I enter the sacredness of this existence

Hold my life with respect

My friends say that I am like a solitary monk
that I am a hermit
a recluse and sometimes
I believe them like I believe the calendar that tells me it is April

Who really knows what “April” even is
the name of months are birthed from languages’
named just as babies are named
and in their vowels and consonants can be found  
nestled
a promise of life’s yearly renewal
cyclical forgiveness,  do-overs

but I do not know what April is I just agreed to it like the rest of us and do not know what a monk is so perhaps

The sparrow's songs blossom like azaleas
until they  become an open chorus sung in rounds amongst the trees
ever circling and deepening
they remind me of what life is truly like when we venture back
away from the illusion of thoughts

Today I changed my agreement with the world
and I am willing to become what I want to see more of
I am willing to not just to fly low, but soar
I am noting afraid of not landing over land
I am strong enough to land
I am wise enough to know I am not the flying, the altitude or in any way extraordinary  
I know I am ordinary
and I know deep down who I really am
and so we begin arms open

You need to speak
you need to set boundaries or everyone you will ever meet
will cross your yard and stomp in the dark over the tulips

You cannot wait for someone to hit the fence
trample over what you planted and loved
you need to speak up
not run away or at some point in the dark of night
anyone who comes to greet you will step over your boundaries
over and over and over until you finally are so offended
that you can no longer take it

you need to speak, speak your boundaries or the same story will repeat

How did my father survive the streets of LA
a young dark skinned man
a mixed blood being in his prime

I flash back to the time he shouted at me while teaching how to drive
a  simple thing like me hanging  a small dream catcher from the rearview mirror
was enough

“They can stop you for any **** reason, Pita” he’d say.

what I didn’t know was that he was right
and what he did not account for was that I would not be seen as a dark skinned male the day I got pulled over in Davis, Ca by a cop and I stepped out of the car and walked straight up to him and he walked to meet me and asked me “Ma’am have you ever been pulled over ?” I replied “ no, this is my first time” and he smiled as if he’d popped my cherry. “I figured a small and smiling girl didn’t get of the car with the intention to start a fight” that is what my father did not understand
and I wish I could say I understood at that moment
and I wish that officer would of understood too that the only reason he did not pull a weapon on me was simply based on what I looked like

there was never a willingness to communicate always a distance always a trying to guess and understand

how can anything end up well when you do not communicate
when misunderstandings are what make up your whole story

how can you really know?
or why did you never want to know ?

were you looking for evidence
were you looking for reasons

Did you finally find them amongst all the actions you never asked about ?
Or Coiled around all the feelings you never voiced ? The anger, the sorrow, the missing,the failure,the hurt, the righteousness, the apathy and the lingering love

did you ever want them?
was ignoring a strategy ?


what was your intention ?