We have had some late nights, long days and big emotions in our family this week. Honestly, I’m exhausted.

As always, though, there are joys and profundities woven among the difficulties.

I have been sharing lent updates (and other bits and pieces) on my Substack, here. I am finding our lent activities quietly hopeful and restorative.

I feel held by this season, with its gentle rain and sweet snowdrops. There’s no rushing Spring, yet new buds and flowers appear daily. Sometimes, new blooms open within the time I am out at work. There is a little more light in the day, and there are breaks in the grey skies for small bursts of blue sky and sun. There’s a bit of warmth in the day, but still occasion to light the fire in the evenings.

Ten years ago, at this time of year, I lost an IVF baby through an ectopic pregnancy, and even now as another February progresses into March, I feel the companionship of my grief. It was a sadness that taught me a lot, so I feel I can walk with it hand in hand, but it is still sadness.

Today, I sit on a bench outside our house. There is a breeze that still carries quite a chill, but there is sun on my face, birds singing, and children playing. My adopted son is having a birthday party. I am so proud of him. He walks with his own shadows of grief and trauma, but I see more and more light and hope in his life as time goes on.

This week was so hard for me emotionally, for various reasons. And this post is not really about putting a positive spin on that. I am not even ready to process and make peace with some of the things I have been holding. But I am reminded of two poems I wrote. The first is inspired by my son, and the second is a poem I wrote for anyone who is hurting. It is meant to feel like a deep breath.

I hope that these words resonate with someone else who needs a little comfort this spring-time.

There was a boy
There was a boy who lost his smile
At the bottom of a murky swamp.
Beneath tangled weeds
In sucking soil,
In the darkest waters,
It lodged itself.

At the surface, the water barely lapped
It oozed around his boat, stagnant and flat.
But in that dark night,
Despite his snarls and swipes,
Around him came a legion of flickers.
An owl with huge, white wings
And shining, orb-like eyes
Patrolled the skies
And kindly toads whispered
In the flashes of the fireflies.

At first, all the boy heard
Were frightening croaks and groans
Everything unsafe, everything unknown.
But even the smallest of lights
Can encroach on the gloom of the darkest nights
The near-silent flight of the sharp-eyed owl,
The glow of the gentle words of the toads,
The soft murmur of the firefly lights
Held the boy in his boat
Held the boy afloat.

And his shoulders and arms began to uncurl
And his eyes and ears began to unfurl
And the boy found the strength to take up an oar
And a string on his boat pulled his smile from the floor
And he pulled away from the swamp and its gloom
And he looked at the fireflies, the stars and the moon
And the smile found its way from the string to his face
And he kept on rowing from that very dark place.

Balloon
Here’s the basket, vast enough,
Strong enough.
Hewn from woven wicker,
Tough enough
To travel the distance,
To carry it all.

The flames are alive and dancing,
The huge balloon billowing,
Magnificent.

Throw it all in.
Your rage, righteous and inexplicable
Wrench it
From that hard, knotted spot
In your centre
And throw it in.
Your pain.
Let it pour into the basket,
Though it flows as cold and sharp as ice.
Your fear, even as it presses in
On your lungs
Even as it shrinks your heart.
Throw it in, in all its swathes of blackness.
Throw it in.

Your loss and sorrow, too.
These, hold tenderly
In the palm of your hand.
Blow them in a stream of rainbow-tinted bubbles
To the safety of the basket.

The lies you believed.
These malicious things should be
Dealt with firmly.
Throw it all in.
The jealousy, ugly and tentacled.
The hate and resentment.
Throw it all in.

The balloon can hold
The weight of the world.
Watch it rise
Into the vast sky
Over snow-capped mountains
Through night and day
Past stars,
Away.

And breathe.
A deep breath, full of air that’s fresh,
Full of the small, green tendrils of growth,
Full of sun and life.

Come back any time.
The balloon is big enough.