The thing about spending almost a decade
In social isolation is you forget what's normal.
Imagine my shock when my friend casually pulls me close to her,
A half-hug, friendly embrace.
No context needed, because touches don't always hold
Some deep, meaningful intention.
Yet for the past almost a decade, that's been my reality.
How rare the hugs, how they only ever follow extreme sadness
Or loneliness, the desire for comfort and support.
How I can never reach out to touch someone
Unless I've done it a thousand times before,
And even then, it's an intentional act of love.
Every movement of every muscle is planned in advance,
To minimise the fearful, pounding beats of my heart.
For someone like me, where anxiety floods through all my veins,
I don't know the meaning of the word 'casual'.
And I don't know if I'll ever learn it.

When I first met her
God put a speaking trumpet
straight up against my ear
and stated
very slowly
in that Godly voice
that is a mix of
the ocean's roar
and the singing of
Barry White

"This is the one
you've been looking for."

The stars were in on it
bubbling like champagne
in the night sky
singing a sweet accompaniment
a singular poem
of one word:
Yes.

What would you do?

I took the only possible path:
Surrender.

Gave up my wandering ways
quit my womanizing
got hitched straight away
tied the knot
didn't know a thing
about knot tying
but the **** thing held.

And here we are.
Poet number one
that would be her.

Poet number two-and-a-half
me

Marriage solved nothing
brought more questions
than answers
more unfinished business
than completed tasks

Yet at this late stage
a sense that against all odds
against the evidence
of my hands
against every argument
presented by the priest
who reluctantly married us

Something has gone
wonderfully right.

The stars,
dear friends,
truly know their business.

Spending a month in a hospital teaches you a lot about people.
The doctor that told me to shave my head or she wouldn't treat me,
The nurses that spent forever chatting to me
And giving me supportive advice about how my illness doesn't define me.
The woman who was given a terminal cancer sentence
And chose not to pay attention to it and defied it anyway.
How she sat next to me on my bed,
Told me that all suffering is valid,
And just because I'm not dying, doesn't mean I don't get to complain.
How she complains more about her skin problems
Than she ever complained about her cancer,
And that's OK, because pain rarely follows rules.
I never even learned her name,
But she gave me the words I hold most closely to me
On those days when I want to fall asleep and never wake up.
I'm allowed to scream and shout and rage against the pain
And the unfairness of it happening to me.
I just have to make sure I know where the line is
Between giving my darkness a voice and pitying myself.