hallow’s poems

'home' (2024) expresses the dark and twisted path of reclaiming 'home' after no contact. it also divulges on the intertwinings of woundedness, sex, and lust (pathology). hand in hand, 'children' (2021) shows us the effect early woundings of childhood abuse and neglect can have: lonely broken souls who project their pain as malevolence and sexual pathology.

What it means to be a ‘witch’

'That feeling deep inside me that knew that those people weren't right about me, about who I was and what I had the capability to become, and about the world and all its potential, and the ethics of the way in which we lead society and what it really meant to be strong...'

#2 conflict

'the desire and option to stand defiant in this situation might be your subconscious way of questioning, rebelling, and fighting the conditionality of this attitude (especially as complexity seems to unravel its supposed firm foundations), questioning its validity, questioning the wounds it may have imparted on you in other moments of your life...

Comment on flower in the cracks; leaving my family by Tebo

In reply to <a href="https://youwillbedefensive.wordpress.com/2024/07/03/flower-in-the-cracks/comment-page-1/#comment-21">sea</a>. Thanks for sharing it

Comment on flower in the cracks; leaving my family by sea

In reply to <a href="https://youwillbedefensive.wordpress.com/2024/07/03/flower-in-the-cracks/comment-page-1/#comment-20">Tebo</a>. thanks for your comment, tebo !! i'm so glad this impacted you

Comment on flower in the cracks; leaving my family by Tebo

what a touching account of being different in one’s environment and having to make crucial decisions because of it.

home poems

these poems were written in a moment where sensory elements in my environment brought me back to my old home and childhood; i wanted to capture my longing for that time and place. having grown up on an estate in london and finding a space in the arts to talk about it might be an unusual perspective that i'd like to share.

Comment on #1 the shadow by Ana Daksina

Comment on #1 the shadow by sea

In reply to <a href="https://youwillbedefensive.wordpress.com/2024/08/26/1-the-shadow/comment-page-1/#comment-16">Ana Daksina</a>. <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Thank you for your comment, Ana!</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph -->

Comment on #1 the shadow by Ana Daksina

Hey, Sad: You’re not alone. I’ve actually had this very thing happen to me more than once in my life ~ once, the two people not only looked identical, they spoke similarly and had a few distinctive mannerisms in common as well ~ and, get this, their last names had only one letter of difference between them. I gave up wondering whether it’s some kind of gaslighting experiment long ago and went with what I could control: the integrity of my relationship to the current person.

#1 the shadow

'if you grew up in a dysfunctional family like i did, traumatic events are likely to trigger some very early vulnerable wounds. due to a lack of support or stability in the home, you may learn to blame yourself for things that go wrong in the family (see shame). it can mean that we become highly self-conscious and develop the harmful habit to blame ourselves excessively, egregiously for our inadequacies, differences, and mistakes...

where is home? the working class council estate

'the essentiality of leaving, slowly but surely, and the heartbreak, the injustice of home being taken from you, as a working-class child. it must have fossilised my already-formed propensity towards masochism. the moving on, the moving forward, away from a temporary state of belonging; a temporary home, because, a poor person has no right to feel stable, and a flower in the cracks has no right to belong...

flower in the cracks; leaving my family

'i came to accept my own limitations - that i couldn't stay in the fire and not be burned by it. that's why i left. shame and guilt and doubt follow me around in life, as can that old lust for family belonging. but they've become rather small shadow creatures that i treat almost as children who don't know any better...

Comment on so you want to save the world? by sea

In reply to <a href="https://youwillbedefensive.wordpress.com/2023/11/21/so-you-want-to-save-the-world/comment-page-1/#comment-7">Laurettaodea</a>. it sure is - thank you for sharing your voice! from our perspective, it takes a lot of practise but it definitely happens slowly. healing seems to happen when we work on understanding our wounds and how they came to be, and self-validating our pain every time it comes up. healing wishes to you from us

Comment on the sharing of shame by sea

In reply to <a href="https://youwillbedefensive.wordpress.com/2023/12/16/the-sharing-of-shame/comment-page-1/#comment-6">Laurettaodea</a>. Thank you for your kind message

Comment on so you want to save the world? by Laurettaodea

Healing sure is a journey how does one truly heal when the scars wont heal

Comment on the sharing of shame by Laurettaodea

Never be ashamed of how you speak or what you speak of my friend any kind of abuse should not be tolerated so proud of you for speaking out for I know all too well what all kinds of abuse does to us as human beings

to be or not to be; on anger

'it became clear to me all of a sudden, hey... am i like... default angry and defensive because i'm overcompensating for having been silenced and reduced to silence all my life? looked over like a puny and weak girl child, either invisible, stupid, or mean, but above all not worth listening to? powerless?...

the sharing of shame

'having been emotionally abused means that i walk on eggshells and doubt myself when i shouldn’t, and that i’m silent when i should be just as loud as everyone else. having experienced emotional abuse and dysfunctionality in the home shows up as questioning the value of my ideas, of my worth, of my right to a voice, and preparing for the emotional slap in the face...

so you want to save the world?

'perhaps it’s easier to think that it’s our nature to be well, greedy, manipulative, selfish, and hateful… rather than look our true fears in the eye: the fear that we’re fragile, vulnerable, and hurt. that’s okay. it’s never too late...