Recovery Part 2 –A Poem In Your Pocket

**This is the second post in a series about living with and recovering from serious illness. The first post Recovery-The New Normal appeared last week.**

Today is Poem in your Pocket day. As it is described on poet.org's website, the idea is simple: "select a poem you love during National Poetry Month then carry it with you to share with co-workers, family, and friends."   

So, I got to thinking about which poem I would choose.
I realized that I wanted to choose different poems for different pockets. The educator in me wanted something children would enjoy such as Father says by Michael Rosen. The British cynic in me wanted something tongue-in-cheek and sarcastic like the Second World War poem In Westminster Abbey by John Betjeman and the caregiver in me wanted something that would express how Jonny’s illness affected us, and what that means for recovery.

I have been pondering how to describe recovery and now think that in order to understand the many facets of it, you first have to understand the myriad of ways the patient and their family are affected by the trauma of serious illness. Each of the pieces that together make up that experience, all need time to heal and to heal in their own time.

One of my favorite poets is Ted Hughes. ( I studied his poetry in high school and still love and can quote lines from his poems.)  If I had to choose a poem to put in my care giver pocket right now, it would be Wind by Ted Hughes.

                                                            Artist-Magnesium Brown

Wind    

This house has been far out at sea all night,
The woods crashing through darkness, the booming hills,
Winds stampeding the fields under the window
Floundering black astride and blinding wet

Till day rose; then under an orange sky
The hills had new places, and wind wielded
Blade-light, luminous black and emerald,
Flexing like the lens of a mad eye.

At noon I scaled along the house-side as far as
The coal-house door. Once I looked up --
Through the brunt wind that dented the balls of my eyes
The tent of the hills drummed and strained its guyrope,

The fields quivering, the skyline a grimace,
At any second to bang and vanish with a flap;
The wind flung a magpie away and a black-
Back gull bent like an iron bar slowly. The house

Rang like some fine green goblet in the note
That any second would shatter it. Now deep
In chairs, in front of the great fire, we grip
Our hearts and cannot entertain book, thought,

Or each other. We watch the fire blazing,
And feel the roots of the house move, but sit on,
Seeing the window tremble to come in,
Hearing the stones cry out under the horizons.

-- Ted Hughes

I chose this poem because it resonated with me in terms of how we felt after Jonny’s resurgence of trigeminal neuralgia last August.    The traditional analysis of this poem focuses on the strength of nature versus the insignificance of man. Hughes' various descriptions of the house's vulnerability in the storm are so powerful. To me, our house is our haven: a place of great happiness, security, love and strength. So the image of the house unhinged by the storm, reflects for me how the foundations of our family's security might be shaken by a crisis.  We were like the house in the poem- Alone, out at sea, in the dark, facing many challenges. Jonny was far from good health in terms of the distance he needed to travel to have a full emotional, spiritual and physical recovery. It is only now, nine months later that I can begin to describe how we have been affected by his illness.

I wondered if I changed the title of Hughes’ poem from Wind to  Illness, how the poem would suit its new headline.  Surprisingly it spoke very clearly to me about how it feels to be hit by a crisis, diagnosed  with a serious illness or to have major surgery or invasive treatment – how the experience thunders deep into your core and shatters your equilibrium.

One friend recovering from brain surgery for a benign tumor told me,
“I didn’t realize how violent the surgery would shake me, how invasive and how fearful and vulnerable I would feel.” 

As Hughes’ poem describes, you are literally “out at sea” and your mind, body and soul are  battered on all sides.

As you travel through the initial storm of diagnosis and surgery, nothing looks the same or feels secure or grounded.

The tent of the hills drummed and strained its guyrope,

The fields quivering, the skyline a grimace,
At any second to bang and vanish with a flap;

You find yourself tripped up by your vulnerability and fragility,like

the house (that)
Rang like some fine green goblet in the note
That any second would shatter it. 

It is hard to concentrate on anything as the poem says, 

….....................................................we grip
Our hearts and cannot entertain book, thought,

Or each other........

And what is left from the ordeal is a great deal of loss. A friend recovering from breast cancer wrote,
“I lost my breasts, I lost my hair, I lost my self confidence, my identity.  Nothing looked or felt the same, emotionally or physically.”
The poem describes how the morning after the storm, everything looks different...


Till day rose; then under an orange sky
The hills had new places, and wind wielded
Blade-light, luminous black and emerald,
Flexing like the lens of a mad eye.


Healing from illness or crisis is greater than just recovering from surgery or circumstances. It is about recovering from the whole experience from first symptoms, first shocks, first diagnosis onwards. It also affects the patient’s family and each member needs to heal in their own way and from their own perspective-as patient, as caregiver, as spouse, as child, as parent.

I also chose this poem because it reminds me that there is hope, that although much is displaced through illness- the roots of the house in the poem "move" -but at the end the house is still standing. Although  the windows tremble they  do not shatter….illness shakes you but does not destroy you. What comes next is repairing the damage of the experience inside and out. It is about putting the house back together, brick by brick.  That’s where recovery comes in and why it takes way longer than it appears.

So I'll be carrying this poem in my pocket for a while.

 

Many thanks to all of you for reading Brainstorm and to those of you who have left comments on the blog or sent me messages via email/Facebook. It's great to receive your feedback and I try hard to respond to every message.

If any English teachers are reading this, please do not publish my grade!

I would like to include some of your experiences of recovery from illness, loss or other life changing situations in my next posts. Of course I will only share your stories with permission and will preserve anonymity.

How have you been shaped by serious life changes? What does recovery look like to you?

 What poem(s) would you put in your pocket(s) and why?

Have a great week and keep in touch

Gilly


Recovery-Part 1-The New Normal,
 Recovery Part 3- What Does Recovery Look Like? 
Recovery Part 4-Take a Break

** Please email me at gilly@bringingbooksofcomfort.org or leave a comment on this post below. I'd love to have your feedback.


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