Peace Rock

There is a peace rock
out by her front gate
with a piece of driftwood
from the ocean
beside it.

Her life has been
a journey
in search of peace,
from childhood nights
spent shaking
in terror in bed
while her parents
waged battle
in the living room,
to a young marriage
where her spirit
was battered
nearly to annihilation,
through liberation
and becoming
a human person
on the earth
who finally
came to realize
she had a right
to be here,
there was always
the search for home,
always the need
for peace,
which became,
over the years,
more important,
more necessary
to her,
than love.

Peace
can be
elusive.

The first peace
she found
by stripping away
all that was
not peaceful:

the tyrannical partner,
then the abusive partner,
both had to go.

Then came the years
of a home full of
turbulent teenagers,
whose turmoil
took a toll
on her heart,
when peace
was on
the other side
of their noisy
launching.

It was then
that her spirit cried
"Enough!
I have done
enough waiting,"
when she took
a huge trusting leap
into the unknown,
moving into
the life
of her dreams,
by the sea,
which had called
to her
for decades,
while she waited
for fledglings to
be ready to leave
the nest.

It was now or never time,
and so
she did
the biggest trusting
she would ever do
and made the leap.

Finally 
her spirit came
home to herself.
She was in
her right place.
In time,
she was
living alone.
Both her home
and her spirit
were peaceful.
Choosing solitude
had finally
brought her
peace.

The ocean
and nature
were her lovers,
and they were
Enough
to keep joy ringing
in her
for ten glorious years.

When she left
that place,
and moved inland,
she mourned the loss.
But peace
came along with her
and stayed,
as she learned
to make a home
where she
was planted,
since she
couldnt have
the home
that she
had dreamed.

She found
this peace rock
by the sea,
rolled it to her car,
up and over
onto the floorboards.
At home, she rolled it
across the yard
and planted it
by the front gate.
She watered it
and watched to see
what it would grow
in this
unaccustomed soil.

It grew
more peace,
for this is a commodity
that one may seek
outwardly
for a
long lonely lifetime,
but which can only 
be found
within.