Being saved instead

Outward creation inward destruction
Can't save anyone else but you can set that intention
Lots of love and work
Needing guidance and strength
Grab your ankles and open wide
Need to have that discussion
Maybe I spoke too quickly
Seeing it through, seeing right through me.
I see a simple difference, but I guess it's not so simple
Not so easy to draw a line.
But when did partnership become ownership
And when did a kiss become a contract.
And how does one diminish the other?
Exhausting exhausted.
Wish I had more to bounce off of, more sympathetic ears
Less judging ones. Fewer bags to carry.
But none of it's simple or easy
Writing and rewriting my own script's a terrifying process.
Slower than it should be.
"Got nothing but time on our hands" though.
Connection starts like they always do, in that place where the pieces of you and the pieces of me that are lowest on the list get highest on the rail.
But ends up in a whole new field.
I want to be the same, but I find myself selfishly helplessly enjoying being saved instead.

Alter.

Anything.
Anything to look up.
To see farther.
Flirting, dancing with it.
Crossing the line only halfway.
Drop by drop.
Reminds me why I do this
Reminds me there are a thousand ways to bleed
And a thousand more to stem the tide.
Some just work better than others.
Start and stop again
My insecurities bog me down
Like wading through the mud, one slogging step at a time.
Every time I am convinced I'll get to hear "no more"
"no thanks"
"not now"
I know it's in my head- an automatic pattern
A spinal reflex response to getting my box stretched.
But every time I am reassured a little more,
That it's alright for now.
I can stop holding my breath.
Reminding myself that there's a thousand ways to die a little.
"Suicide on the installment plan"
And so the floor stays dirty
And so I do it wrong some of the time.
I'll be the first to say I fuck it up alot.
But the things I do right matter.
The laundry piles up.
I will never be a housekeeper, or the things a good woman should be,
But I promise to be interesting.
Fascinatingly, horrifyingly so.
There's a thousand ways to see it, sometimes a perspective check is necessary.
So I pour myself a lemony nightcap
I enjoy it's bitterness- distracting me from the more acrid thoughts I am helpless to stop.
Whining only, when is it my turn?
A small blow to my fragile ego makes me stiffen, cautious.
Today's sin is: envy.
Is it really worth it?

Opportunity

My shirt says: Absolut: Opportunity.
Opportunity to overcome fear and self-doubt: sweet!
Can I push through this pain (safely)?
Can I keep running til the top of this hill?
Can I keep my mind calm and focused in the dark.
I know my body can handle the mileage-the question is: can I wrap my head around it?

Sudden.

Just not big enough.
Too tiny. Too, too tiny.
Sweet little boy, born too soon.
I wish you a short and peaceful journey.
Go quietly.
Do not cry.
Do not fight or strive.
It's ok to give up, to let go, to slip away into the morning.
Don't reach your tiny arms to the sky, it isn't worth it.
It isn worth the tubes and stabs, the million painful moments between here and any joyful one.
If you ever know joy.
If you ever shout and run and skin your knee.
If you're ever grounded or lose your homework.
If you ever grin a boyish grin.
Chances are you won't.
So leave it all behind, drift off into endless sleep until your turn comes again.

Alien and miniature.
A blurry, bloody, garbled sprout of the forested future planned for you.
I'm sorry for you. For all of you.
And I hope you find your way out.

Sometimes, babies die.
Such a taboo to even think or write... But I know what this one faces,
And in my heart, I hope he dies soon.

None.

Your ghost haunts me through the halls.
You tug at my pants when I stop to breathe.
Startle me around the corner.
Invade my ears with your silence, and echo through my sinuses.
I open my mouth to forget for a moment, and fail again.
I was ok earlier, but superstition overcomes logic
Limbic overcomes conscious.
My reptilian brain destroys me again.
Like a fog, like a choking mist from an age-old waterfall: it never stops, thunders on from a stream to a river over the edge, and who is to say- who draws the line between the pounding downward force and the fine lifting fairy drops. They are one and the same- carving the rock and filling the air and so they are one. And so they are one.
My eyes sting, lungs burn and hands ache, grasping at straws for a meaning, an answer.
A cause or a cure, I have neither.
So, follow me if you will.
Scratch at my neck, howl in my ear.
Boast your very existence, until you forget how to be, swept downstream over the rocks.
A cause, a cure, meaning or answer, I have none.
None.

Desert.

All the things we said, all the skies you heard.
Gentle, broken, twisted words.
All the laughing loving moving on
Held me in the morning light.
"The only woman..."
Complicated.
"I thought it was headed that way..."
Wish it had, but it all really does flow in the right direction.
Whether that be toward or away, it is as it should be.
I am as I could be.
I could be with you.
Shaking, trembling trying something new.
But I am left in the driveway,
Holding my keys, dribbling memories onto the concrete.
Before this dream melts into the sunrise,
Before we dry off completely,
Before we start to clean up the mess we live here in,
Before we even begin,
Hold my hand, open your heart, let me in.
I'll send you back out again, whispering and grinning your small triumphs.
A mess, yes. When you jump this high, it's a long way down.
Sometimes, we have to stop and scrub our elbows clean again, but the times we do are so worth the times we don't.

Working Title.

Bodily harm.
Stretched too thin.
Goal.
Overboard, overwrought.
Phone call in the night.
Looking forward, I have a choice of focus.
Downward slope.
Open water.
Take me home.
That brief, electric touch- one moment met carries me through.
Superstition, jinx. Murphy's Law. Always.

Going for some wide open space.
Clean air, goodbye.
Clear night, bright sky.
Temporary license, leave your trace.
Decipher your intent, you're intense, test my patience.
Death by veiled negligence.
Loving your quiet, awkward elegance.

Higher.
One.
Indignance.
Rude and vicious.
Whirlwindbluroutoffocus.

Forgive me my melodrama, it's in my history.
Sometimes, I just can't help myself.
I dip a toe in, and stir it up.
Woolly little caterpillar on my finger, you're terribly cute and amusing...
Can't wait to see your wings.