How I Fell In Love

After all the toxic relationships that I have experienced I still managed to find the man of my dreams and fall in love. A near impossible task I had once thought. For a long time it seemed that I would run away from every serious relationship that presented itself. The key I think... was one man's patience.

I had a five year long terrible and abusive relationship with an A-class narcissist. Controlling, possessive, and always demeaning.  Verbally and emotionally abusive, never physical, but I was always afraid that day would come. It took everything I had to walk away. I had absolutely nothing. It was an incredible struggle to start over. Even now it is hard to look back on just how desolate my life had become. Yet, at the same time, I was free. Being cold and hungry was so much better than being abused.

Venturing out single again was terrifying. My self esteem, my confidence, my true sense of self was completely forgotten. I did manage to round up a date here or there. Turns out I was better looking and more of a catch than I had been lead to believe. Slowly but surely I regained some self esteem, but still always struggled with trusting someone.

I had some hard theories about men and relationships in those days. They made great friends but dating seemed to be the beginning of the end. The same year as my break up, I made such a friend. But unlike all the others, the friendship was constant. For a very long time (about five years long) it stayed just that. A friendship. Over time he became my very best friend. The one person in the world I could count on for anything. Knowing I was in love? Well everyone knew that that we were in love,  but us.

I remember ending yet another too short romance, I had become a serial dater. My BFF still in the dating game himself, I had come to a point when the thought of something long term didn't really scare me anymore. I had to consider, what or who I was even looking for. I had a distinct exterior in mind. But what I wanted from someone I couldn't even begin to describe. I just knew what I didn't want. Any sense I had that someone was trying to control me was out like the trash. Kicked to the curb. Then I had a thought. I realized that no guy in his right mind would be okay with me having a guy for a best friend. That wouldn't be controlling just good sense. Then I thought, well I definitely knew that no woman would be okay with my BFF having me for a best friend either.

I realized to even consider having long time relationship would mean sacrificing the best relationship I ever had.... wait a sec.... and then I knew. I was in love. I would rather be single forever and keep my BFF then be with anyone else. No wonder no one ever struck me as "the one". He had been right at my side all along. Five long years of building our friendship day after day until finally there was none other to even consider.

My only fearful thought, was not knowing if he felt the same way. But looking back it was quite clear that it was we, not just I, that was in love. So how does one profess their true feelings?

His birthday was coming in a few months and I wanted to give him a gift that would surely reveal my feelings for him. I had always wanted to play the guitar so I took up guitar lessons and began to learn his favorite song. When his birthday came I told he would have to wait for his gift a little longer. Over my birthday and the forth of July we had a trip planned with friends to a small town in the woods with a big lake that congregates everyone between 21 and 30 within a 200 miles radius.

We watched fireworks off the dock and ventured back to the cabin we were staying in. It was probably around 2 AM I gave him my birthday cigar and told him to go light it up out on the deck. I came out with our friend's guitar and told him I was ready to give him his birthday present. So there we were on a warm July night, alone, under the stars in the woods, I played "landslide" on the guitar for him.

We were pretty much together from that day forward. By the following year we bought a house and got married. Seems reckless to get hitched after such a short dating period, especially after all I had been through. But I knew him, inside and out. In five years, he was constant never wavering from who he was. Five years of marriage later, he is still the guy I sat on that deck with.

Hoping you all have a wonderful Valentine's today, and if you are not dating, or seeing, or courting someone.... I suggest you spend it with your best friend.

Through The Trees Book Release

It has been a year in the making and finally it is here. My book, Through The Trees, is finally available for purchase at amazon.com (click here)

I say a "year in the making" but really it is a "lifetime in the making" that brought this book into existence. I hope that it is loved by poetry lovers and book lovers, alike. But mostly, I wrote this book for specific reason. I have endured a great deal of hurt in my life. I reached a point when I was willing to do whatever it takes to move on and be the happy person I knew I could be. This book began as a cathartic process. Using poetry I allowed myself to remember, to go back through my past hurts and experience each and every stage of grief. I moved past denial, I let go of anger, I let myself by sad, and finally I accepted. Everything I held in for the sake of being strong.. I let go.

Publishing this book is the final step I had to take to really become free. By making my words, emotions, and heartache, available to all, it releases me from the guilt, shame, and fear that I have been carrying. It is my true hope that this book reaches those who have been hurt by someone they love, someone who has endured a toxic relationship, someone who cannot seem to move on.

My intent in publishing this work is to convey to others that they are not alone. That love and hope are possible and tangible to those who seek it.

About Through The Trees: Take a walk through the trees, a poetically written journey of nature and metaphor. Experience a wilderness that comes alive with a hauntingly enchanting spirit. We all have or will experience the heartache at the end of a relationship. It could be with a friend, a love, or even someone from our own family. We grieve all the same. This humble book of poetry is a journey of healing. Each chapter represents a stage of grief. The writer touches the hurting soul in a most compassionate way with artful words that are deeply vulnerable and true to the experience of loss. Challenge yourself to deep self reflection as you take a journey through denial, anger, depression, bargaining, and finally acceptance. May you find your way out of the woods and finally be able to see the forest through the trees.

