One. Two. Three.
And then you exhale.
Your head is cradled in the pillow.
Your eyes are closed.
You are fast asleep in a very waking world.
It’s a noisy world, my love.
Machines are beeping, wheels are squeaking,
busy heels are clicking, clacking on a white tile floor.
It’s a world of firsts for me, my love.
The first meal bought in a gift shop,
the first night sleeping on a army cot,
the first consent form I signed on your behalf,
the first time I squeezed your hand
and you didn't squeeze back.
A world of hope and faith,
friends’ prayers wing to heaven,
and surround me in peace.
A world of fear and doubt.
I count the seconds until you breathe.
I will you to inhale.
Then exhale again.
Please.

Dreams of you frighten me more than nightmares.
I can handle the sight of bodies on the floor
and monsters clawing and biting at my door.
Neither so scary as dancing while music plays slowly
my head resting on your chest gently.
An attack where I’m weakest,  
I wake and I’m speechless,
rubbing my eyes, holding my heart,
The most terrifying dreams are the ones
that I wish were real.

After some months, I look for you everywhere,
In crowds of people at
places you’d never go.
In cars passing me on the streets of
towns you’ve never seen.

So much a lost part of me I look for you in
the mirror before I go to sleep.

Then in the end, I see you and joy.
Feelings that feel so strong,
they’ll leap out of my eyes and out of the smile
splitting my face to grab you
in a hug that lasts forever.

So much a found part of me that
two hearts beat in my chest as I go to sleep

I’ve found that my indefinable truths are hard to hide.
I can’t hold on to what I don’t fully understand,
it escapes from me unhindered by the label I've yet to stick on it.
Then how easily the world captures what I can’t even find words for,
how quickly it encircles what I perceive boundless,
for my truth must belong in this box or that box and
when it’s all wrapped up and labeled accordingly,
the world delivers my truth back to me, and tells me
I can accept and acknowledge or reject and deny this gift of a definition.
So generous, to give me options, yet
somehow I suspect that I have no choice, for
because I cannot define what I hold unswervingly and confusingly true,
the world and its definition will always appear more credible than me.

Actions more than words, my mother said
wait for the arms to enfold you as mine do,
for a sonnet won’t hold you in the bitter cold.
I waited, and in the cold that came
words passed me over as I sat sheltered
warm with my mothers arms around me.
I peeked from her embrace to wonder
sadly how actions matter more than words when
the words come few and far between.

Leaves emerge in spring when the winter leaves
and me too, leaving the arms that held me.
I live on my own, and when your words came with
actions to match them, I wondered why only one
should be so important and not both
because two is nice and better than one, like us.

when my mother asked me if I loved you,
I gave an answer elaborately crafted,
neither yes nor no, and full of platitudes,
a tale of loyalty and bond and trust earned over time.
I finished, and as I caught my wasted breath
she crossed her arms and repeated with gravity:
Actions more than words.
I understood.

I know. Days like this do come.
Days when I wake up and do everything right
but something small to supersize goes wrong so
I crawl to my cave of sadness and stress because it’s my life and
at the moment it’s about me and my panicked heart.
Yet then, a desperate call comes from someone loved and when I answer
instantly, it’s better—my life is no longer about me, but that someone.
Is it really a life unless it’s a life for someone else?
Do I truly live if what I have to give is given only to me?
Whether your wallet fell down the drain or the sky fell down to earth
you are still you.
And sir, you’re wanted on line one to give what you can give.
Live today for another panicked heart, and remember:
On the days when your own heart flutters madly,
I’ll always answer the phone.

I fall in the trap of lovesick lines,
ballads for my broken heart,
and dragging my world down into angsty darkness.
But I promise you I have more words for my life.
There’s that thrill of seeing a sunset sky in winter,
turning from the oppressive gray to that vibrant orange and pink,
warmth I didn’t expect to see in the cold.
There’s the nostalgia in eating a Chicago style hot dog on a summer’s day
at a picnic in the green grass that’s just right and
doesn’t stain my shorts or leave them damp.
There’s the peace felt the first day of wearing sweaters in the fall,
where my arms, exposed to the heat for too long
revel in wool covering every inch as I walk to my car with cocoa in hand.
There’s the hope fulfilled in hearing baby birds in springtime,
chirping in hunger in the birdhouse hanging by my window,
the first signs that life still exists in a world once frozen over.
There’s hope. Always. And so I promise with conviction,
there are more words for my life, because there is more to my life than you.