Breath
                                          In
                                                                               Out

Think of rain not pain
Think of pages not rages
Think of the calm not the bomb

Find something to ground you,
Then...                                              Breath
                                 In              
                                                                              Out
                                    In
                                                                    Out

Fly–Floating away
Toes gripping the earth

“Not today.”—and I sway

Rush 2 grab what little I have
                                                            ­                                  Are you mad?
3 to 1
And the bottle’s gone

Fictitious lawn
Fumbling home
Stare deeply—oh dead-eyed drone

Screams turn to whispers
My mental blisters—take haste and heal
Inevitable scars?
And still I a–peel

Shoot up
                                                              ­                              Good morning.
Blinded by salty I’s
Higher eye rise

                                                           ­                            You must be mad.

Surprise!
Skies contaminated by cries
Ensuring an anticipatory demise
No way to sur–                                                             ­                     prise!

Heart drops
Incohesive thoughts

Towards regrets
Plunging until the earth is met

Shoot up—Grounded
                                                     ­                                           Not for long.
And I sway

It is okay to be grounded
This is something i must tell my soaring heart
Every second of every day.

When the world seems to open to you
Like it’s yours for the taking,
“Oh, but you must hold back”

That is something that I wasn’t used to hearing
For I was the one who had to make my own path
And holding back was never an option for me

I was told to always bite my tongue and never let others understand what I was feeling
So the expression of words got stuck in my mind
And could only be freed when I placed a pencil in my hand

It is okay to be grounded
This is something I tell others
When they worry about where life may take them

I still have no idea where my own life is taking me
But every second of every day
I must tell my soaring heart it is okay.

This will all be okay one day,
And perhaps my okay is different from yours
But one day it’ll all work out

You’ll get the promotion you always talked about
And maybe we’ll fall in love
And have a nice colonial somewhere we make our own

But for now we must tell our hearts that while it is okay to dream
We can stay grounded for the time being
Until we both sprout wings and have the ability to soar

My beloved cries out—
I bring cool cloths, rub her back, I pray
and wait, and split in two—
As one watches over, the other packs her bags
and drifts into the night

First the forest and the fog—
I am blind with darkness and use my hands
to feel my way through
the unaccounted for,
the unrecognizable, flashes
of memory dismissed
Tangled branches whip, roots rise up
tiny monsters nip,
but I don’t run
And always the presence—
thick film and sticky, bearing down
too heavy to be comfort,
and cold

There is more air here
but I see what’s next and drop
to all fours
Now I am on the rocky ocean’s edge at low tide
Here the wind rises and I know it can
spirit me away
while parts of my little body are cut away and discarded
it can spin me into ether
Here it feels free,
but not really, false promise—
I will have to return some time,
to face my broken heart

I’ve been here many times
and have what I need: layers, rain gear
soft soled shoes
(we’re on slippery ground here, pay attention)
a locket, some string
and one match
The match is my beacon, string
keeps me grounded
I know this road, and will
find my way home

When you lay there
thinking your life does not matter,
every exhalation meaningless
every unfaltered lub dub wasted.
Go out there
and make a difference in someone's life.

Help,
be compassionate
give yourself a sense of purpose.

Because it is then
when you will breathe life
into your life.

When you will find
yourself grounded and rooted
rather than swaying like the wind
and allowing time
to slip like grains of sand unnoticed.

Allow fluffy clouds
of magical wisps
to fill your head
and propel you forward
to fill you with color
and life.

So choose to bring peace and joy
to someone else and yourself
for you will not be just be surviving
but bringing significant difference
in your own beautiful way.