grieving happens in rushes
in pulls
in plunks and splats
grieving happens through the cracks
in between life carrying on
grieving happens in the best of all worlds
in the worst
and in the in between
the more luck that floods your way
the easier the grief can bleed
its old hope out onto the floorboards
the aching making way for
the new love flooding in
eventually
if you have loved and unlashed your gripping
as a daily vow made plain
only the gifts remain
only the gifts
often eternal
blending seamlessly with all the others Often we think of grieving as a linear process of healing that can be tracked and that comes to some natural conclusion where we are whole and healed. But grief and the grieving process, like any other creative process, actually has its own organic maturation. While the narrative of healing may be that you feel better today than you did last month or last year, the somatic process of healing is one of releasing, stabilization, plateauing, and then more releasing. If we understand that grieving has a cyclical, sputtering nature, we can be more gentle with ourselves and others as we grieve and heal. Some days we may feel "over it," and other days we may be deeply in touch with the truth that we will never be "over it". Both of these are truths that can exist in a paradoxical and spiritually mature person. Inner balancing and community support, along with somatic therapy or other healing modalities, can help us contain these paradoxical truths.