The Dance of Sorrow: A Prose Poem

by Bri Odom

THE DANCE OF SORROW: A PROSE POEM

Nothing I can be or do can make you stay. Nothing I say or do not say. No plea, no scream, no cry. I cannot make you stay. No dream is large enough, no hope apart from Christ strong enough. I am not enough. You leaving me had everything to do with you. I could not make you stay. Oh God, the ache to say, “You did not stay, you left me, you left them.” Dear God Almighty, why? Why does life have to hurt so? Teach me to let go. To let go. I cannot do this on my own. Left. Over and over again. Left, alone. I did not know life could hurt so. The greatest fears of long, a reality. My God, how could it have gone this wrong?

Let the floodgates open. The waters rage. The waves of sorrow and defeat crash upon the rocky shore. Breathe deep the realities. You cannot run from these. Feel the weight once more of this utterly broken world. Feel. Feel your heart, your soul rip in two. Not in a neat clean line upon foreseen ridges. No! Feel the shred of devastation, bloody, horrific, unknown. Feel. I am not enough. No matter how much I try, strive, contrive. Release. Feel the severed mess that is my heart. Lay it all bare.

As the fierce, stormy winds beat mercilessly on the tree in its unforeseen path. As the tree bends, weeps, and wails as it dances in its sorrow. Unsure which coming gust could be its last? Oh, how it dances. How fluid it now looks. That tree that once stood so strong, so secure. The dance of sorrow, of destruction, of all that was unknown. You can hear its cries as it cracks in the tumultuous winds. As it sheds so much of its life it was not ready to lose. Leaf by leaf. Branch by branch. Splits, cracks, screams. You pliable tree, I did not know it could be. Dance, let out the fears, the cries. Embrace your realities. You cannot escape. Sway in the sorrow. Bellow your lost tomorrows to what you thought life would be. Oh you poor, pliable tree.

Sorrow that comes upon us, that unforeseen wave waiting to take us under. How fierce life seems to be. The indignant sorrows of tomorrows, in scope of our newfound realities. I am not enough. Release. As the waters are pulled back to the sea, so my heart screams inside of me. You cannot fight this force, you have to let go and ride through this storm. The only way out is in. Into the great unknown. Feel the weight of the waves as they pull you under. The dark spin that begins below the water’s surface. Feel the rough waters as they pound. Disillusioned. Which way is up, which way is down? Ride through the storm. To fight it only exhausts you. Only depletes what is left in you.

And at once, the winds cease, the waters still. The tree stands again, weathered and freely wearing the scars of its dance with sorrow. The sea gently washes ashore all it had beaten so violently only moments before. The wreckage of such events cannot be contained, but even still, there is sunshine in the rain. The clouds part enough to let that exuberant light, that glorious, healing light begin to illuminate the gray skies of sorrow. Oh the contrast, the light, how it reflects on the life that remains. The wreckage takes time to make right and some things will forever be changed, but there can be beauty found in the new shoreline created by the violent seas. The raging waters may have consumed the shorelines that lay before, but the new path can be learned once more. Familiarity with the missing and broken limbs on the tree will come with time. The tree was humbled in that wind. Learning it can bend and not break if its roots go deep. Oh God, that is only You inside of me.

I rest, I breathe; I feel and see the wreckage of the storm all around me. But stronger still is Your life inside of me. I am not enough, but You are. And even more, You never asked me to be. So I stand, like that tree, like the newly beaten shoreline. Beauty in brokenness. Beauty in scars. In cracks that so freely let Your light shine through. I rest in Your peace in the aftermath. Your peace inside of me. Oh tree, oh poor, pliable tree, I did not know it could be. How your Maker lets His glory be seen, even in your dance with misery.

BRI ODOM

Bri Odom is a lover of words, a seeker of beauty, a wife and a mother to her four dear ones. She has loved poetry and the power of words since she was young, and she believes we all have a story to tell. Bri has always been drawn to the dichotomy of beauty in sorrow in this human experience that we all share and finds much inspiration from it in her own writings. She spends her days raising and homeschooling her babies in beautiful North Idaho where they love to be in nature and seek adventure. You can follow Bri on Instagram: @brismusings.