Who’s there, yearning, in pain
In the dark of my past
I look behind and see
The silhouettes of the many
From whose dreams I was born
I feel their unrealized needs
In the needs of my present
What they have not let go of
Holds me now, outside of my life
I see you, I say
I’m sorry, I say
This is yours, I say
I lay their burdens at their feet
Look them deeply in their eyes
Thank you for dreaming my life
I’ve got it from here
You kissed the scars
The carvings he made
On the inside of my thighs
Ugly remnants of his violence
And just like that
I felt the wound heal
Red, raw angry skin
Became baby-smooth again
“I’ve forgotten how to be in my own body,” she said
“I feel like I have woken up in a foreign land”
I took her by the hand
Led her down the the sea
“Sit down and let the waves remind you,” I said
We lay back, and with closed eyes
Became one with the ocean
The undulation, the caress and push-pull
We let ourselves be swallowed
And we became mermaids again
Bodies arching, diving
Arms moving through the water
Embracing the flow of the tide
She started crying tears of deeply relieved joy
And so then did I, to see her find home again
Our salt tears mixed with the salt of the sea
And when we finally returned to the shore and found our legs again
We took the ocean with us in the sway of our hips
And the pulse of our hearts
Forlorn once was I
No hope was in sight
I’d fought hard to live
But felt I’d lost the fight
Were it not for my cats
Wouldn’t’ve made it through
How sad that’ve been
For I’d never’ve met you
Sometimes I still think everything would be fine
If I just had a deep-fried Twinkie or two (or three)
Or perhaps a few handfuls of Lilac chocolates
A half dozen chocolate chip cookies right out of the oven
A pint of Moose-tracks or Honey ice cream melted just to the right consistency
A big bag of Jelly Bellys, assorted will do, but plenty of Popcorn, Chocolate Pudding and Cherry, please
Some Banana Cream Pie
A box of salt water taffy
And unlimited funnel cakes
My sugar days are over, alas
But I still long for its soothing, sticky-sweet promises
Carnival-candy dreams for a happy life ahead
The high, the pleasure, the fullness, the love
I miss it all
But I know better
Today I bid thee farewell, my special unhappiness
You have been a steady companion lo these many years
You have held my hand and held me back
Kept me safe, yes, but also kept me on the outside
Looking in at my own life
I thought you were a force beyond my grasp
I thought you were put inside me
That I was a host and you had taken root
Turns out that like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz
I have had the key all along
All it takes is this: my decision to let you go
I am sovereign over my own self
And I no longer want you here, in the driver’s seat
So farewell, my old friend
I am sure you will raise your voice now and then
But I choose to no longer recognize your power
So you may wish to find a new dwelling
My heart is full of other things now
There is no space for you here
It began innocuously enough:
A fissure in the surface of her consciousness
Something slowly began its escape
From the depths of long-since sealed off passages
And traveled the complex distances within her soul
Until one day it broke free at last
The bloody, naked truth shot forth
Filled her awareness with itself
A seismic riff that turned her world on its axis
A silent scream shook every cell of her psyche
And with that, she came to know her Real self
How can I release this grip
This clinging on to everything good
As if my life depended on it
It feels so dangerous to release
All that I’m attempting to control
It is exhausting to hold on so tight
But it’s all I’ve ever known
Learned early to clutch and grasp
At what little good was parsed my way
If I loosen my fingers, if I let go my grip
Will I slide into the Void
Disappear into Nothingness
Or will I float into better climes
And find out what Life really feels like
What you did to me
The position you put me in
Contaminated my insides
Deposited sludge in my veins
Dark, thick and foul
Could not be contained
A pollutant infesting my waters
Every time I think I’m clean
I feel the slime come again
It catches in the corners
The nooks and crannies of me
And heaviness sets into my bones
And then came the day
I pulled the stuts out one by one
Pulled off the boards, and
The mighty fortress fell at last
Naked to the world, I stood still
Trembling in awe of my freedom
I kissed the ground goodbye
And greeted the sky hello
Beyond the Skinny Branches 