the cauldron

This week I'd like to share a poem I wrote. This always feels extra vulnerable to me, but it nonetheless feels important to go for it right now. I think there may be themes you relate to in it, whether you are a perimenopausal woman or not. But I'll stop spoiling the poem and just go ahead and show you. Here goes:

The Cauldron

​
This is for the women who

after the day is done

come to rest

on the sofa to watch

the shows they love

and can't.

Consciousness pulled from them

without consent.

Here, then gone.

Sleep like some shroud

thrown over them.

Finally they are still.

Some relief in this

capture.

Perhaps it is because they know

that later

they will rise

fueled by what experts say

is their age-related rite:

estrogen,

cortisol,

low,

high,

Some imbalance

forcing them upright

out of their beds.

Some explanation

for the thoughts

the fears

the galaxies

they finally remember.

The heroic acts,

minuscule and massive.

The transgressions,

felt and levied.

It's nothing too big but

human existence,

the questions:

obscure,

unanswerable.

This is for the women

who are learning:

You don't have to

get back to sleep.

You don't have to

be afraid.

This is not a slosh of

chemicals gone awry

whose course

must be reversed.

You are just touching into

the simple truth

of all the lives you have ever lived.

Of all the lives

anyone has ever lived.

The chemicals,

a cauldron,

its still surface

beginning to rise.

This is for the women

who wake up

and peer into the cauldron,

who meet

their reflection and touch

just for now

at this secret hour

the translucent

purple

liquid

of

everything.

So, the specifics of cortisol and estrogen aside (or maybe not), what is being revealed to you by your current phase of life? Is it uncomfortable? Exciting? Are you resisting it? Or jumping in?