An explorer never stops exploring.
If they do, they cease to exist,
to be, to live, to be free.
An explorer has to explore,
so what happens when they don’t?

I never wanted to stop searching,
but after two years
of contradictions,
when I asked God to heal my heart
but subversively asked you to break it,
I finally ran out of supplies.

I had to stop breathing light into holes
that you wouldn’t let me tent in.
I had to stop crying at dusk,
telling Him I needed Him to save me
from the jagged rocks I fell on,
and the game of Russian Roulette
I liked to play with the pistol I found buried
under your sand pit, just south of the stream.
I had to stop waking up each morning,
proclaiming I didn’t need Him,
just you, just you, just you.

Just one more mile,
one more night,
one more cave,
one more newly drafted map.
I can’t stop exploring,
because as much as I don’t want to live,
I do not want to cease to exist.