My Obsessions

                Hello, my name is Ashley Lavergne and thank you for allowing me to introduce myself. I´m a five-foot-four, brown hair, brown eyed, metal gypsy missionary poet from south Louisiana; and, no, I´m not from New Orleans.  I was baptized into both the Catholic and Evangelical church, I´m the oldest of nine homeschooled children; and, yes, we had television growing up.
                My grandma shot squirrels and chickens like in an old story book, my dad taught me about super heroes and to enjoy everything I cook, my mom taught me how to survive in spite of what everything is looking like, and those eight little monsters taught me to love life.

                

                Now, life taught me that music is the language of eternity, and that poetry is words painting the picture of what eternity sings – just like in the beginning when God spoke in a thunderous chorus of creation that was a bigger bang than anything Darwin ever could have thought of.
              You see, words have the power to turn everything around with just one simple phonetic sound – the power to send me flying or crashing to the ground. It´s not a power I gave to them, and would very gladly take from them, yet they overwhelm me. And that is exactly why words and I have this love/hate relationship from which I have gained this sickening tendency to write about my past – to let my mind dwell on things that for some reason didn´t last. To dwell on that place inside of me where I still feel safe because it´s the only time I actually understand simply because it has nothing to do with the day at hand. But when I try to write about today I seem to get confused – I don´t know what I want to say much less what words to choose. Yet while looking behind I not only find the doubts in which I was confined but also the Light that broke through my confines.

                

              And even though people tend to think that I´m living an old disaster – licking my old wounds instead of writing that new chapter – it´s the memories of those “befores” that give me hope for the “afters.” And for a while, I thought that they were right; dark demonic clouds spilled from my pen onto those lines, but now I see them as moments of heroic rescue and brilliant Light. I finally came to see that there are two sides to my plight. I learned to see the very same day in two very different ways: I can either remember how darkness became the captor of my brain, or how in the midst of it all the Light kept me sane, but either way it´s the same old pain.

                

               So just as numerous condemning verses seemed to give my obscurity it´s wings, one simple living Word came in and changed everything. It suddenly felt like I was part of this literary masterpiece based off of the real “never ending story.” As if I were that kid reading and screaming for his mother making the foundations of the castle in the sky quake. Just like that moment when you´re not quite sure if you´re dreaming or awake. And it´s only that Word that shows me the difference between what´s real and what´s fake. And that Word is the very same voice that spoke and broke out crying “Lazarus, come forth from the tomb” and also called me back to life from the death to which I myself had doomed.
              You see, I believe that just as Words formed this world they can also change it. Beauty is not only in the eye of the beholder, but also in the Word that made it. So I can take my pain and allow it to be with beauty painted, or I can take my beauty and allow it to be by my pain be tainted.
            Words are the only things that can change even our memories – they´re the only difference between the night that I nearly died and the day that I miraculously came out alive; between the day that I attempted suicide and the night when a Verb so divine came and saved my life.

              
                Yet, I must say, that the most interesting part of the tale is this – I´m actually not the author of these beautiful words but the story they´ve yet to finish, so please pardon me if I can´t help but to be obsessed by It.

America

               In the beginning we fell. We died in the pride of trying to obtain something that we already had – freedom.
                Like my Momma once said, “Land of the free and home of the stupid;” and yet we still praise ourselves in our independence so putrid. In the name of “freedom” we are on the brink of killing each other without realizing that the freedom we seek shouldn´t choke or smother.
             Why should my rights eliminate yours and why are there tears that validate wars?

                You´re fooling yourselves thinking that we´re founded on Christ like values – we´re founded on cowards avoiding conflict with their pagan king. Yes, they fought and I´m glad they did, but it wasn´t until they realized they could no longer act like scared little kids.
                And we´ve found ourselves yet again in that position – trying so very hard to avoid conflict that we´re actually starting it.

Stupid Cat

August 29, 2014

               Curiosity killed the cat and everyone knows just where she´s at. Hell seduced her – swallowed her whole and even managed to convince her to sell her own soul.
                A minute of pleasure for an eternity of strife – what a curious way some choose to live life. 

