But This Will Give You Poetry

It was the Fall of 2017 and I found myself in what came to affectionately be known as The Circle of Terrible. I was in New Mexico for a retreat with twelve other women who were writers, activists, and leaders in faith spaces, and I guess we all needed to unload some big feelings? When we went around the circle to introduce ourselves in our first session, each of us shared our names, what we do, and the most heart-wrenching, traumatic stories we had experienced in Christian communities in recent years. I wept the entire time.

Two years out from my ejection from evangelicalism, my wounds were still fresh. Through tears and heaves, I told the group that all I had ever wanted was to be good, to please God, to make my family proud. I told them I missed my mom and brothers and that I couldn’t accept the loss of relationship with many of the people I loved most in the world. I told them I had just married an amazing woman one month earlier, and that we had awesome friends and an adorable cat named Prince, but that most days when I sat at my computer to write, I spiraled into feelings of helplessness, meaninglessness, and overwhelming grief.

When I lifted my gaze from the floor, I saw twelve women empathetically nodding along with me. But it was hard to know what to say. We didn’t really know each other, and a cathartic group therapy session was not the purpose of this gathering. So, one of the women sponsoring the retreat turned to a well-worn response: “Julie, I know you lost a lot, but look what you have now! You have a beautiful wife and an incredible community in DC! You are loved for who you really are! You have so much to be thankful for.”

It was too soon. Through fresh tears, I told her that, yeah, it was awesome to have a wife and new friends, but that lots of people get married and make friends in adulthood without losing most of the loved ones from their first few decades of life. I was going to need a minute to come to terms with that.

Three and a half years later, I’ve had that minute, and I can tell you the joy I feel now doesn’t cancel out the sorrow I feel over the loss of other loves. And yet, new life did spring up where my old self had been cut down. I’ve never felt so alive, so at home in my body. I have extraordinary people in my life, but the real freedom I feel is in understanding I can show up as my full self and know my value and worth is not tied to their opinion of me. I can take up space—I can take up lesbian space—in all of my communities and know that I’m okay because I’m me and I’m enough. I went to the sad and lonely place inside, where only God and I can go, and after sifting through the fear, the sorrow, and the overwhelming sense of shame, love began to grow. The roots of that love go deep, and the outgrowth has been peace, delight, genuine compassion for myself and other people.

I recently read a poem by Yrsa Daley-Ward that made me look back on The Circle of Terrible with a fresh perspective. Here’s an excerpt from a poem called “Poetry” in her book bone.

You will come away bruised.

You will come away bruised

but this will give you poetry.

This will give you poetry. I don’t know if you have to be bruised to have poetry, but I know there’s something glorious in that which has been remade. And I think that’s the difference between this poem and the words of that kindhearted woman in The Circle of Terrible. I felt like she was saying, “I know your childhood home that your grandfather built with his bare hands in the Great Depression was just burned down, but look, you got to build this hip new condo in its place!”

Some relationships are irreplaceable. New love doesn’t replace the old.

I would describe my process more like a renovation because it communicates that something else was once there, and much of it was lost. But when something like an old cathedral is renovated, we know the history is preserved. When everything crumbles, we gather up all the valuable pieces and make them the foundation of the next iteration. What was beautiful about what came before? Was it values like integrity and generosity instilled in us by a faith community that didn’t endure? Was it rhythms we saw modeled in mentors that eventually dropped out of our lives? Was it a childlike sense of possibility that was worn down by disillusionment? We get to bring the valuable pieces with us in our process of becoming, even if some of the structures that came before didn’t endure.

I’ve come to a place where I can say I’m grateful for the ways the pain formed me. I’m proud of who I’ve become and excited about who I’m becoming. I’m in love with the poetry.