my biggest heartbreak is still that these words were once dance:
the letters were arms, tracing invisible surfaces; the semi colons silences; the periods as fading stage lights; stream of consciousness as music, rhythm made available by choice. my choreography was a line of spirals made from bodies in diagonal formation--beatless, fleeting, smoke-like, diluted into the next move.

i had sworn my allegiance to this: the slowing of time in the practice. every breath taken lied down pulled my eyes further inside its sockets, closer to the soil under my skull - complete release of the body unto the ghostly embrace of stillness.

i let this take me.

We are the people who came before us: the crooked, the loving, the boring, the extraordinary, the joyous, the depressed, the sick, the healthy, the poor, the wealthy. You cannot forever shun your roots; you can only walk with them attached to the soles you own. You cannot forever pretend to forget and wish to not be a part of them.

This is growing up: accepting your source, accepting that you are coded in the system as a part of a larger picture and sometimes, that picture isn't the one you wanted it to be - whether for your own conscience or another particular reason. The challenge is to love yourself greater than what exists now and to love the ashes, the shadows that led you to be.

How long will you dwell on the mistakes of the past? How long will it take you to forgive the wombs that birthed you? How long will you forget that you are made of them, too?

I feel you like I feel dirt in my nails after a long day of work in the farm. I take you with me to the house, letting you stay a little too long after the work has been done. I let you be a transient mark of pride and of fruitful joy; I feel this as I wash you off with warm water. My hands are clean now, but I miss picking my nails already. It's a kind of fondness that sits with you in the evening near the day's end, over dinner, and on the way to bed. I try to fall asleep faster because I look forward to tomorrow - when I'll have you in my hands again.

your sartorial opulence arrests me,
mijn geliefde -
but i am learning.

when i pull pants that look like pajamas
out of the drawer
to wear to work,
i think you'd cringe
at my weak monday patterns,
incredibly unconventional for the modern world.

i look at you:
torn up jeans with indigo embroidery
and
a crisp white tee shirt
and
very nice leather loafers!

i'm intimidated.

i look again:
you smile
at me
and
at my weak monday patterns
and
at my pajama pants for work.

"mijn geliefde,"
you said with a softened gaze with no cringe.

little did i expect
the radiance
from sweet
little wrinkles,
nostalgic banter,
and walking canes.

i am happy i did not forget how to love the elders i walk with.

she was never my mother
                                             (nor father)


so i was
                                                                ­          unwanted



but only because i was never theirs in the first place.
it was simply her acceptance i wanted,
but it was her children's love that sustained me.





it is not the same.

invite me to your cradle.
                                           your womb.