Sometimes holding on
Does more damage
Than letting go.

Sometimes, Love is the pause
between holding on
and letting go

So many voices yelling and echoing and cluttering up
Every heartbeat with dissonant commands;
Discordant rhythms
That give chase, pulse racing wildly ahead,
But I can never escape because the speaker is

Myself.

Who taught me these monologues of doubt?

I’m trying to find some dark corner to crawl into
And hide
From all of the should be’s
And didn’t you’s
And what if’s
And why aren’t you good enough to
And why can’t you just fix everything
And why aren’t you strong enough
To just live
And not break at every streak of light
Surmounting the dregs of night when the morning returns again
And still there is a feeling of falling
And not knowing if you should reach out and hold onto something,
Or not?

And so you just grip your coffee cup as if it were
A solitary rock
In the middle of
A storm-whipped sea
And I really just need to wrap myself around
Something that is made of clay
And dirt,

Drag my spirit through the veins of the earth,
Where the cut-banked canyons rise into a
Reddened western sky  
And release the broad-winged birds to flight.

And everything is quiet

And I know my worth:

No more or less than the brush along the shore.
No more or less than the darting shapes across the river’s floor.
No more or less than the dusk,
Than a gentle touch across my face,

Than love;

No more or less than love

And how it spills like water over rocks
And moves like music through the blood

And how the morning becomes quiet
And I am
Just
Singing softly to my children,

I won’t give up.

Iron in the stone bleeds a colour
against grey enamel,
bone bedrock

See ticks and tocks writ on lined faces,
craning to read flickered futures
where rock-solid certainties
and metal connectivities clash
in janky dissonance

Grasping the surety of a copper coin
in a clenched fist,
the shape as sure as love and rage,
when opened, shows
the sleight of hand and thought
sold to us all

the pain must be
becoming more and more
unbearable each day,
and we have to continue
walking away from each other
when all we ever wanted
was to run
towards each other's arms.
so how about
we do this, my love?

how about we go on
with our day,
pretend we're going
to see each other
the very next day,
and face things
with excitement today?
how about we go on
with our breakfast, lunch,
dinner, and snacks in between,
and pretend we're going
to dine together tomorrow?
how about we sleep tonight
without crying our eyes out
to the memories of us
and pretend that tomorrow,
when the sun rises from the east,
we'll wake up
to see ourselves
next to each other?
how about we repeat
being hopeful every day,
looking forward
for the tomorrow
that holds you and I
in one page,
until we can
no longer remember
what we are ridiculously
holding onto
and we're just truly happy
with our lives
without each other?

When the branches are weary
And the leaves could only
Helplessly fall on the ground,
The birds sigh in unison.

When the clouds are in deep burden—
They try to hold it in for quite a while
Until a sudden downpour occurs,
And nostalgia creeps into every person.

As you watch all these happen,
You come to realize that sometimes
It's okay to just give in to the universe,
Because beauty isn't always in holding on.