The Suffering of Others

There's a lot of noise on the internet these last few days. I don't feel much like adding to the debate over mental health treatment, gun control, or the masculinity crisis. I wrote this poem several years ago. It's the only response I have.

The Suffering of Others

You can protect yourself from the negative 

energy of a crowd by envisioning white 

light surrounding 

your entire body. Imagine this light 

enveloping, protecting you. 

Imagine this light 

filtering out  the suffering of others, the pain 

your body is prone to absorb as its own. 

Imagine this light 

as your shield, your womb, your favored skin, 

your dearest armor, 

your police dog, your invisible 

fence, your power word, your safe house. 

Imagine this light 

filling you, traveling 

from the soles of your feet into 

your spine, through your

core, and when grief 

howls in with a vengeance, when you are 

bowled over, in fact

bewildered, by the failure of this light,

after the blow 

of betrayal, you might well say, 

you might  well understand, 

that it was never Them at all.

It was never feasible: no skin no light 

no prayers save us for we have, 

all of us, swallowed 

ourselves, and contain 

only one another.

--Kristen McHenry