i have made mistakes—
i have strayed from this Path that we all speak of which such uncertainty,
i have allowed myself broken words and empty promises
and i have been a slave to burdens that are rightfully no one’s

i have done gentle nature a great injustice—

i have taken my time to learn that it is not what happens to us
but how we allow it to exist within our lives

i can tell you about grief, the kind of pain that’s missing words
love, laughter, and cliches— i can tell you about faith
(that’s a tricky one)

i can tell you that we are small and it is not worth the energy is takes to desperately wish
the future to turn out how we like or the past to be any different than it already is
i can tell you that without this one word with so many definitions present in our lives
it is so easy to sit down and watch everything you’re not a part of rush by

i have made mistakes— however, a life of regret seems horribly unsatisfying to me
perhaps we sculpt and shape where we can and sit with what we can’t
perhaps it is simply about being okay with this unique composition of life
that we all hold

no one will ever know what's at the bottom of the ocean
not you, not me, not scientists, not bob dylan
and frankly, it's no ones business
let her keep a secret or two, okay?
let her mysteries stump generations
let technology fail and lights go off and
powerlines collapse
disaster!
allow disaster
allow the new, the numinous
break your clock
cook pasta for a nice girl and watch for when birds
are just playing

when i was one and fourteen
i knew a woman whose soft hands could make colors fly
wherever she told them to,
covering canvasses and fluttering into human hearts with a
puff
of breath.
a woman of Hope, a woman of Pocatello--
her spine was the trunk of a tree, her mind abundant with fruit
she told me about colors, wild geese, and what it means to be beautiful
she told me to show up, pay attention, tell my truth,
and not be attached to the outcome--
but i was, so much.

i am one and seventeen
i am a woman with soft hands, i speak to colors and make them fly:
they cover canvasses, bodies, and hearts.
a woman of Campbell, a woman of Heron--
i press my back against trees and imagine what it would be like
to have one for a spine.
i know about colors, wild geese, and what it means to be beautiful
i know that i spent years trying to cling
to the slippery, slimy, gelatinous blob that is the future--
it sure is beautiful from a distance.

i believe in beauty.
i see it in the small blossoms clinging to trees as the sky gets bluer and the air warmer
and in the dry leaves scattered around the base of their trunks months later

i believe in beauty,
i see it in the human who desires what is pleasant,
the human who independently brings a touch more kindness into this world,
and in the human whose unanswered questions release a bitter child from within,
the human who hurts because they hurt.
how natural is it to be afraid existing in an unreasonable universe,
how natural to be tossed around the rolling and crashing waters of life
like a panicked cat.

i believe in beauty,
i see it etched into the surface of every hand written letter i’ve received
     and leaking out of my grandmother’s eyes when she remembers what she loved about
her son Thomas.
and he was beautiful too--
his eyes told the weather, they shone like the sun or darkened with a silent storm
and when he made music, the world stopped to listen to this foreign and wordless language
      he used to articulate what existed in his private corner of the universe.
he crumbled with the grace of a star:
      bright and alone,
his very existence still shining through the thick darkness of death, so natural and abstract a
      state

he is alive again when is Telecaster, so worn down from his constantly callused fingers,
      makes music again.
he is alive when his brother and daughter stand together afront his grave,
      arms around each other with teary eyes because it hurts to love someone
      whose eyes you don’t get to see anymore
he is alive in my eyes when i can feel the years he spent in my grandmother’s basement
       making an old piano sound young again--
i know this because i see him there

i believe in beauty,
i see it in death because i remember my father's life, i remember the blossoms
that preceded the dry leaves scattering the base of tree trunks

i met the universe when i was fifteen
she came to me from the stars, the same
sky i share with my sister.
she came to me when my sleep was polluted
with a bitter fog of guilt, and
bed without mattresses burned behind my eyelids:
here, she planted a tree
she came to me in the quiet light of morning,
she told me i was alive and that's the only thing
that really matters
but it also matters to write about it, so i do.
i impress the lines of my heart onto paper.

i don't know what day it is, but
there are seven billion webs of experience getting
clearer and more tangled every moment;
bursting, unraveling, stretching to each corner
of this earth-- these paroxysms of human life
illuminate the caves and shadows of my ribs.
i feel the glow in my chest behind each breath,
behind each swelling of my lungs with atmosphere
and everything that i can feel. it hums
to me, reaches out to tickle plants--
they breath into each other, my pores are seeping with life
and aching to be touched by the universe.
so i reach out back--hello again, dear, i’ve missed you.
i spent months cradled in your embrace, the stars were
so bright, and my eyes never clearer.
an old sticky shell was shed, a parasite of the mind
which could only say, “i’m sorry, i’m sorry…”
a demon with her hand plunged down my throat and around my chest,
a whisper of someone who would not return--
i waited in vain.
but i can tell you that the smell of listerine and cigarettes
doesn’t bring tears to my eyes
anymore, my dreams no longer plagued with visions of mattressless beds.
my body exists the way it should: i eat plants and avoid chemicals,
especially ones that trick my brain into subdued happiness.
i give away all my hugs and kisses,
tell strangers their smile is the light of someone’s life--
i pet dogs and hug trees and cry because i didn’t ask for
this gift of consciousness and free will, but it’s the best thing i have

profess self-love
scream it from the mountaintops--
not just in utah
i will lose myself in each moment, i will become lost within myself
i will laugh too hard, i will never apologize

give me time, love, and appreciation
i will if you don't
watch my eyes get clearer every day,
see me grow and grow and grow
(but i'm still 5'2)
i am a woman of the universe, producing poems
friendship, and vegetable stir fry
i am, i am, i am
forever

i don't see you when i look in the mirror anymore
your eyes aren't burning behind mine, bloodshot and tired
there is a new vacancy about me--
i'm the only one here now, finally
(finally)

i am soft and filling in these empty spaces
with poetry, home cooking, and coconut oil
i don't cry about the afterlife, i just cry for me
(and only sometimes)
i'm not sorry about it--
your existence within me rotted, and quickly
we were grotesque partners in crime, but
i work much better as a single entity