Faded Spark

          June 5, 2015

                You were the one who showed me the way and now I come to find that you´ve completely gone astray. I have no idea what to think and I wish I knew what to say.
                I used to feel some type of happy for innocent people not knowing what was happening. They had found some type of joy in this rotten life and I wasn´t going to be the one to add on to their strife. Besides, I knew nothing I could say or do would actually change their minds.
                But you I honestly don´t understand. You already tried it. You were the one who told me not to hide it. And now I find out that you decided not to fight it.
                Explain it to me please. I want to know why you chose this path of supposed ease. I listened to you explain all the ways that it was wrong and here you are singing the same dang song. Did you forget your former explaining? Did you forget the night that gave me the hope and light to uncover and finally fight what was going to kill me?

                This doesn´t make me doubt what I believe, but it makes me wonder if anything is real. 
                It makes me see how God used your moment of clarity to bring me out of the dark, but it also makes me oh so sad that you lost sight of the Spark. It helps me understand how so many feel oh so defrauded thinking that they were lied to when for people like you they had applauded.

Addictive Curiosity

                I still remember when read the sentence that said, “Blessed are the pure at heart, for they shall see God,” and it made me angry. It made me angry ´cause it didn´t seem fair.
                I didn´t believe that, “pure at heart” was possible for somebody like me – somebody who´s heart had been soiled from the beginning. You see, the first time I touched myself improperly was at the innocent age of three, and contrary to popular belief about these things I don´t recall being abused or learning it on a screen. Even before I reached the age of four, thinking the unthinkable came natural to me.
                Now, in my young mind of thoughts my parents´ threatening was reason enough to stop, but because I knew I liked it all I really learned was that I had to hide it. So by the active age of six I was what you could call an “addict.” Of course, I didn´t know that and neither did anyone else and I spent over a decade of life on myself and I wasn’t even old enough to know to ask for help.
                I knew it was wrong, but I didn´t know why – all I knew is that it lulled me to sleep when I became too tired to cry. It became that magic trap door that opened in the floor when I didn´t want to think anymore, and for the next few years it was the way I soared with my mind and image in complete disaccord.
                Then coming to the tweenager age of twelve my curiosity got the best of me and for the very first time I looked at pornography. All on my lonesome I opened up the port hole to the hell that would become my home.
                Being completely honest, seeing those images so very bare that seemed to come out of nowhere really did give me a scare and make my conscious twitch. So I decided I wanted to forget it, but we all know I never did. Little by little my curiosity craved more and my mind became like that of a whore.
                The things that went on inside my mind would take grown men by surprise – as a matter of fact it did when they would find out I was only fourteen after having talked to them. Then they taught me how to cyber in order to get my fix, so I soon stopped letting them know that I was really a kid. The internet became the world in which I hid where I lied about my age and everything I did. It then became hard to have real friends without privately and silently always undressing them. It was hard to have friends without wanting to screw them. I began to avoid anything that could be referred to as “him” in order not to add them to my automatic naked autopilot playlist – I felt guilty for mentally taking advantage of them.

            

           When I finally came to the realization of being oh so very twisted I was to the point where I couldn´t help it, but I still couldn´t see that I was an addict – a realization I came upon when I finally tried to quit. It felt like a monster had taken control of me and I had no idea how to make it let me be. For years it was hard to even try to sleep without it and what made me even angrier about it was that I suffered silently and didn´t allow myself to shout it. Actually trying to quit made me feel worse than when I was actually doing it.

It´s a sad day when you finally see that curiosity has taken you over oh so completely that you can´t even think straight, and what´s even worse is the feeling that it´s too late to take it all back. Opening your eyes and everything seems to be suddenly off track. The cold realization that everything has fallen through the cracks and you don´t know who you are anymore. Knowing that you have the riches of the poor, but no one would actually think to call you “pure.” The sad fact that you caused your own self to mourn, but “no, never again pure.” You know that you are humiliated and hungry, yet oh so very dirty.
              I honestly thought that no one could ever fix me – I was about as damaged as anyone could ever be, so far gone that I wasn´t even worth touching, and so messed up that I was beyond healing.

                 Now, here´s where it gets interesting: did you know that gold is not pure in its original state? A fact that only heat can change. When we all first come through the gate we are not only innocent, but also soiled to begin with. So while pure may not be the reality with which we begin we cannot lose hope about the state in which we end.

