We all falter and that is okay
and i understand sometimes it’s just a matter of whose turn is it now

Love involves due overs
it is expansive and forgiving enough

but when we falter we must offer someone else the dignity of acknowledging the suffering we have intentionally or unconsciously caused them by saying  “I am sorry I hurt you”

there is no fault in faltering
instead in never saying I am sorry
never offering sorrow the dignity of its name–of naming it

i cut my hair so that another
girl who had only been an earth for a few years could carry
its softness and know someone would
give whatever she was not born with
this world would offer itself to her
cradled in her bed wherever she was
....
i forget the many times
i slept in other people’s homes
or had to leave mine as a child
those many times were coiled and repressed
pushed back into a box like a jack
...
my youth is here present
i mingle with it
and forget it is not always going to be here
and i hear the world is not kind to older womxn
but hear from older womxn those years are the most fruitful; there, they are their most powerful
and like the promised land i want to rush there
the way i used to want to rush towards death
and none of them will do when the early morning hours come
because i just want to be here
cradled in my bed wherever i may be

It feels so raw so fragile
a pink bubble gum bubble blown out falling back a little, creasing when it beats

There is no bridge you’ll cross that will be clean

there is no being that does not create
and you cannot forfeit the cold for only the warmth
or only the warmth with the absence of cold

you can not deny what you are
do not spend your whole life
pushing away your humanness
hold it once and for all
do not spend your whole life THINKING something is wrong with you
hold your self, sit in yourself
tomorrow does not exist

I gave it all I could muster with all my strength I dared
will all the might I could call upon I came
with all reserves of courage
with everything I am
with no tear withheld with shakey hands
but I came

This as is
is no longer my place of belonging
when people talk about it’s
absence
mine floats to the surface