Solstice

There is no growth without pain, she says on a ragged East Village stoop, take-out pina coladas in our hands and heavy silences in our midst. The city lives on stoops now, I have time to think, and there is no pain so large I do not remember how much I love it. An old lover reaches out and says I have so many stories to tell you. Do you still love the beach? and I wonder what strange magic of the Universe this might be. The dog waits patiently by our feet, wags her tail whenever someone new walks by.

I woke this morning with a great weight on my chest, a rerun behind my eyelids, I thought I can't do this again but the thing is we always can, I paint my nails in bright pink and still exhaust myself along this river, I meant every word I said and so many more I didn't, the thing is love is more than stumbled words on a townhouse stoop in Greenwich Village, it is whatever you do after, and after,  and after. The longest day of the year is here, the brightest moment even in a sea of dark, I think I cannot do this again but the truth is I will because somewhere out there must lie a grain of magic still, and don't you think it might be worth a fight to find it?