I Can't Cry Enough

I can't cry

I need to

I try

It gets stuck in there in the depths of my grief and rage and confusion

I can't cry

Really cry

A few tears here and there

But not the catharsis that I crave

The clearing that will open new pathways and help me understand

When I was young I never stopped crying

Back then they said "Stop crying!"

"Why are you always crying?!"

"There's nothing for you to cry about!"

Were they unaware of all there is to cry over on this earth?

Or were they just stuck like I am now in the overwhelming feeling that there's nothing to be done?

How can this be?

Were they afraid that if the crying started it would never stop?

Would the tears of generations spill out forever?

Would they never be able to see anything but the suffering?

The Buddha said that suffering is part of it and by fighting the pain, resisting the pain, we increase the pain

I'm all in for feeling it and releasing it and walking through it

I want to be cleansed and clarified in my own grief but the tears will not come and I don't know what to do

How to move forward in a world that is filled with so much hate without the ability to cry for it

To avoid the shame that followed crying in my younger years I grew numb

I medicated

I worked myself to a nub

I kept the tears at bay no matter the cost

They told me there was nothing to cry about and their shame was too much to bear so I chose to believe them and not myself

I chose to believe them and not my open, beautiful heart that felt it all

That sweet, vulnerable heart that KNEW the way things were was NOT OK

I believe myself now and yet the scar tissue that formed to protect my little self from ridicule and shame has hardened and now I'm stuck carrying all the pain with nowhere to send it

Even when I cry, I can't cry enough