Pain is Only Pain, After All
My First Yoga Class, Summer 1998

Desperately seeking:
Salvation,
Freedom,
From the pain.

A cure, a cure, a cure.
Somewhere,
There must be a cure.

Been through:
Every medication,
Every modality,
Except one.

Drawn somehow
To figure out
This yoga thing,
To give it a try.

Didn’t know much about it really.
Thought of it as pretzel poses
That I could never do anyway.

But what if,
What if,
I could actually do it?
And what if,
What if
There was something there that could help?

What if?
What if?

So, here I am
In my first ever yoga class.

Keep in mind
It took a great deal of effort
Just to get here.

It is taking a great deal of effort
Just to stay here,
To sit in easy pose,
And wait for class to start.

Effort meaning working through pain
Just to get up,
To get ready,
To drive,
To arrive,
To be here.

But I’ve come here
With an Attitude!

I am going to do this
No matter what!

It might flare the pain.
Temporarily.

No, not might.
It does
Flare the pain,
Temporarily.

So much pain!

But so what!

I realize
Like a revelation,
Like a light going on
in my brain:

It cannot actually hurt me.
It cannot actually injure me.
This yoga.

I am doing gentle movements,
Some more strenuous,
Working through enormous amounts of pain.

Observing the pain.
Observing the movement.
Observing my body.

My body,
Doing things
It hasn’t done
Since all this pain began.

I feel somehow:
Liberated.

I feel:
Exhilarated.

My body is more than just the pain.

My body can still move.

My body can still bend.

My body can still twist.

My body can still stretch.

And, pain be damned,
There is still some tone.
There is still some muscle.
There is still potential
For my body
To do whatever I want it to do.

Regardless!

Regardless of pain!

That, my friends,
Is the day I learned
That:

Pain is Only Pain, is Only Pain, is Only Pain,
After all.
After all is said and done,
Pain is Only Pain!!!

Even while coping with it,

Even while dealing with it,

Day,
after day,
after day,
after day,

Pain is Only Pain, after all!

And iWendy
Can do anything I want to do
Regardless!