Several months after I posted this poem to Oprah’s “Remembering Your Spirit” page on the web in 2000, I received a note from a producer asking me to call her about the possibility of appearing in a segment on Oprah about surrender. I was asked to provide several photos and additional information about my life and perspectives. Whether it was because I was too whacked or not whacked enough, I was not selected for the appearance.
Honestly, I don’t know if I could have gone through with it if they had said “you’re on”.
A few weeks ago, talk of an old love got me digging through my archives to find this one. Here it is for what it’s worth 10 years later:
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Take Y, for example. He is a big, fat St. Bernard. No purpose in life but to run from hand to hand, licking and panting until he finds food. Before he’s finished eating from your hand, he’s already picked up another scent to follow.
no more strays
good-bye old loves
it used to be enough
to prove I could win
a part of you
and anyway
you only wanted
a part of me
the part that wiped up
your messes and
held you when
you shivered.
good-bye to you
who only let me
throw the ball to you
when no one else
was looking
to you who
needed my brains
and siphoned them out
through my heart
knowing I would
gaze back grateful
proud of being enough
to arouse the
animal in you.
when I meet you again
I will resist
grinding myself into
dog food
for a chance to
get a call returned
or a birthday wish
or a check in
when it is me
who is in need.
I don’t blame you
with every lick
you told me
that I didn’t count
unless I fed you.
JULIE ANN STEVENS 