There is something deeply satisfying about knowing you belong, that you fit somewhere.  I believe we can feel this so deeply because it is likely we’ve also felt the lost, left out and forgotten feeling deeply at some point too.  On top of that we layer comparisons about significance or special-ness, bullied into believing that some are more important than others by our culture or our experience.  But connection – belonging, is more about completeness than it is about uniqueness – the picture isn’t complete until every piece is fitted into place.

So, this poem was begun with a longing, but emerged with a strong belief that each piece has a place, suited, specific, and essential to the whole picture.  Today, is a day of remembrance, of appreciating each and every piece, each and every sacrifice made by individuals who accepted the part they played to maintain freedom, recognizing and remembering them as part of the complete picture.  We remember them as individuals, relatives, friends, women and men who belonged to communities and loved by those communities.

My sense of belonging is heightened by the sacrifices made.  My hope, then, is that my longing to belong helps me to let others find their place too. That might go a long way to keep the horrors of war as memory rather than current reality.

Sky Blue

Invisible as a piece of jigsaw
shuffled among those easily chosen
and locked into place,
(a fire engine red one needed
for a kite and one with script
to finish a sign) leaving
a solid blue shape lost
among a thousand blues, until –
with a little luck, some elimination,
and sheer determination
by a true puzzler who knows
a missing jigsaw piece
is not a hole but a longing
satisfied by only one
particular sky blue piece
slipping smoothly into place.

© 2017 – Laurel Archer

Featured picture: Beacon Hill Park, Victoria