Spend so much time
Dancing around
Shuffling foot to foot
Feeling the feelings bladder swell
Pressure inching, ratcheting up, up
Left scanning
Searching acceptable release
Not safe to scream
The bladder’s volume escalates
Soon it’s all that can be heard
While also not making a sound
Nothing gets through the barrier
Distracted presence
Rude, shocking
Dancing in place
no I don’t have to pee
Need to escape
Need to say the things that
Can’t be said
Swallow
Swallow
Run to the car
Cry.
I didn’t know until I went there
I didn’t understand
I had disturbing preconceptions
That now I’m searching for ways not to turn into self loathing
I want my stretch marks to witness my growth
Not tattoo my shame
I want to wear them visibly so I can speak
about how wrong I was
visible my growth
I earned these scars
Oh, I used to be different, see?
chocolate token
sweet
offering left at
enticing feet
humble in its
obscurity
it’s just a token
nothing more
taken
eaten
boundary redrawn
entitlement ensues
light shifts quality
boldness follows
access granted
protest ignored
touch unasked
protest ignored
contract completed
inevitable after consummation
of bait
That tempest beaten place
where water meets the land.
Winds blow unceasingly.
Words fight to be heard here.
Motion is hampered by terrain and the gale.
Ever in motion
Ever the same.
The bone embracing roar
The Earth’s unsubtle reminder
That she IS water and so much bigger than you.
You are just a puny creature of the land
Your experience not a witness to Her true majesty.
Your thoughts, your words, hunger
Are a footprint in the sand
Nature is not solid it’s fluid
Both above the surface and below
Flowing, going, churning
Longer than anyone can know.
Looking forward to the weekend of the soul
This time and place of ease
Where the off duty sign hangs swinging on the the garden gate
Where time ceases to matter in the few places it still exists
Like spring, or budding or first frost
Anchored into the spiral of time
Yet flexible in it’s specificity
Here but an unpinnable now
Animal time
Soul time
Lost in the space between
The individual and society
Focus is peace found in
Unfocusing
The clouds roll and the hands move
Each to rhythms beholden to no one
But themselves
Their patterns and workings create
The weather and the structure of what is to come
The solitude is essential
The safety of space
The crowded loud echoing
Hustle bustle never ending chaos
Of humanity bouncing painfully off itself
Leaves me hungry
Feeling detached
just a little held apart.
Not quite touching anything
not with my body
not with my mind
gently sliding past everything
not passing through
no phantasm this
but somehow slipping aside
static repulsion with a frictionless grace
but completely disabling
my ability to attach
or connect.
My depression is not depression
it’s anger.
Notice the difference now.
You can’t medicated away anger.
I Refuse to die for it, too.
Refuse to give up because I might hurt someone’s feelings or sensibilities.
Refuse to give up after coming so far.
Refuse to give ground on my truth.
If my truth is based in lies?
Why is that??
Certainly not for me.
Lies are never efficient.
People forget lies might change a story,
but not the evidence.
Lies leave evidence, too.
If you lied to me and I believed you,
you might have forgotten the truth.
Repurposed it,
built over everything that was
so no one would ever find it.
That’s not usually what happens though.
Now that I believe you,
you are left with that gap in our stories.
Two truths and a lie.
The burden of that gap lies with the liar.
The believer doesn’t know it’s there.
Though the evidence, the reality
affects them both.
This burden, this gap, becomes a place that can no longer stand
spotlight of scrutiny.
It grows stagnant, poisonous.
It’s directional existence will put a wedge between us.
A place we cannot go.
For a reason only the liar knows.
There will be evidence for the believer,
The changed subject,
change of mood, change of plan.
They will see the touchy subject,
and often avoid it out of convenience, too.
But it doesn’t go away.
Even if I believe you,
the lie is still a lie.
It will poison our relationship, but not me.
It will poison your wellbeing, but not mine,
except that your wellbeing affects mine.
Me wanting to help you deal with suffering you caused yourself,
by lying,
that compassion, that love,
that you have to keep at arms length to protect the lie.
The secret, I, who believes you cannot see,
but clearly you suffer from.
Your panic at my kindness will blindside me.
Your shift from adoration to contempt will become permanent.
You will blame me for believing you,
more than you blame yourself for lying.
And I will just witness. All. This. Pain.
Big Thoughts in Our Little World 