Her Treasured Stones

Her spirit ached,
Fatigued, but too stubborn to release,
The bucket of rocks she was carrying.
Each stone, a story,
Memory,
Of a life who’d touched hers.
Sometimes through a book, a video, an essay,
An honest, even painful, conversation with a friend,
Other times through small interactions at work,
A career working with survivors of domestic violence,
Human trafficking… everyday life, full of stories.
We’ve all survived something, haven’t we?

She dug through the rocks, looking,
Glancing,
At each stone as it tumbled over the others.
How many of these were hers to carry?
An awfully heavy bucket,
Full of stories of injustice and tragedy and loss,
Each one tenderly tucked into her empathic heart,
Without a stream to escape to,
Where the stones could, maybe,
Find a new home,
Together, making a beautiful melody,
Water cascading over the layers,
Textures,
Of all these stones,
Stories,
Turning their collective calamity into something resembling,
Beauty.

Where is that creek?
Is it close?
Can anyone hear it?
This bucket is so full,
Nearly snapping her in two under its weight,
As she tries,
And aches,
To carry it on.

She’s carried it for so long,
Adding one treasured story at a time,
That she hadn’t even realized it’s substance,
Til her spirit couldn’t step anymore,
Giving in,
Before her body did,
Pleading,
Grasping,
Frantically searching,
For the map,
To that hidden creek,
So she could dump her treasures,
Lovingly,
Into the babbling water:

A story of a woman cowering in fear from an angry lover,
Of a girl losing her life to racist systems that failed to protect her,
Of a migrant starving in the desert while grasping at the hope of providing for his family,
Of a boy losing control after one more sip of that drink that keeps calling him back for more…

To dump the whole bucket upside down seems –
Careless.
Her spirit hasn’t had to endure these things,
She doesn’t have the solutions,
Can’t seem to find the solutions,
That will right these wrongs,
The least she can do is carry them, it seems.

Until the weight,
Of one more stone,
Halts her where she stands,
Eternally immobilized by her bucket of stones.

How does she learn to release?
To let go of these sacred treasures?

So she can, at the very least,
Add texture and depth to this rippling creek,
Trusting that the beauty of their lives,
These stories,
Won’t be forgotten,
Just because she isn’t,
Tugging,
Pulling,
Dragging,
Hundreds – thousands – of them around with her.

That maybe the responsibility to mend,
The GRAND ACHE of all the world,
Isn’t hers to take on.

Maybe,
Hers is an invitation,
To sit by the stream and bear witness,
To the stories held within this ever-moving creek.
And when the next traveler comes,
Walking,
Down the dirt path to find some refreshment by this stream,
Maybe she’ll get to tell the story,
Of a stone who changed her,
Of a stone who touched the world,
And how it continues to shift,
To mold,
This little stretch of creek,
Alongside a treasured collective of holy stones,
Magnificent stories,
Decorated all across the stream-bed,
Each one adding beauty and texture to its sound.

This story was published on Substack. View the original story here.