like the ribcage
of the deer
lay hit aside the road
now begging to be
devoured
red and gnarled
against greying grass
vultures circling
eat eat eat
take a bite of what
now open bare to see
once hidden
under fragile skin

i am cowboy lonely
lost, haunting,
hoping to be found
the searchlight-sun hitting
across canyon walls
sagebrush vibrant
against rust-and-cream stone
or cast over fields of
sweetgrass and wildflower,
i stand on the horizon
with only the wind at my side,
in my ear,
watching the clouds ramble by

Change is tedious
and does not happen
in a single night

It takes time to
move, to uplift
to push and pressure
into your next form

Remember to be forgiving
it is not as if
the Rockies or
the Himalayas
punish themselves
for taking millions of years
to grow to their height

And it is not as if
the Appalachians feel down
about their change
from sky-cutting magnificence
to tired, rolling hills

Time touches us all
for better or for worse
for building us up
or eroding us away
but in the end

mountains are not
made with serenity.
their peaks are
not carved calmly,
nor carved neat.
we too cannot be made
gently,
or with careful precision.

Do not forget:
becoming
is as tumultuous
as orogeny

“what has changed since everything?”

at a glance,
very little.
my room is still
a messy grave.
i am still just surviving,
the way i was before.
but i have overcome
in this process
of becoming.
there is no more pretense
for who i must be.
no tether to
an overidealized self.
it’s scary, daunting-
but i am not alone.
i never was,
despite what i
was made to feel.
what fear was
hammered into me.
not
anymore.
since everything-

                          Everything has changed.

i have been valued
most of my life
only for the pieces of me
well-liked.
they take those pieces
with them
when the rest of me
becomes intolerable.
leaves me full of holes;
full of things deemed
unlovable
frustrating
damaged.
walls have grown
to guard the tender parts,
to be particular about
what people get their hands on.
still these particular parts
chosen to share
get put atop a pedestal,
later revealed to be
more than ideal, unattainable-
i am still too much
and not enough
all at once.