Speak

               This is your classic love story in all its cheesy glory about how I found someone who was absolutely perfect for me, and I think anyone can relate to the feeling of accidentally falling for one of their friends. It´s the best and worst sensation to have that, in a way, can be compared to being torn in half. And even though they probably won´t return the sentiment – and they usually don´t – we find the suffering worth it just in order to be close.
                That person that understands you by simply looking in your eyes and in silent communication you wink in reply. I never thought that anyone would ever think like me, yet this special person never judged me as a freak. I never felt more special than when we were together and we seemed like so much more than simple birds of a feather. Even if I felt like I was dying that person would show up and I suddenly felt like my insides were flying. When their soul cried, so did mine; and I needed their voice just in order to smile.
                For the very first time someone had come into my life and finally made me feel like I was worth something. They took all my pain away as they sung the night into day and I slept safely in their arms – the one and only place where I felt like nothing could go wrong.

              

                So how do I explain to you that even though this connection seemed to be sent from above that I was never meant to fall in love? You see this story changes with just one simple word – the person that made me feel on top of the world just so happened to be a girl.
                She never seduced me and never used me; she was just my straight best friend who had no idea what she was doing, and to make it even worse she was actually godly. Even though I had never touched her body I had become addicted to the way she loved me.
                So, now you got all your “holy” Christians  that say, “all got to do is decide” and “it´ll get better if you just give it time;” but what they don´t realize is that they´re taking away your reason to be alive. Would you want to give up what I just described?
                Then you got your L-G-B-T who say that I can´t possibly change. Old Bruce Jenner can become Cait, but for some odd reason I just can´t be straight. Would you actually let me choose if you don´t like what I have to say?
                So this is my message to all of you who fight over me as if I weren´t in the room. One of you has to accept that this is the hardest decision that anyone has ever had to make and the other has to accept that I simply don´t want to live this way. You see, I know that I wasn´t born gay, but I also understand that for reasons outside of the grasps of my hands God didn´t stop me from feeling this way.
                I´m not denying that what I felt was absolutely amazing, but there has to be more to life than just some uncontrollable craving, and what´s even more amazing about Christ is that I´ve come to love Him more than my own life. What I longed for was never sexual or dirty and it is such a lie that every single one of us is perverted. Even so, it was still unhealthy because, in the end, all my selflessness was actually pure selfishness. Like, “giving up everything and all for love,” but you ain´t giving up much if you´re getting what you really wanted.

                
              Now, I´m no advocate, and I´m not trying to start a debate; but there are things on my heart that I just have to state.
              To all of you were just like me, I´m not gonna lie to you: this is not easy. You know how it feels so I don´t have to explain it – wanting to hold on so tight so nobody can take ´em. The sensation that no one else will ever understand – us walking contradictions dying to hold hands.
                So please consider this: if I gave it up it´s because I found something better and it has nothing to do with religious pressure. Because if God loves me just like this why shouldn´t I be willing to love Him just as He is?
                So this is not about what I am or what I´m not but the fact that I love Christ more than what I want. That classic love story in all its cheesy glory about how I finally found the One who was actually perfect for me. 


Petition: Hear the voices of those who have left the homosexual lifestyle

Figments of Reality

                So, according to many, a Christian cannot be possessed, crazy, or depressed. If you´re crazy then you have a demon and if you have a demon then you´re not a Christian – Please!
                Demons raped my mind with the voices of darkness that fill your nightmares; and that ain´t no metaphor. I´ve heard things that would make Stephen King curl up in a ball and cry. Few have truly seen when darkness comes to life. Many know the twinkle that it seems to give our lies, but few have felt it crawling inside.
               

Normal kids are afraid of the dark, but I was afraid to be alone because I knew that darkness wasn´t just when you turned out the lights but where ever and whenever my eyes were closed. You see, darkness for me had little to do with if there was or wasn´t light, but something I´d discovered to be tangled with my insides.
                A teenager terrified and don´t even know why just wishing that they could die just in order to finally find some silence. And there were people who had the nerve to tell me that I wasn´t crazy, but do you really hear sanity in the statement that there are voices in my head?
                My only two options were crazy or possessed. But then there are also people that say a Christian cannot be possessed but only oppressed – do you really think I care where they are when coming to the realization that they can talk? The constant buzzing of a bee hive that would never let me rest in peace.
              And those demons never gave a rip that I was Christian or forgiven; all they knew was that somehow some way I was ripe for the picken´. They´re not scared of you, but of Him whom you´re for, and if they can convince you that you´re not then everything becomes imagination including your God.

          
                 So don´t patronize my state of mind by debating over what it was because those of us that have seen true darkness are the ones who identify the one and only Sun, but we´re in desperate need of help to remember that darkness has not won.