I give you my trust
So that you will not abuse it.

I give you my heart
So you can keep it safe.

I give you my fragile hope
So you can build it.

Please God,
Let the Devil be wrong.

But

You make me smile and laugh
I think of you when I am in a mood
I know seeing you would make it better.

You peel away my shields,
I spill my heart
And you listen intently

I listen too, to your stories
Neither of us conquering the conversation.
We are too two distinct characters.

You are a type I know will not work
I've said this to you,
As we go to the gym, walk, eat together.

In one of our talks, you asked my stance on friends with benefits
Just in general, not propositioning explicitly
I explained no, that's not who I am.

But here we are two planets captured in elliptical orbits.
I brush past your back as I walk away
You hold me from behind to show me a video on your phone

In my head, I think:
You are too young to understand this
This is me being lonely
This is you being a fair option
This is a stupid idea
This is destined to fail
This is destined to happen
This is waiting waiting sweet aching anticipation.

I thought this loneliness was over.
I thought a year ago I learned some incredible lesson.
I remember it feeling so wonderful.


I.
I.
I.

I wish I would stop talking about myself.
I wish I could communicate without bragging.
I'd say this is a list of resolutions but

I.
I.
I.

I can't smile without a motive
I can't hear someone talk without thinking of theirs
I feel like they're usually motivated by hatred, lust, disinterest.

I.
I.
I.

I know nothing about these people.
I should stop making assumptions, but
I keep thinking how last year's 'epiphany' hurt me.

I.
I.
I.

I was so vulnerable, so gentle and sweet, someone had to shatter me.
I tried again and again more feebly to learn the lesson
I was crushed each time more easily by hatred, lust, disinterest.

I.
I.
I.

I have another chance here, the best chance anyone could have.
I can't believe someone would give it to me.
I wonder how good an actress I must be for them to have believed.

I.
I.
I.

I want a cram session of reviewing that lesson.
I want to be shaken back into that vulnerable, feeling self.
I have a new life I could give that self, a fitting gift.

I.
I.
I.

I met a beautiful boy, a vegetarian rock climber violinist environmental engineer.
I'm going through the motions because he is an incredible match, only
I can't put the spark back in my eyes, let alone light his beautiful

eyes.

I.
I.
I.
I'm done with I.

We want to preserve the nature that is beautiful to us.
We travel an hour to leave the congestion,
A day to sleep under skies slightly less polluted
A month to feel we’ve migrated like geese
And left the world of men, us men out there.

We bring flashlights to see in the dark sky
We leave cigarettes and Clif bar wrappers on the soil
I read recently of a group of mountaineers
Who traveled a month to touch a mountain
(rumored) to never have been climbed.
They brought a TV for the local people

You see, we yearn for some untouched place
And only bless that as “Nature”
We forget to save the wildflower we crush underfoot
We ignore squirrels and crows and anoles
Find pleasure in killing spiders and hacking mushrooms

Can we find some way to love the world we have?
Utopias don’t exist unless you believe in heaven.
This is not a case for despair, there is no case.
Despair allows you to give up on the world we do have.

This is a case for overwhelming beauty
Everywhere, at every scale.
Look at the eight eyes of the spider, count them.
Stare at your hands as they become unrecognizable beasts.

This is a case for hope, if we can see it.
Stop crushing, stop climbing, stop escaping.
This is a time to stand up for beauty
That you join and do not destroy.

It is when I intently idly
Walk in the woods,
By the stream,
On the grass,
Over high mountains,
That I find a peaceful place.

A place where I look down at
Sunflowers, rising
Butterfly wings, fallen
Earthworms, crawling in
The soil.

The soil.

The soil I plant my feet in,
A part of a huge whole.
It greets me heartily.
This soil of my soul.

668

“Nature” is what we see—
The Hill—the Afternoon—
Squirrel—Eclipse—the Bumble bee—
Nay—Nature is Heaven—
Nature is what we hear—
The Bobolink—the Sea—
Thunder—the Cricket—
Nay—Nature is Harmony—
Nature is what we know—
Yet have no art to say—
So impotent Our Wisdom is
To her Simplicity.

Just let me be invisible
The too-beautiful wraith
Will put a bag over her head
So you won't stop to stare

Let me not change
This imperfect world still
So precious to me
So wondrous to me.

I will live on heels of bread,
Come at the end of the day
To steal food seconds from
Becoming ******* in a bin

I have an affinity for
the smallest red cherry tomatoes,
but I can carefully rearrange the pile,
hide the absence of a few.

I will ride my bike into town
When town is closed on holiday.
No (carbon) footprint left
I'll only slip indoors behind someone's feet.

A stranger. A fading memory. No trace.