so hard

 

trusting that things are happening that i cannot see or feel or know

that i cannot even sense

there was magic and i was clunky

oh how i wish i hadn't said something dumb

it's so hard to be in the world and stay sweet 

who knows?

 

  No coffee

  and I am still not sleeping 

  What is it that compels me to stay awake

what do I think will be answered by morning

What important work is all my night time whatever ness

amounting to

not sleeping is hurting my mind and depriving me from delicious dreams

it is stretching out each minute and not allowing the day to end

is that it

was it so wonderful. it would have been more wonderful 

if i had just let it end when it did

midnight

i suppose that isn't too terrible

but i am doing something wrong

not being at work this week

and yet i know that my body is still healing

i cry

because i do not know if i'm making a mess of everything

or if i am being wise

the worlds within worlds

 

 would you like me to say hello to you?

 I could

 but that would be all I could say

 for I cannot say that when I came home today

 I wanted to find you here

 that as I took off my wet raincoat

I wanted to see your arms outstretched

sometimes life is hard

there are hundreds dying everyday from war

and in my little world

I have chipped my tooth and it feels the world holds no way into it anymore

I did not expect this

I wish there was some way to be together

without needing to be curled up 

your voice a whisper

maybe some day it will be raining and you will be near

slipping

 

 I have slipped beneath the seasons

and the laughter of children in the school yard

far beyond voices

and ordinary moments

I am consumed by the falling rain

like silver coins

tumbling down along some unseen track

I see bright pink flowers

that seem out of place

and I feel my body aching

my toes lifted like a ballerinas

aware I lift them slowly higher 

as I balance the computer on my lap

a thread of connection

though I write to no one

this rain, this ache, 

a candle lit but I cannot feel it's warmth as it is so small

the brightest thing

my still wet yellow raincoat

a nearly forgotten memory 

of this mornings walk 

lost in the waiting

 

   September strength is gone. October beauty is passing by. November rains have come.

And I cannot remember how to be amongst the children, marking time, and captivated by the world around them. 

I have been too long in silence. Wearing pyjamas. Keeping fear at bay.

Will I really awaken in the dawning of hibernation?

Will I really have my first day of life in Decembers dark days?

I know waiting rooms and hospital beds

I know my body weight is lower than usual.

I know my breath is still tight and I can't lift a milk carton yet

But I don't know the class routine and I haven't gotten to know the girl who loves

space.

And my school days will be shortened by nearly half.

And this morning as I walked past beautiful red leaves and mossy tree bottoms

I nearly cried

because it was like walking blind

I will light a candle and pretend I am cozy 

and not missing another day of my life. 

unspoken things go heard

 

 What if  I can't do this. 

  I have fought to keep my Spirits high or at least my heart open and curious as I have faced

the loss of back to school, a woodstove pizza party in the backyard of a windmill house with new friends, the ocean (as I am not to swim for a few weeks and by then it will be nearing winter weather), but this is asking too much of me.

  Tonight, Alastair flew to Ontario to be with family, to be with all the family. I would have flown for just one of these people, but to have so many be there. And it is Autumn, and it's for a wedding in Niagara on the lake. 

  And my heart is breaking.  It's breaking beyond tears. It's breaking beyond years. 

I do not know if I can trust this loss. 

Please, please give me something in this time that offers some kind of understanding of how I am not standing there, in Autumn winds, with my arms around people I love, maybe more than one at a time, smiling so authentically from the depth of my being. Loving and being Loved.

I am holding out ...

(too overcome with despair to type the words - barely hope.. barely.. hope.. my wish had scarsely left my lips.. entered air.. )

and the most incredible soul who has ever seen me truly and given me the words truer than i even had courage to speak - my witchy wonder sister spirit friend.. and her epic wild child are coming by, are staying with me. 

for just one night. 

if that isn't an answer to a wild eyed hopeless call in the night..

i do not know what is. 

You are still surprising me

 

     Well it happened again, this sense of wholeness, this calm washing over me that there was nothing more to do.. nothing more that needed to be done.. life was beautiful and everything was okay.

     the first time it was this sudden feeling that none of my dreams had to happen, i didn't have to go to peru and see machu pichu.  I didn't have to go anywhere. I didn't have to be anyone.  It was so incredible, to have all longing just hush.  Nothing was left to do. Everything was. 

    Everything was.

     And tonight, though my body hurts and there is a sense of unknowing about my health and if and when and all of that..  there is a peace.. there is a smile on my face that is larger than this room in how it feels

there is a connection, no a transfer - a flowing between us.. a sense of nearness

  and if we are okay, than everything is okay

  and i can simply breathe.   I can breathe in and breathe out and feel this deep rest.

  I am loved.

   and I don't need to ask again. 

   And the most incredible thing is that I no longer feel the deep desire to fall apart

   in safe arms.  I desire to be those safe arms.. I am those safe arms..

   There is gentle reciprocity, there is.. and like a breeze barely noticed that swirls through the

 trees causing them to dance to and for and for many to be torn from the branches, to fall to the ground, to crunch under feet. 

     i need only the lightest sprinkling of love..   it is yours, and i don't know why.

but i am so deeply content this night.

