no, i mean this anger
no, i mean this guilt
no. i mean, what is the difference
between this anger and guilt?
because the chains all rattle the same behind me.

i could go and ask my mother,
but the lines on her face would deepen
and she would tell me there is only anger
and she doesn’t know guilt
and how could i expect her to believe in something
which she has never experienced?
and would i take the trash on my way out?

i am unsure if it is my fault my mom feels this way,
or if it is my fault she doesn’t feel any differently.
she’s sewn me richly ornamented robes,
woven from girlhood ambitions fallen short
threaded with hopes she had long dismissed.
but i am not joseph, and the garments never seemed to fit me right.
and my mother is not god,
her love has never been unconditional.

the robes have long since become stiff
gathering dust on the coat rack.
maybe i could hang some of the guilt there, too.
or maybe i’ll hang the anger.
or maybe i’ll hang both.
or maybe i’ll hang on to it all a little longer.

i never learned when it’s appropriate to let go
and i learned a little too late about the bruises i leave behind by holding on so tightly.
a lesson all my mothers before me had to learn.
after all, in the very beginning,
eve never once received a mothers embrace.
the closest mother she had was the garden of eden.
(was she saddened in her exile, or was she relieved to be free?)

i wish i knew what the birds sang of
then maybe I could listen to music about more than heartache and the grief that accompanies.
are there any bards left in the world
who could tell me of the tragedies
the otters went through
before they learned to hold hands when sleeping?
so that I may avoid drifting apart from my loved ones, too.
where can I find the proud redwoods
who will tell me what the world was like when they were saplings,
and the lily pads in the ponds, who didn’t have time to worry about trivial things
such as taxes and eternal damnation.
i am so hungry for love, life, knowledge.
does the world today only serve watered down versions of that? or is it only me who feels so starved.
what trade school exists that can teach me the skills I need to know how  
to walk into a room and make it more inviting
to radiate the warmth of several suns
to properly clean and disinfect the baggage of those i love?
because every year the rain comes down harder
and everyone knows how the melancholy grows faster than the mold

The blue jays rise the dead
to rise with the sun.
Singing the suns song of his divine departure
as he departs those farther from their fathers,
farther towards the heavens,
bathed in heavenly glow.
Bound still to the earth, mourners cry
mourning a loss
deemed lost by the morning light.
Lighting up their despairs
despaired as life moves on,
missing out on a life.

The song a blue jay sings
is the same
as the ballad a mourner cries.