The Sun and the Vine

~From Through The Trees: Chapter 5 Acceptance

A shadow creeps onto the wall capturing the sun’s rays.
The vine shivers in the cold and for the light it prays.
The vine reaches up to the sun calling its name aloud.
The shadow stands still, the shadow of a cloud.


“Sun! Sun!” cries the vine, “Give me back the light!”
It withers with a sorrow and calmly comes the night.
The clouds collide with others; their thunder chases the wind
The vine looks up with hope, only rain the cloud did send.


In the coming morning, dew set upon its leaves.
The vine stands still, it cries and it grieves.
The sun looks down upon it with confusion in its eyes,
“Why do you cry, my vine? Didn't you know that I would rise?”

The vine looks up with a dewy tear,
“My sun when you are away, I truly fear.
You left me to the cold of the night.
Without you I am filled with such a fright.”

“My vine, do not fear. I raised you from a seed,
I would never leave your side and will provide what you need.
You may fear when I am gone each and every night.
But, my dearest vine, I tell you,

You need the dark and rain as much as you need my light.”

Moment in the Night

~ From Through the Trees: Chapter 4 Bargaining

In the deep woods far from many lights

The stars fill the sky like frothy milk .

The scent of Alyssum sweet as honey in the night

Is draping the ground like soft white silk.

All can be seen in the moon’s brightness

Illuminating everything within its scope

Casting starlight onto the lake’s surface

And glistening blades of grass on the hill slopes.

The night appearing to be so gently calm

All life it holds seems to be in peace

And after such turbulent ventures

There is relief in such attainable ease.

I feel a sense of safety in this night

It as if tonight alone was called in truce,

So without foreboding I might freely roam

Passing through realms of bitter spruce.

Glaring eyes are held in the caves

And sneering mouths are tightly bound

Passage is granted for the night

For the moment I am safe and sound.

I cannot see the lurking monsters

Only the night’s beauty is lit by moon.

It is in these moments that I wonder

If I cast judgment far too harsh and too soon.

I realize now that I have found sweet content

This calm night is how I had wished it to be seen

For in this journey there is so much I could resent

But now I see beyond its smoky screen.

Within me I am stirred by a hopeful presence

I release it with a sigh from wakeless bliss.

I see far into the forest’s eye and find fortune

To have known a moment such as this.

---

Copyright © Nina C. Palmer 2014. All rights reserved.

The Cloud

~ From Through the Trees: Chapter 3 Depression

The Cloud

Starlit eyes grace the dark night clouds.

Blanketing the heavens with a muslin shroud,

It drapes silently over the forest canopy.

Drifting its train through the pine trees.

It falls between the branches to the floor,

Sweeping the earth as many times before.

Dragging along following the winds.

With no repentance for its sins.

Caught up in gnarly twigs and boughs

Remnants linger behind as coddled clouds.

Hugged in the branches caressed in leaves.

It sobs of dew on pine bark sleeves.

The break of day crests over the mountain.

The night clouds come apart like cotton.

It trembles in its warmth and starts to thin,

Mourning begins to awaken within.

And from the tree limbs it drifts below,

Over fallen needles it sulks with sorrow,

Dissipating into a heavy humid mist,

It wanders; questioning why it even exists.

Copyright © Nina C. Palmer 2014. All rights reserved.

Yellow Roses

~from Through the Trees, Chapter 2: Anger

You have spoiled the seeds that you buried

With trample and flood at your feet,

And though we grew with fury,

Our scents could never be sweet.

Our crooked stems extend with angst,

You played with our petals too long,

We’ve become tangled and interlaced

Our moment of perfect plucking is gone.

For who would want a stem so bent—

Unsuitable for the shape of any vase

So here we are un-plucked with discontent,

Writhing with the sun on our face.

Shall we be your yellow roses,

Releasing all our petals to you

To be gathered in gnarly poesies

Or left to wilt into a bed of Rue?

Rooted in hardened clay

Our garden in need of tending

Petals on the wind seem at play,

But they are just pretending.

And when the blossom dies

Neither flower nor bud to find,

All will be heard is the gardener’s cries

From the piercing of thorns left behind.

---

© 2014 Nina C Palmer. All rights reserved

The Mist

~ From Through the Trees, Chapter 1: Denial

Going down a lone dirt path,

It winds and twists through the valley

Swarmed in vines tangled in wrath

Clinging to earth feverishly and madly.

The mist stretches down the mountain’s side

Into the vale it hangs heavy down below.

In the haze, I am able to run and hide,

Left alone to distress and throe.

On this aimless path I wander,

The morning’s mist full of gloom.

I walk all alone so quiet and somber

The air is scented of Spanish Broom.

The mist is heavy and fills my chest,

I can’t breathe its humidity and I gasp.

To my knees I fall and I lay to rest.

My breath is stifled and filled with rasp.

Bogged down by the mist’s weight,

I drown in nothing more than heavy air.

Lying on a dirt path I accept my fate,

I am enveloped fully in its snare.

On this unmarked path I will not be found.

It seems the fog will forever persist,

And to this path I am eternally bound,

Fatefully indentured to the mist.

Copyright © Nina C. Palmer 2014. All rights reserved