Education without Graduation

Completion is the goal,
is it not? You identify a need,
educate yourself, change,
grow, evolve until the goal
has become accomplished,
a thing of the past.
That’s how I’ve done everything
all my life, it seems. Passions come,
passions go, and along the way
I’ve learned, changed, grown,
evolved, accomplished,
moved on. Yet, there’s a problem
when recovery is the goal.
What is it that happens
when you can say,
“My name is such,
and I used to eat compulsively”
or “I’m this, a recovered addict.”
You’ve done the drill. Learned,
changed, grown, evolved,
and accomplished. But what happens
when you move on? It’s then you learn
about that line that says,
What we really have
is a daily reprieve contingent
on the maintenance
of our spiritual condition.
And we come back to learn…

barbara hs grad3