Conversations in the business of life

The confusion of conversation

“What you think you heard wasn’t what I meant to say.”

What I meant to say
What I thought I said, and
What I actually said

Didn’t come out the way I intended

What you thought you heard, was
What you wanted to hear, not
What was actually said, or
What was really meant

What I wish I had said
And what I wanted you to hear
Is now such a jumble
Of confused thoughts and mixed emotions

The judgements and assumptions surrounding conversations
Move like shifting dessert sands
Each of us an island
Choked
Stuck in our own rightness

Unable to listen, frightened to hear, we
Tear ourselves with anxiety
Longing to free our souls’ true words
In honest clarity

Give me the courage to speak from my heart
With love and compassion
And honest intent
May you do likewise and both of us hear, sensitively,
Our realness.

Charlotte Lavine