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I WAS NOT ALONE by Heather Awad

This poem’s story dates back to 1999, a pivotal point in my life…

That time was pivotal in terms of accepting my life on larger scales and learning to cope with everything that had come before and what I wanted my life to be moving ahead. It was a time of deep self-reflection and rejection from many who I believed cared about me. 

It was also a time of feeling the loss of myself, slipping into unrealistic visions and expectations, forming them into realities, suffering through disbelief and denial. When there was no one to turn to, I turned to spirituality and faith for support, comfort and love.

I Was Not Alone

It was spring
the sun brightened
the flowers on my bedspread
kept watered by the heavy flow
of tears that gushed from my eyes.
Tears that would never end
from a heartache so tangible
it built a home inside me.
I prayed it would release
its clutching hold, freeing
a pain that burrowed
deep in my soul, consuming
my weak-beating heart
polluting my fragile veins.
My woeful cries were not
heard until a brilliant light
answered in those darkest
desperate hours,
come to assuage my pain
apply healing warmth
to this lump of despair
growing inside my chest
becoming a cancer
on my inner peace;
a wound so deep
the scar may never heal.
But the light, it came
It comforted
and I knew I wasn’t alone.  

Heather Awad: I began writing poetry in my early twenties. It started as a way to express deep emotional feelings I could not release verbally. Very bound by my own voice, poetry became the medium for me to speak. It remained my salvation in healing hurts, and in learning to deal with strong emotions such as love and loss. Throughout the last ten years, it has been an up and down process of writing consistently and seriously, to letting it slip away in place of other more pressing demands. The most prominent time when I returned to writing poetry, was this past January 2014 when I began using photographs of various kinds to incite myself and awaken creativity, and I have been engaged non-stop since. I have taken numerous online poetry and creative writing classes over the past year, and continue to do so. Much of my poetry can be found on my Facebook page here.

~If you are interested in seeing your poetry appear in this blog, or submitting a poem by a woman that has inspired you, please click here for submission guidelines. I greatly look forward to hearing from you!~ 

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