Something about you is intangible and so deeply necessary for my life.

You are having a time of pause. Stepping away from the focus of your days. You are finding a new direction. 

We are both shifting.  And it's October.  And we are in the Autumn of our lives.

The warmth of the summer sun still lingers, still teases us.. but the Winter winds are there to draw us onwards.. 

We are older. The time of day dreaming and molding oneself for others.. is over..

It is now time to breathe. Time to allow the very nourishing calm of everything getting ready to sleep. 

Time for russet leaves and golden sunsets.

Time.

  

A giggle in the night. Maybe I will be alright.

 

  You are becoming more beautifully yourself

with no apology and i think i have freed you with my decisions

set you on a course so clear

but i wonder if as you come together on the outside

you are becoming something new within

and i don't feel any closer than when things looked together

Did things ever look together? 

I say I'm sorry I didn't make you my priority

that i let myself stay free and loved the whole world

but you i forgot 

you i could never fit into 

you wouldn't let me

wouldn't let me

i'm made to mold myself to someone else

but it just would not work with you

we are two worlds that met in the early hours of those

hazy powers

love makes you someone else

gives you listening skills and wild embraces

and hours to be in eachothers arms in silences that go on and on 

and the thing is

no one can sustain this bliss

but why did i have to blow it all up why couldn't i see my traumas as a block

never realizing who it was i was fighting for 

you never said a word against me and i condemned myself

oh hell

it's so complicated now

And you are more beautifully yourself

and i don't know how to begin

and i think that loving you might be a sin

what i mean is that the thing that i've always done is to be no one

and now, if the conclusion is more of you and less of me

then have i not set out to do the very damn thing that slowly

unravelled our love

How do I love me and love you? 

Where's the us of it all? This blended unity that's indestructable.

We did love like a kindness

like a service

like a gentle breeze

We did love, like don't focus on that 

if there's a problem just let it be

And I did love, like who i am is far too much for you and I'm all wrong and terribly sorry.

And you did love, like whoever you are is okay, but you looked away.

You looked away.

while I was looking.. and I just loved harder for the both of us

and where did you go?

I remember not knowing what to do past adoring

Once i waited all day for you to come home, my living paused. 

I wish I could make a hearth and home but no one ever showed me

I wish I could have understood how to get you to know me

But all i knew was Love was never leaving even though you should

and Loving is real when it hurts

and Loving isn't easy isn't something sweet or true

It's something you endure through

If I had a wish, it would be to let go of all of this

completely and just see if you called me

I don't think I have a home, I often feel I'm all alone.

I know it's feelings but my little heart.

It only knows how to embrace, and how to try and value those I meet

it's easy to adore them all, they shine so brightly, they live so rightly,

I've been lost for a while. 

Maybe it's time, to put away my rhymes and let this be the last entry in this narration of my life.

To quiet everything. Even the words that pour from my finger tips on dancing keys

How do I find ease. Because I think that lost and found in time. Is more of who I am.

There's nothing to solve. I lose my ground, I lose it all, I lose myself and I find everything I never

could have without the falling. 

                                                                                            Like that underground smile.

babies cry when they are born

 

    I awake to a silence that is no longer sweet

    where is the all encompassing embrace of quiet

     that has deeply soothed me

     I feel alone in this house

     left behind

     maybe this is how I have always felt 

     that somehow I'm missing something 

     not doing life quite right

    The surgery was sudden

    there was a risk that i could have died

    a scientific probability

    and these things happen

    people are gone for lesser complications

   

    but i am here

    so why am I not feeling an inner sunshine

    or some kind of joyous glow

    tears are right there, ready to fall

    and i cannot translate what is it they need to say

    this time at all

    Shaky I suppose if I had to choose a word

Maybe I'm learning how to be here all over again

 in this completely unknown world.

    

   

i say it's all crumbling while i hold the earth in my hand

 

     Without a perfect ending

without a choreographed move

without a graceful bowing

    right in the middle of an ordinary 

conversation

                          the silence between us resumes

and only a few days after 

i am asked to let go for good

and i know that that's not in my power

  with a head in a fog from not enough sleep

the gorgeous bright sunlight of a brand new day

that i will not touch

it all seems so disjointed

but that isn't my truth

if i surface from it or dive a little beneath it

I am happy right now. 

there is sunshine on green hedges

beautiful wild flowers in vases around my home

gifts from him

little things

things that matter more than all we will never be

somehow

a cat curled up sleeping in a fuzzy ball of greys and brwns and blacks 

one white tipped paw extended

this is a beautiful beautiful day

this is an emaculate life. 

i am smiling 

with a secret whisper i can barely hear wrapping itself around me

you are wrong. i know you don't feel it

but I am here!

the silence is here

morning is here

the pain in my head

the pressure of my foot on the glass tble

my hunger

my sorrow 

and my unknown tomorrow

this summer sunshine for only a while longer

the smile on my face

that's only getting stronger

the tear of relief 

from what's always beneath

the living is greater 

the living is louder

what of thsess wondering?

what of relationships?

what of deep longing for closeness

what of our distances?

there is the Moon still so bright in early day

the closest it has ever been 

and i am completely okay

going slow

Of course I am lost. I have no one to follow this time.

