The Best Medicine Totake Poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar

I could have not have said it yesterday,
With a consenting to contentment meant...
What today I can say to anyone,
How I comprehend what I thought had been...
Obscure and abstract messages delivered,
But in my mind I knew they were personally sent.
They would not leave.
Like pieces of a puzzle each day something connected.
Something in my mind became affected to give them time.
And time I gave each piece,
More of it to satisfy my growing curiosity.

I could not have said it yesterday,
Or the day before nor those days before that.
But it is with faith that I keep and forward steps I take,
That has helped me tremendously to eliminate regrets.
Those regrets I had let marinate to leave me in fear.
Fear that I knew too well with a keeping it near.
And that puzzle with pieces I spent time to put together,
Showed how my kept faith assisted my survival...
Through treacherous pitfalls and frightening stormy weather.
With a slow diminishing of fear I grew stronger to feel even better.

Faith I relied upon to recognize my strengths.
Faith I relied upon to recognize what I should ignore,
And not contemplate to become easily tempted.
Although with kept faith I believed to have been powerful,
There were moments I experienced the taste of being teased.
And the taste of being teased left me to face consequences.
Stupidity greeted me on my knees pleading to leave me alone.
And stupidity seemed to have repeatedly rewind in my mind,
Until my last visit with it...
Proved I could not accuse anyone else for what I had condoned.

And that was the best medicine to take.
With no one around to witness...
A charading of a faith I made claims to have been strong,
But nearly abandoned to be weakened by the taste...
Of something I knew would create for me more headaches.

I could have not have said it yesterday,
With a consenting to contentment meant...
What today I can say to anyone.
And that is...
From experiences not intended,
Without faith there is no exit.
Only one entrance that leads to a lifetime of misery.
And a lifetime of misery hopping from one temptation,
To others with druthers...
Is not what I suggest or recommend to find happiness.

It's okay to be curious.
But recognize stupidity and quickly from it leave.
No matter how it dresses to impress.
And...
Without feeling a need to explain.
Leave it with faith kept to keep intact.