Reli.Able.

 “I am not what I have done.

I am what I have overcome.”

“I could never have done this if I wasn’t sober.”

Well, I wasn’t sober.  But I was trying 

Working hard to find a place to work from.

Trying hard to find my feet

To find the ground.

I am still fragile.

Still have mountains to climb,

“Fourteeners”, they say.

But this time, I got to be there.  

I made a decision that I’m proud of.

Momentum, they say.

Is everything.

Far. Away.

 Some days we weep for sorrow.

Some days, it’s for for happiness, 

Or emptiness.

I’m glad I don’t pour my emptiness into my hands, anymore.

Some days it’s grief: for friends, for memories, for dreams and all the things you dreamed for me.

But mostly, I weep for loneliness.

I know you are lonely, too.

I know you hoped I’d be there forever, and now I’m not anymore.

I know you check in, here: to see what I’ve been up to.

To see who I’m becoming, 

Without you.

I’m grateful, for all you gave me.

I can’t breathe life into your dreams,

Any more than you can heal my strange wounds.

I love you for breathing your own life, fanning your own flames. It took a lot for you to realize you deserved it.

Keep breathing.  

I’ll keep weeping.

Someday, we’ll all be gone to dust and fairytales.

And I’ll miss you.

Shaking the rails.

 She growled and grabbed and gurgled her frustration.

At her body’s sudden betrayal:

broke all its promises too soon.

At me, at God, and anyone walking in the hall.

All I could do is hold her hand as she

Squeezed and gurgled what I imagine to be 

Thank you.

Helpless, each of us, 

Her: to communicate.

Me: to offer anything more than the tiniest of comforts.  

I ache with sadness, grieving a little for her crumbling 

Dignity, and a little for my own humanity.  

I’m not a God-fearing woman, 

But if I were, I’d pray tonight.

Please, O God, someday when I too

Am 64,

Don’t leave me in that terrible half light

Don’t tear my body for the sins of my mind 

To leave me half awake and

Half asleep.

Let me be, or if I am not to be, 

Spare me from shaking those rails, myself.

Story.

There's a moment of clarity, there.
A moment where a spark becomes a flame,
A quantum collision of intent and momentum,
Of experience and consequence
Where a life fades into death
The point where all confusion and possibility and chaos coalesces and contracts into
A single

Solitary

Place

It's a meaning, a home, a purpose
It feels like a destiny.
It feels like God and like endlessness and like the ocean
It's a sharp left turn before impact.
It's the top of the rollercoaster, just as you start to
Fall.

It's the last breath you take
And the first time you scream
And the moment you knew
You were so very alive.

"You write the stories, I'll take the pictures."

Oh, what stories we'll tell.

What breaths we'll take, and 

What impacts we'll make together.

Not that ocean.

Oh, would you.

I’m not the angel you are looking for.

I’m not your solution, or even
Your brief hiatus from some
So painful solitude.
I am here, though.  And not leaving.
I am afraid though, and not gonna lie about it but I am

Afraid I’ll love you.

I’m afraid I’ll fall so far into your
Too good to be.
Too interesting to be
Too hardworking to be
Too loving to be
Just too much to be
True.

You know, I’m the one of us with the carrot.

You know I am the one more activated.
I have you captivated.
So, show me.

Good god you have me so captivated

I say

And here I am, am I asking for something I couldn’t ever
Give you anyway
I have built myself a house of straw,
So many stars shining brighter for it,
How do you bring that light to me?
You want all of me,
You’ll get it.
Ain’t nothing left we either have to lose
Or really to gain anyway.
I wasn’t missing you, before you came along,
But I sure as fuck am now.

Maybe I want you,
Maybe I don’t even know better.

Maybe I just want to be wanted and cared for
And to feel small and listened to and cherished for
Who I fucking am.
Rather than the ways that I just reflect someone's tenuous
Success.
Oh, to be worthwhile
Oh, for my thoughts and opinions to matter
Oh, for someone to pay all of that glorious Attention
So selfishly, to

Me.

Oh for someone to give me the same

Courtesy.

Every question ever asked was just an opening.
If I could change everything about me,

I’d keep it the same if I could keep it 

The same about you.
I know all of the times I was embarrassing.
My cheeks still flush hot today,
What is love even made of?
What are we even worth?

It takes an ocean not to break.
And I am not that ocean.

Oh I am not that ocean.

Examine.

Gave too much away.
Tripped on my good intentions.
Didn’t fall so much as jumped.
Facing my bad decisions one by one, and finding
If you were me, you might have made them too.

Maybe I’m making excuses for being tired
For laziness or sensitivity
But I hurt for her.
I hurt for all of them.
For all the times I could have stood up and said something
But was silent.
I have power, I am powerful
And I was quiet.
I am sure she made herself clear
I am sure she said no in every way she knew how
And I am sure you didn’t listen,
Because you never really do.

Examine yourself, then.
Examine the why and whom and where and now
And then storm the last of that temple, anyway.
We tear each other apart in the name of some faceless god
In the name of someone else’s idea of better.

I was quiet.
I could have kept watch or stood witness in that holy place
I could have spread my careful wings around her
I have power.
But am I powerful.
Examine that, I suppose.

Boundary.

I am a blurry thing.
Somehow the wind fell out of my sails,
Or the keel dropped right out the bottom.

I’m not drifting this time
On some inconstant breeze,
Rather taking the hand of any direction that will have me.

Deck wide open, belly-up to the aching sun
But every door is still shut tight.

Every hatch battened and not a soul about-
I bare my broken teeth to an uncaring sky
A half-hearted snarl plastered over my bow.
Heave-ho among the waves breaking over me.

Have to find a way, again.
Have to feel my feet on the ground,
Or at least gather the pieces of my scattered shell.

This wind that blows right through me
It rattles my bones clean.