Ghost Whisperer Grief Obsession

I am obsessed
with the Ghost Whisperer
as though somehow
my destiny  is linked
to Melinda’s at this crossroad.

Of course, my therapist would say
this is understandable:
Melinda is the name of my mother
whose apocalyptic judgments
I’ve been running from
most of my life.

But that’s not it.   

I have a Ph.D.
I’m not supposed to like TV,
let alone be obsessed
by a show my child
ridicules me for watching
on my DVR.

(Yes, I tape it.
I told you I was obsessed.)

Still, why? I wonder.

At first, I think I was trying
to figure out why
I haven’t seen my dead husband
when I know many do
and hesitate to talk about it.
Evidently mine walked
straight into the Light
and didn’t look back
except to connect through
odd thoughts, dreams,
birds, turkeys and snakes. 

But that’s a different story. 

What does a co-dependent do
when her husband just up and dies
at the same time the nest empties
and she is left behind
with absolutely no rapture,
confused about how to proceed,
feeling like a lost child
in a darkling wood?  

Of course, Jesus
and good pharmaceuticals save.
This is a given.

But curiously, it’s been Melinda
who’s been my prophet
through this grief,
for she has taught me
to fear not
all the ghosts,
to instead be open
to what they have to say,
and to help them to the Light
because when you do,
they’ll come back and protect you.

It’s not a bad philosophy, really.

As I struggle to figure out
how to be a woman now left
with all this sexuality and no husband,
I see that apparently it doesn’t hurt 
to show lots of cleavage
while wearing filmy nightgowns to bed
and running your own antique shoppe.

(Really???)
Why all the boobs?

Is this to signify that Melinda
is the Supreme Mother
with ta-tas full of the milk
of divine compassion?
You can’t miss what look like nursing breasts.
Is she is the maternal goddess
whose mission of mercy balances the world?
Is she the mother I need
and didn’t get?

I can’t quite figure out
this third-wave feminism
I’m trying to embrace
and still be faithful to God,
while hearing the voice
of MY dead grandmother
asking me,  “Where’s your undershirt?!?”
because I was always supposed to
wear one, even in July.

(Obviously, I digress.)

But here’s where life gets interesting:
I started seeing my own ghosts,
and now I’m on to them.

The dark forces scare
and trick you into believing
that they are more powerful
than they really are
so that you’ll despair
and hide piecemeal 
within their pain
until the hopelessness
your doubt engenders
creates the reality
it desires.

They work by force,
manipulation, hidden control
like puppet masters
that we women, just wanting
to be taken care of
like a child’s beloved doll,
allow, emptying ourselves
of our own desires
believing they're not that good anyway.

This I learned from my mother
. . .  and faculty meetings.  

(Now I know why dolls
creep me out
and always have.
I was one, voiceless
except when anxiety
left me Chatty Kathy
with Tourette’s 
while someone else
pulled the string.)

Thus I objectified myself
and condemned others for it
when they didn’t care
the way I wanted.

And I continued Its chaos.

But now I see that
what I fear is what
these ghosts of fear do--
separate parts,
compartmentalize,
disorder until all is lost
or inadvertently thrown away.  

(Is this Jung I see before me?)
  
I fear what I’ve become
and never wanted:
Angry.  Alone.  Afraid.
My mother.

But I know from exorcisms
that Jesus does indeed save.
And I have seen the Light
I swim in
like a fish astonished
to see water
for the first time.

In the busyness of noise
that is the darkness,
the Light
that simply is
just quietly shines,
illuminating, warming
enlivening, growing,
empowering the other
to be fully who they are
and embody hope in Life,
saying no
to what objectifies
and destroys--
patiently restoring
and ordering
and polishing the tarnished
and putting away
the doll’s broken beating heart
by wrapping it in tissue paper
for protection
until it is time to take it out
and share sacramentally again--
In short, by working through
without condemnation
but only firm care
that here I AM
for the good of all,
myself included.

And that something as flimsy
as tissue of care
and light of being 
is what lasts
past the last flicker of TV
late at night.
The rest is just scare tactics
born of frustration
that refuses to accept
“Not my will but thine”
is what shines.

(And no, you may not
milk the cow until you
commit to care for her
as who she is,
trotting free in fields of grace,
happy to come home,
udders full,
after battling ghosts,
at the end of the day.) 

           © 2012 Tess  Lockhart. All rights  reserved.