Poet warrior's Blog: Poems, articles and musings.
» Listings for 2017
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Letting go of the demon's hand - Day 16 - Shame tinted blinkers
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Shame tinted blinkers.
For the sake of diversity and equality we need to acknowledge that if there are people who are fortunate to have and be wearing ‘rose-coloured spectacles’ there must also be people who are wearing shame tinted blinkers.
Where roles coloured spectacles help us to see the world with a lovely pink hue and the world as a pretty place full of people who want to love and care for each other. Shame tinted blinkers in some ways could be considered to be the exact opposite.
Shame tinted blinkers force those of us who have been made to wear them to live in a reality where it’s our fault that we can only see part of what is going on around us and maybe even believe that we only deserve to see a part of what is around us.
Like dray horses we have become beasts of burden and life is something to be endured rather than enjoyed as our brethren who are wearing rose tinted glasses seem to be. It’s not just the blinkers, shame tinted or otherwise that are our problem. It’s the whole set-up; harness, dray and someone with a whip to make us go in a particular direction at a particular speed.
So, that’s what we do, not because it’s right or wrong, but because that’s what we’ve been taught to do from an early age, wear our shame tinted blinkers and drag our burdens behind us. After a while, we don’t even imagine a better time or place where we may get to wear the rose tinted glasses.
We’ve been so beaten into submission that we don’t even have to be wearing the blinkers for the world to be tinted with shame and we assume that this is our lot, this is all we deserve. Yesterday, today, tomorrow, who knows, maybe even for ever?
Sh
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Letting go of the demon's hand - Day 15 - A blurry snapshot
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A blurry snapshot
Like all of the others this snapshot is founded very much in the shadows. So much so that one of the first questions that arise is where in the midst of the shadows is our subject? You won’t see him if you look too closely or carefully as he doesn’t want to be seen. Perhaps if you look away and look back you will catch a fleeting glimpse of something. You may not know what it was you saw, but a part of you would have registered it.
Amidst the shadows is a large overcoat, time has bleached it of a specific colour and the shadows have tinged it grey. However there is a pattern that distinguishes it from its surroundings and someone in the middle of the overcoat is the reason for its existence. At first he thought he hid there because it was warm and re-assuring like a kindly grandfather but now he wonders if there’s more than that.
In case you hadn’t guessed there’s a little boy hidden in the middle of the overcoat deep in the shadows. At first it was a safe place for a boy who’d been left behind to hide, then it was a little tight and smelled ‘gamey’. Now it’s squeezing and choking as without his realising the little boy has become a man and neither of them know how to escape from of their prison.
Sh