And though their is wonder in the pathless woods, whenever

I am in the woods I am finding the paths.. be them barely visible dirt ones

or sadly trodden on branches.. 

so i follow where others have gone before me and preferably

i do so while their boot is still visible just ahead.

I know who I want to be near, the life I would be happy within, but this doesn't seem

to be what is happening. Though I want to celebrate the lives of others, it just hurts.

I can adore them but it goes further than that. I feel farther from them and scared that

they will see how curious but clueless I truly am.

I will watch a wind surfer for hours. I will smile and be impressed as they jump

farther than you'd expect off the waves into the summer sky. I think maybe that's a 

water sport that I'd like to try. Then I see the strength of their arms as they grip the 

handle and pull against the force of the roaring wind. And I know that I could not

do that, not for long, maybe not at all. 

It's not that I think I shouldn't try, but I just wish I couldn't put myself so easily

into anothers life. 

I'm trying to find the path within me that will begin my path outside.

But I have always known my call but somehow everything is being swallowed in grief.

Even the encounters that were only ever happiness are now people far and relationships

muddling. More on the side of  a sorrowful thing.

Even you, busting away in the backyard caring for the plants and folding up the tent.

I offered to roll up one of the sleeping bags but I have mostly been inside watching.

I want to DO something, move my body into action, make ripples on this planet.

I have a concussion. I'm being told not to make sudden movements. To be in quiet and dark

when I can.

So right when I am tired of my thoughts and feelings, when I'm sick of journalling and resting.

I am told to go slow!

When do I get to feel my feet on fire again, my heart ablaze. 

back to school

 I am happy.

It's 12:03am on Sunday morning 

and it must be noted that I have a smile on my face

and I feel content maybe more than that

It could be that I had coffee only a few hours ago, certainly that could be why I feel awake

but the happiness, the feeling of suddenly being well rested, well adjusted, calm in spirit

full of expectation

is because my life is returning, I will step back into a world of schooling

the way I step into the sinking sand at the oceans edge

eagerly, slowly but with a wish to hasten

because it is deeply being alive, it is deeply seeing even as I am seen, it is growing in ways you cannot notice and in ways you can, and never knowing how you are lifting a soul as you help them understand. 

It is play! It is service! It is where I belong. It is feeling a constancy like the first notes of your favourite song.

It feels like after the longest and coldest of nights

here come the first warm rays of dawn!

My happiness could also be, at least in part, that we are talking. That there isn't the weight of unknown silence. There isn't that distance pulling on every hour of the day any longer.

We are freed to be here now. To be where we both are. 

Maybe happiness comes from feeling that things really are completely new. That there can be a new start. 

if i die tonight.. because i might

 Well goodbye

I am so glad you got to see my magic 

while I was alive

I was already symbolically dying

now I've bumped my head three times and I think

i might not be okay

something feels slower than it should

and i googled what it might be

so goodbye

I don't know if I'm okay with how I'm leaving this life

I am glad I can hear the crickets

I am in a hot pink tank top

bathingsuit bottoms

my hair almost darkened back to its original shade

and a toe ring

and a suntan

I guess actually I'm pretty okay

in this moment, writing a poem or something

my cat not far away

I just wasn't seeing

If this is my last evening here

and if my breath will disappear

It's hard to hold back tears

because this moment, I am totally me.

and I did my best. I wanted to be kind, to listen,

to be quiet when I wasn't feeling soft and sweet, i rarely let my anger surface and when it did i think you know how much it hurt me that it hurt you.

And I can hear the crickets

a car as life goes on

I wonder how my life will end

I feel the headache growing strong

and wonder if this is my swan song

though I just learned that they don't sing before they're gone

I am quiet. I will never touch every leaf, every flower, I will only see a few sunsets in my life.

I have to trust this mandela on the sand and trust the rising of the tide

so goodbye

and if i ever loved you know that i never wanted to leave you.. but i can't be everywhere.. and there were so many of you in my heart

and a few shone brighter because i know I was in yours too.

I am sorry I wasn't more for all of you.

Just know, I had to take time to listen

to the crickets song too.

This isn't summer

 

      This isn't summer!

I say to myself

    who spends their summer indoors

when it's tropical paradise literally minutes from where you are?

   who spends their life this way?

another me fearfully whispers

   you have been trying to overcome this since you were

eleven!

  well, then, this is the last time!!

At forty four?  a bit late.

shut  up! I yell at this hopeless me

shut up! this matters

 it just has to be,

There will be more summers I have to believe

there will be more smiles

and times to feel free.

the illusion of letting go..

 

• if this is what it is to shut the whole world out

  then i am for it

  
  

  no images to enter into 

  
  

  only lived truth at every moment

  
  

  i can handle this

  this quieting of everyone and everything

  
  

  this making the world small

  so i can slip beyond it

  
  

  like having one small tomato growing in your yard

  you notice everything

  
  

  and in knowing it

  you know all tomatos

  
  

  one is thousands

  but thousands are never one

  ---