The Buttons

Consciously
or not, you know them,
just the right ones
that cut through my veneer of rationality
to the most vulnerable places,
to make me bleed
from places I would have sworn had no blood left,
to draw anger from my reservoir of love.

You press them, and I dance,
like puppet on strings,
using the vulnerabilities I handed you
to bring out the worst.
The fear.
The anger.
All out of context and tangled
in history and childhood and betrayed trusts.

All for your pleasure,
your need
to control that which is not yours,
which you drove away,
banished, and yet can not quite let go.

Does it make you happy? This pain?
To see me dance?
Does it bring you glee? Joy?
Does it make you stronger? Better?
More powerful?
Does it heal in some mysterious way?

I cannot know.
For your life is not mine.
I live here, quietly
unraveling the wires, disconnecting
from the buttons, making certain
that each time they push, I dance
less,
until there is no connection at all
and any dances I do
are all my own.

About this poem

As a person and as a pastor I see so much anger and purposeful hurt and desire to control those we have thrown away. I understand that it is so, even when I don’t understand the whys.

We can never change the controllers. We can however, slowly, persistently, cut the strings that control us.

And dance.

Tom