Half Away

I opened the door, and there it was, the moon full overhead carefully framed by all the buildings and street lights.
I stood there, staring straight up into the sky, feeling the cold creep over my skin and the light cover my face
And I wanted to weep.
Like a temperamental flower I seek the warmth and sun and long gentle days of early summer.
The crazy blackness in my head makes the night seem so frightening that I can't bear witness to it anymore.
But then, at that moment, the full moon was so breathtaking and the cold so bracing and all the blackness gave way.
I didn't realize how empty the days are without the night sky. I've forgotten the moon lit musings.
I can't find the poetry in the daylight - I think I need too much.
I can't find the moon often enough in these circumstances
And so I suppose I must change.

Confrontation

I told someone again. I used words that I wrote years ago because I've lost the connection and my current thoughts are all jumbled up.
I used the old words. It hurt.
I suppose that's the root the bottom the end the beginning the tangled web of then and now - the hurt.
I thought it was gone. Maybe it was, for awhile.
It's a thing that's never buried, never over, never gone, no matter how much I wish it away
Or lock it up
Or hide behind the daily tasks of life
And in that place of truth I am
Despaired.
How often the things we want are stripped away to our basic need
I hold on so tight and it hurts;
The jagged edges of life are uninspiring, even ugly;
Confronted, I am turning away.
Until I tell again. Using words from so long ago because I've lost the connection and my current state is so full of suffering.
Because I cannot hide, I cannot bear up under the weight of these expectations.
In the lies of my despair I cannot rephrase or remain silent.
I am absolutely certain that I am being taken over and that I am being found,
Bloodied.
It hurts.

Lacking a Proper Goodbye

Do you remember the day you stood in the fast food parking lot and yelled "Why can't you just go out and have fun anymore?"
The answer, we both knew, was the scary future in front of us. College years, and miles apart, and endless pressure to find the way forward, and most of all my starving mother.
I know we talked frequently after this moment in time. Letters and phone calls, before the prevalence of email.
I know you prayed for me, entreated me, yelled at me, loved me in your way.
Until neither of us could keep up with the emotions anymore and we just
Stopped.
In spite of all the things that came after my heart remembers this moment of sundering, in that fast food parking lot, when you yelled at me for crying on a Friday night double date.

I remember when I called to tell you my mother was going, almost gone, and broke the months long silence, hoping your voice would bring her a measure of peace.
Loose ends. That's what we had become.
It's what we have remained.
I never would have expected this outcome, but I have an enormous amount of patience for it.
We were all so young, and selfish, and lost.
Older now, I understand how often ends are left undone in this lifetime.
I still remember, though. I would like to ask if you remember, too.

Challenging Things

I have let go of all of this, or I thought I had, and now it is swirling all around me in a dizzying display of light, trying to lure me in, telling lies.
I am determined to keep my hands open, to turn away towards the truth, to finally be divested and free.
It is so much harder than I had expected.
The steps forward are mounting and taken in full they are overwhelming.
I made a promise.
I've lied to myself over and over, cursed my own deceit. I have created whole fictions from kernels of reality until I can't tell the difference for myself anymore.
Until the puppetry falls to the floor and the disaster is revealed.
The truth is like the wind, teasing and pulling, capable of more than I can imagine
But for now I'm stuck in the light of these lies, waiting for them to torment someone else willing to pick them up and carry them forward.