Grabbing for rocks in indigo waters, searchlights gleaming against the waters illuminating darkness, illuminating those depths.

The center of an explosion, a heatwave ****** into a sink drain, evaporated, muscles relaxed and honeysucklesweet liquid deep in the veins, sharp crystals forming in lungs and a hard breath, cold condensation; exhale and release.

I am, she is, we are
In spheres of consciousness, orbiting the dark side of the moon
waiting for death by a bus stop.

Lazy whiskey sky balancing on telephone wires, slipping, stagnant then pulsing for life, for air, for peace. There is nothing as clean cut as a saturday morning in September. Nothing as urgent as a windswept pane of glass, cut sharply by the salt of the shoreline.

An old woman enumerates; this is addiction, this is addiction, and she’s blown away in the wind of yesterday. This is the new age of sycophants and petulant masters; it lacks heart! It lacks love. It is cold like concrete, like a highway stop halfway to midnight, pulsing and cimmerian. Vitriolic stillness, stinging remains beneath penetrated skin, releasing passion with every exhale.

Climbing through a toilet drain, stopping to gasp and pushing on through biting cold, realizing the world is not as you remember it. Crawl into the sanctum, collapse for forgiveness, repeat.

For this is it, the eternal sprint.

In the dewy mist, snow-peas grow on stalky limbs, blended into the mousy brown forest. For now, their buds are pale, firm with cold, hesitant to release their beauty to the world. They bulge with green, the silhouettes of miniature peas visible in their pre-ripened state.

April will come, and bring with it warmer sunshine and soft petals, small white flowers perched from paleness, extending themselves so graciously to sunlight, unfurling their delicacy as if they are praising the sun. I wonder why they are so shy, why their flowers ***** down.

I wonder what they know.  
I wonder if they have souls.

I am a child then; I am soaring under dark flocks of birds, spending my summer days squeezing their firm buds, for I am a sanguine sycamore elf with plump berries spilling out of my mouth and juice staining my knees. The snow-peas and I prance in the meadow, and the sun is half past noon, and there is nothing more that matters now.

I will return home, planted with kisses of nature: grass stains and ruffled hair and there’s something deeper too planted in me, a desire to love, love that loves without eyes, without knowing.
I return pink fleshed, bitten, scolded for not wearing sunscreen.

I do not know better yet. I do not understand the world of adults and their yawns, their grins, their whispers and all knowing dinner table glances. I know the world outside though, I know to not touch poison ivy and stinging nettle and I know the grace of the forest, where the meadow winds into woodland and back to Turtle Pond where mosquitos gather in clouds and bullfrogs lay dormant in murky waters, their beady eyes lurking just above water.

I know when a snow-pea is ripe; when its leaves have turned and it has flowered, like a full moon, so gentle under the sun, so gentle under the sky. And when the snow-peas are ripe, I will return to their scattered bunches, and I will dance with them under the moon.

Moonflower, primrose, and goldenrod are hanging on silk strings in my Dream Room

Everything is lovely and lively in my dream room, the flowers in my Dream Room smell like Candlelight and cinnamon and starlight
I am so happy here i have never read so many books before, I have never pressed my nose against the glass and watched condensation form like clouds so gently
So delicately, before

Anyone was awake, I was prancing like a sprite and
i never knew the world could be so beautiful, so still before dawn; the eerie indigo in- between, evening slipping into morning, when I lit three candles and blew them out and laughed. I dreamt

Maybe we could sail away in a hot air balloon with a
On a warm sunday Morning before anyone else woke up too; I could show you the world

you could collect it all in jars and put the jars on your shelf; all those scents and sights and sounds and i’d Keep them in my dream room, i’d protect them there in my Dream Room forever.

I have never run so far through the dark grass, leaving my wet footprints like loose threads on a satin trail
I have never taken flight
But maybe, just tonight, in my Dream Room  
I can

Like gold, it’s first notes emanating out of polished brass. Brass, that gleams and feels cold and smooth and haunted. Jazz! like an anxious sort of happiness, like something brief and sweet, there in one moment and gone in the next.

When the trumpets go silent, something still sits deep with you and grabs hold of you and won’t let go. Maybe it’s just in the background of the room, or your thoughts, but the sound seeps into you and blooms inside you and grows into something blue, brown, red. Something curved and  circular, lines bouncing off one another and intersecting and going their separate ways once again. Jazz, pounding with the urgency of a heartbeat, but not matching its steady beating. For some are early and bright, others take their gentle time and arrive in auric shades and dark shadows. A mournful note strays.

There’s a man on the sidewalk, wearing a gray cap. He listens, he pauses. For a moment his dark eyes are fixed on this sight, this sound. For one moment, his back straightens, his eyes closed. He drops a dollar into the upside down top hat. Then he nods his head wisely, sighs, and moves on.

settle down with a story, learn to live constantly, rather than in leaps and gasps. Little moments are precious treasures though; collect them, write about them, feel everything that is ought to be felt.  

Steep yourself like tea; laze in warmth, seep in that couch and finger the plaid coverlet worn with age now. These coverlets; they are now relics of a bygone era and you know that. Treasure them nonetheless.  Run your fingers over each stitch; it was made with care. In these moments, exist languidly and proudly, and stretch yourself out to realize just how big you have become.

For you, I have left three crates of books in my apartment; two boxes have been read, notated, and worn by cautious fingers. One has been left unread, aged by time; the books will smell of yellowed paper and the covers will be dusted over. I have collected them, from libraries to garage sales, and now I impart their wisdom onto you.

Fear is primal and raw, it latches onto you and won’t let go, until you let it. Trust yourself to know when to let go.

Time is aching, it is beautiful, it is as steady as a lake, and it carries on like a wave of water, pulling out and coming in again to lap at your toes. Let yourself sit by the shore and watch the tide.

Remember to breathe. Remember that tomorrow exists, and a hundred more tomorrows afterwards. Remember this.

—to cardinals, with love

You are an angel in the snow, you pale cheeked wonder, with dark eyes so bright. Go to sleep now, don’t stay out in the blue black cold, under the new moon, in the night air that will soon glow pink and glassy with the sun.