On Sunday Morning

An alarm rings. You’ve already dreamed of it a hundred times so it cannot hurt you now. There was a moment in the quiet evening that I heard again the soothing sounds of peace in my ear drum, it breathed around my heavy head and sank into my blood flow until I sat smiling into nothingness, I do not forget what a gift it is, not what I spent to receive it. When I step into the sleeping home, a Christmas tree lights up the dark room, everything else is still.

I’m okay.

Mantra

(if you don’t heal what
hurt you,
you’ll bleed on people
who did
not cut you)

Spela Shoreline

While you were listening, the voice says, were there any aspects of this talk you found particularly compelling? I come to, having heard none of the words that came before this. My mind is a thousand miles away, my mind is a dozen months away, my mind is lost I was hoping someone might find it but the flyers got soggy in the snow and no one could find a number to call. My roommate takes a mental health day, looks out at me from under the covers with a conference call on mute and pleads to be put out of her misery. I bring her coffee and no relief. The couple across the street have sex, winter dusk turning their brightly lit window into a showcase, into a holiday display behind lazy drifts of snow flurries, I try to write poetry but am constantly interrupted by the bobbing behind the blank sheet of paper. Her pale breasts, his unruly afro. Later, finished, or at least perhaps satisfied, I see their hands waving in the air for some post-coital conversation or other. See my own muted reflection in the window. Seven point six billion people are, at this very instant, living lives in which they are the main character, it blows you away. How life is precious, and beautiful,  and kind, and cruel, and above all short enough that you owe it to yourself to make every second count. One floor down, a man sits alone on his couch, in a messy room, looking at his phone. I fear if I do not tell all the stories inside of me I will explode, or -worse - deflate like a forgotten balloon in the corner of a birthday party.

All this to say, I forgot to say thank you
but not a second went by when I forgot to
feel
it.

Dial Down

At last it catches up with you. All day, all week, for ages it's been circling your street corner, been just outside your line of vision, you could feel it approach but catch nothing if you reached for it. For once, it is not the dark, wet blanket of winter that finally sinks its teeth in you, but a wind like a current, a moment's peace, a brief instant when the jumbled thoughts in your head all line up and you see clearly at last that which has only scared you in the unknown. I race to find pen and paper, to jot everything down, to not forget how my present and future paint themselves in my to-do lists. For too long I have been slipping, and at last I find footing. The Universe is testing me, more and more, again again, the first step is to realize you cannot rest on your laurels. He calls and I hear peace on the line, today I read a piece of poetry so precious I cried and smiled at the same time, life is gifts and daggers in a jumble, just roll with it. We speak in half truths, I know, but the wind is here now, I think I can breathe now, I'll dig where I stand and promise to unearth the other half of the truth for you; it's not perfect, but it's a start.

You are here now. What will you do about it?

Drill

I dreamed of road trips, of expansive vistas and a driver who changed course at a whim and I thought how odd but how right at the same time. A baby morphed into a puppy to great delight, the famous singer in the back of the bus squealed, I pointed out scenery as we flew.

I woke with a hangover in my heart, a muted sadness behind my eyelids. Back to reality again, and none the wiser. My dentists hugs me and says the teeth are fine, just like we agreed. The pain in his chair is a welcome relief. It’s gone when I rise, and I am better off than before.

Agains

Look at me, I'm growing, she says, as she unboxes a white Christmas tree in the already crowded West Village apartment. It's only different. The twisted monster unfolds and writhes in pastel ornaments and jaunty lights, you laugh and toast to ghosts of holidays past, it's a delicious tradition you wouldn't want to do without, even as everyone rolls their eyes and tears their hair with every year. I stare past the branches, lost in trains of thoughts that run nowhere, slowly. The walk home is cold, and just as heavy in my bones.

There was a moment, in the strange afternoon, where I sat in the emergency room of a downtown hospital, wracking my brain for morsels of light, where I thought this is what life is. We got through it after all, didn't we? But I came home with my head exploding and fell asleep before my time, and all I could think was but this isn't what I want. Sometimes the Universe doesn't leave it up to us, and then what do we do? The holiday lights sparkle regardless.

I just forget how I ever did it, myself.

All You Can Bear

Wake early, red and green lights still bright at the edge of your vision, I had so many dreams, I was reluctant to let them go. You were there, and how sweet a quiet moment between souls, it's a gift but I don't know where to put it anymore.

I took a long run along the river, Monday morning so full of sunshine and mild beauty, the waves wild but kind in that way life can be, sometimes it overwhelms me how little I know and how much I have yet to learn; the Universe holds its secrets until you are ready for them, until you can prove yourself open to whatever comes of it. I whispered my gratitude into the waves later, but I do not know more now than I did before. It seems a treacherous road to sleep more for the dreams to return.

I'd rather learn how to make them true.