I love when I can look back at poetry from decades ago and see how far I’ve come from who I was at one point. I wrote this poem a year before my marriage ended. I was struggling with the longing to serve Christ and be true to who I was built to be but with the pain of knowing that I never would be able to live free of hypocrisy because of the life partner I chose and all our behind-closed-doors secrets.

When you wonder why a woman stays, you forget that she doesn’t always believe all of her options exist. From where she sits, most of the time she truly believes the only ways out are her or the person she is being abused by dying. This is an inside look at the thoughts of someone who loved Christ, loved her husband, loved her children, and yet hated waking up each morning because it meant being a hypocrite for another day since she had to pretend to enjoy her life.

If you are here, please call someone and seek help. There ARE ways out and you can do it safely.

Wondering

Wondering

To the world: Joyous, Beautiful, Lively

To herself: Sad, Hideous, Dead

A mask that is so hard to maintain

Colors begin to streak

Black and white run into one another

Fade to gray

Life ends

Death begins

Only God is not that generous

Instead the pain continues

Day-by-day

Waiting for it to end

Only hopeful that maybe just maybe today will be the day

The day the Son shines through the darkness

And takes over her heart

The day that words can speak life instead of hatred, death, and disgust

The day that love can be shown, felt, and expressed

Then dawn comes in like a lighting bolt

Crushing that hope

Yet another ear pressed against the wall

Listening to the world as they laugh and love and live

While she cries and hates and dies

Eyes pressed to the glass

As she watches the world fall in love

While she falls out of life

Slowly

Ever so slowly

Dying on the inside

Wishing she could take the mask off and end it all

But she can’t because He has given her a purpose beyond the mess

And so she continues living

Hypocrisy at its best

Can one have hope in the Son

Yet want to leave the world?

No one this side of heaven knows the answer

And so it continues daily

That she puts on the mask

And asks God to let today be the day the Son returns

Because then she can end the hypocrisy

Of which she he so often accuses her of living in

And rightly so

Only he doesn’t realize he is the reason why.

©2007 Michelle Vera

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