You do not attract what you want, you attract what you are / so if you want your epic love, you must be an epic lover / if you want abundance, you must be abundant / in other words, Universe does not respond to your want / it responds to your I am it responds to your energy / and the times I’d thought I found love, what I’d really found was whatever feeling I was operating from / and anger, desperation, fear, lack——none make very satisfying bedmates let me tell you / and none equal love

So be love / be love, and let the world love you back / do not think your empty prayers your daily affirmations will fool God / God’s language is not words

I want to get married, I say
and I want to run across every corner of the earth without stop;
but I think I have a soulmate
somewhere in Italy, sipping his after-dinner espresso
and I think I’ve probably got another, sailing around Greece
F_ck, I heard a Columbian’s accent for the first time last night
and—-though I’ve never been to South America—-
I’d bet there’s a few men waiting there for me too, and
How do you pack all the lives you want to live
into just one?
…

In one of our lives, we got married / bought a little house, down by the sea / played music in the mornings dancing wild through the kitchen / nothing but two sets of boxers and breakfast sizzling / retreated to our single studies in the evenings / slow jazz notes tumbling through the quiet hum / I gave you a couple of kids, so I could watch you be a father / and you were the most beautiful thing standing on two legs / teaching your son to ride a bike / cradling your newborn daughter / and every single day was enough / reason to love you harder
…

And still another, we were Old Gods
Intimately entwined of the infallible energies
Birthing entire planets and star systems
  of our chaos and of our joy

And time would pass
and we would grin
just watching
__

“when I see the moon rise in the deep sky, all  
large and looming,   that is hope

and as the sun is red-setting, throwing its last rays
of God-love over the hills,   that is hope

when a ranger sees the homeless man parked in
his illegal overnight spot, and decides not to
disturb his sleep,   that is hope

when you hear a dream from a friend of a wall of
steel wrapping your home whilst fire tornadoes
around it, and wake to find yours one of two
homes still standing,   that is hope

when a son who has received absolutely every
reason to leave, Will Not Abandon his abusive
elderly mother,   that is hope

when the city dims down enough to see the darkness,
lit by a Universe of stars——”

Isn't it a funny feeling; guilt
And the things we feel it for

I'm not sure which is harder; being unloved
Or being taught love is what it isn't

But both leave you robbed

And angry.

"
It took me two decades to understand,
You never knew how;
Yours came with strings of compliance attached

And obligatory love is a **** poor excuse for it.

"
I left, I left
And still the guilt came;

That unwanted visitor who refuses to leave.

What draws me in, to this?

Is it love, or something twisted—
Said a mother to her daughter
It's so hard to tell the difference

                            But please;
                                     I need to know the difference

"
I didn't understand then
And I won't pretend to know much more now;
All I can do is try to not be angry
                          
                            And at that, I'll fail.
                                                           ­        But I'll learn

"
I used to believe in the world, with an innocent infatuation for its goodness

Now I believe, with a knowing compassion for its faults

...

I think things that are perfect are easy to love;

         We meet God in our love for that which is not

"If there is only one thing to do well in this life,

It is to love well;

For if there is anything you are to be judged by

It is the plainness, of your loving."

||

.
Will I always be this sad?  Maybe
Perhaps. But there is no reason
you cannot live alongside it,
no thing stopping you from
painting over that chasm with joy

chasm: “a deep fissure in the earth, rock, or another surface.”

Yes, maybe it will always be there, even
‘probably’
But your body is made of earth
and no one is stopping you from
tossing a rope to the bottom;
from climbing down
and planting flowers

—this place, too
            we could make beautiful
.