm

it brought it all back

the storm

it was a time travel

brought me back exactly where I had left myself

like no time had passed

like a part of me that been frozen in time

waiting for my return

and the storm

it came as a guide

It was a lot

and it has passed

what it is like after the storm

what it is like after the storm