In this post I'm sharing a selection of paintings and poems from my series about living with pain, either physical or emotional.
In Pain
Invisible
Navigation negates
Perpetual problems
Acceptance avoids
Ignorant
Naivety
In the hush of night, I lie awake in pain,
Listening to rain's soft rhythm, its cadence a lullaby,
Wondering if sleep will ever come again,
While your peaceful breathing sings an untroubled sigh.
Memory dances like shadows against my mind’s pale wall,
Trying to conjure dreams where quiet rest resides,
But many nights drift by with their heavy thrall;
Unrefreshed wanderings are all that this heart abides.
Will slumber find me beneath the fear I swallow?
Each drop outside reflects my restless plight;
I grasp at hope for a calming peace tomorrow,
Sleep’s gentle kiss feels elusive as night.
So here I remain, a sentinel of despair,
Awake in pain while the world dreams unaware.
There's an advert on TV
A painkiller advert
It talks about the language of pain
About how we're either in pain
Or we get relief from pain
And it hits me like a brick
I don't know when I last had pain relief
I've had pain reduction
I've coped better with pain
But relief?
That's not something I even dream of
And this isn't a pity party
I'm not asking for sympathy
I'm just sharing my reality
Pain is part of my every day
For so many people pain is never far away
It is a constant
Possibly variable
Often unbearable
Yet we bare it
We cope
We live life our way
With a smile
And an "ok"
Even when we're far from ok
When the pain is eating away
At our energy
Our positivity
Our ability to be
How we long for relief
To be able to breathe
Without tension
To live without the grief
That is caused by pain
Head shoulders knees and toes
Pain with me everywhere I go
Eyes and ears and mouth and nose
When it ends, no one knows
Life frozen solid
Yearning for spring
Whilst nocturnal nuances
Leave us fearing
Are we forgotten
Did we even exist?
Can anyone hear us
Are we crossed off the list?
Chasms of goodbyes
Hide silently within
Whilst debris of our lives
Are left as ruins
I'm sorry I cancelled again
You see I was overtaken by pain
I wish I could guarantee each day
That everything would be OK
But that's not the life I live
I hope, again, you can forgive
The pain crippled her
Morning, noon and night
Tormenting her every moment
Determined to win the fight
The fight she never chose
Didn't know even existed
Yet one day she woke to find
To this battle she'd enlisted
The battle was with herself
She slowly came to find
Pain could not be beaten
What a criminal mastermind
There was no other choice
She had to keep on going
She turned her back on war
The future without knowing
Could she find a way
To negotiate a peace
Would pain accept a deal
To give her some release
She tried to understand
The issues that pain brought
To offer some solutions
But it all came to nought
Running was her only option
Yet no option at all
Her legs wouldn't cooperate
She'd fall and fall and fall
Yet she kept on trying
Each day a new attempt
Mediating agreements
No option exempt
The pain slowly retreated
In the background it remained
Still a constant presence
But in a box contained
The war with pain was over
They lived an awkward peace
There never was surrender
Neither found release
They gained an understanding
A way to coexist
She listened to pain's needs
Wrote up quite a list
Then focused on the future
A way to thrive again
She found a way of living
Her best life despite the pain
Pain is irrevocably in love with the dark
Taking advantage of the long silent hours
As dawn breaks, your words are a light in the dark
Lightening my heavy heart
Then, when the dam of grief breaks
You pull me from the water to safety again
Reminding me that I can still fight
Though it's also ok to accept what will be
On the days I long to hibernate
You whisper conversations into the void
And when yet another night approaches
You whisper a light of hope in the dark
Pain
Truer than the literal truth
To those that know
Daily
We search the skies patiently
Hoping for rainbows
Shattered
Broken into pieces
Hugged back together
Longing for spring
Warmth emanating
Through every touch
Every day I wake
A different person again
Unexpectedly
I'm sitting here again forcing my heart to beat
In a place where I hope the dark can't reach
Searching for glimmers of hope every day
Only faith can chase my fears away
Realistic
Revealing
Every dream
As an impossibility
Living is limited
In the constantly
Shrinking
Test tube of
Increasing
Constraints
Silent marauder
Not merely malevolent
Unsolicited
You unbidden invader
It is time for eviction
Unsettling sight
Within the mirror I see
Secrets revealed
Refractions of lost beauty
Without visibility
The painting below may not look like a person in pain....
And that's the point!
You can't tell how much pain someone is in by looking at them.
Please don't ever assume anything about someone else, and definitely not about their pain, exhaustion, health or mental health.
Surviving in pain
Breathing vapours of sorrow
Excluded from life
Beneath the ice of life
I feel warmth unexpectedly
Through the fog of anxiety
I have lived in obscurity
Now the sun touches gently
The frozen parts of me
Carefully
Caringly
Slowly
I start to defrost
My inner truth opens
To be reborn vulnerably
Under the light of eternity
In Pain Zine
You can read each page of the zine by clicking on them in the gallery below.
In the gallery below you can find some more paintings I've created over the years, again on the theme of pain. Some of these are included in my book Dormiveglia: Living with Long Covid which is available for all your normal bookshops.
There is Hope
It may feel as if everything is changing
Ending
Dieing
But despite the fear and anxiety
Amidst the grief
There is always hope
It may be only a glimmer
A blue sky on an autumn day
A kind word along the way
But when we let these moments simmer
They start to grow from a speck of light
Into a glow that warms the heart
Reminding us that change may be hard
But in that journey there is positivity
Even when it's out of sight
It still shines a light
And finally...
There is always hope, no matter what situation we are in, no matter how impossible life feels, no matter what fears we are feeling, there's always hope.
Hope that the sun will shine
Hope that spring blossom will bloom
Hope that pain will reduce
Hope that we can hug again
Hope that prayers will be answered
Hope that peace will descend
Hope that poverty will be eradicated
Hope that smiles will be seen once more
Hope that love will conquer all
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