I hear you,
your sky is falling.

I wish it moved me to know that.
Prompted me to grab an umbrella to shelter you.

But, it seems like your sky falls every day.
I'm out of umbrellas.
They lay strewn around you,
while you hold your hands above your head,
preparing for bare knuckle assault.

Some people are cut out for this,
they fill and overflow.
I am pierced with holes.
And while my love for you is real,
everything flows in and out.
I work like a fountain,
wishing to grow bigger,
to shelter you instead of raining on your head.
You are precious,
and I pull and pull everything I can from
the pipes underground.
Still my patterns remain.
I can't break free from this stone,
for you or for me,
but I'll keep trying.

People are magnets.
I attract,
I repel.
If you and I meet today
do we come together,
or move apart?
Do we find each other with a click of recognition,
or pass as a running stream
dancing around a rock in its path?
Do we see ourselves in each other?
And if we meet tomorrow,
in a different orientation,
will we connect then?
Or is our fate sealed?

I gather 10,000 stars from the sky,
tie them to strings,
and present you with a twinkling bouquet.
You turn away and let the bow slip loose,
carried away in your swirling stormy thoughts,
complaining that no one brings you any sunshine.
Left tired and alone in a heavy grey cloud.

your foot caught in an invisible trap,
wild wide glassy eyes,
teeth gnashing,
breathless howling,
crushing distress.

i am powerless to release you
from this unseen snare.
it's there, for sure, it's real for you
yet not within the influence of my hands.

you bite when i approach.
you scoot away when i reach out.
you scream when i look.

i see you, i recognize you
any trapped animal would do the same,
would act this way.

so i sit helpless.
i can't go, i can't stay.
i try to hold space
and you try to escape it.

fear is contagious and i become as afraid of you as you are of me.
i can no longer move,
or speak,
or look.

the only way through is to wait it out.
the outcome unclear in this cloud of dust you kick up.

i try to wrap you up in my heart,
sending it in waves from my mind's eye.
surrounding your curled up body
hoping to contain you.
but that's just for me,
imaginary efforts fading to nothing
in your chaotic atmosphere.

and you're there, two feet away
utterly alone and hopeless.
i can't break in,
you can't break out.
us in pieces,
particles in the air.

and when the dust settles
we'll pretend
like it never happened.

Around her I'm someone who says sorry.
Constantly.
An erratic tic,
in words said or unsaid,
in gestures and averted eyes.

As though her ever present thunderstorm is my doing,
as though I'm sitting on her shoulders
dropping rain on her head.

But she didn't put me there.
She didn't bring in the clouds to strap them to my back.
She carries them herself,
inadvertently strangling my breath in the devastation of her north wind.

So why do I wrap myself up in it,
and make it my own?
Trapping myself in the grey fog,
alternately freezing and lashing out.

And now, she is not only a storm,
but a tempest dragging a caged intruder.
Weighted in destruction.
Heavier than before we crossed.

And I am lost,
in "I'm sorry".

I ask for light,
not to hold it,
keep it to myself,
hoard it into my chest,
burning my own hands,
but so I may
in radiance
send it out.

That i may
be and do,
receive and give.

That I may
connect,
in and of
light.

That I may be,
not alone,
as a lost soul,
but swallowed whole.

Wholly lit,
illuminated,
illuminating.
Each cell
shimmering,
transparent.

That I may
disappear in participation,
persisting as one ray
in the magnificence
of the sun.