Broken. In a society that prizes perfection - or at least the image of perfection - being “broken” is akin to being junk. “Nobody wants that one - it’s broken!” “Why did you give me this - it’s broken!’ and so on…

As someone who has struggled with chronic pain, depression, and all the ancillary drawbacks those conditions come with I felt broken. Everything that was bad in my life - my nonexistent relationship with my parents, my struggles as a father, as a husband, as a friend - those all tracked back to me being broken.

The epiphany moment for me was when I realized that it wasn’t just me that was broken - it was all of us. The only difference was in the way we were broken and how we chose to respond to it. Rather than being a victim of being broken, I decided to take control and be the best I could be, no matter how broken I was.

As I worked through this I thought of a book that I had as child; a book of fables and stories that I hadn’t thought of in years. One of the stories in there was The Steadfast Tin Soldier by Hans Christian Andersen; the soldier in the story is broken, yet at the end becomes whole.

Being broken has become a theme in my family recently; my youngest is struggling mightily with his diabetes and my middle child is struggling with himself and his relationships, and his role as husband and father. They both feel broken to a degree; I’ve been there and I can tell. They are both capable of rising above it; yet this is something I can’t do for them, they have to do it for themselves.

Today’s poem talks about brokenness, and how it pervades our world.

What’s Broken

The slate black sky. The middle step
of the back porch. And long ago

my mother’s necklace, the beads
rolling north and south. Broken

the rose stem, water into drops, glass
knobs on the bedroom door. Last summer’s

pot of parsley and mint, white roots
shooting like streamers through the cracks.

Years ago the cat’s tail, the bird bath,
the car hood’s rusted latch. Broken

little finger on my right hand at birth—
I was pulled out too fast. What hasn’t

been rent, divided, split? Broken
the days into nights, the night sky

into stars, the stars into patterns
I make up as I trace them

with a broken-off blade
of grass. Possible, unthinkable,

the cricket’s tiny back as I lie
on the lawn in the dark, my heart

a blue cup fallen from someone’s hands.

-- Dorianne Laux