I think of falling, headfirst into the unknown. Lips fissured and stained burgundy, resisting the cold until we can’t. Someone else’s sweater, someone else’s glass, the touch of a foot in the night is sincere. Staying up until we can’t, all heavy lids and torsos curling in on themselves. All our limbs, how they reach and pull and hold at bay. All the warmth that spills out once we allow some form of surrender. How we take it. The sunsets that split our hearts open and the mornings, unremarkable, innocuous, that don’t. How the risks that are worth it never feel big enough at the moment but the fear looms and looms. Knowing it would all end someday. The good parts and the bad parts. We wash it all down. The ways in which it evens out even if we don’t try. Looking at photos of ourselves as children, seaside, up in the mountains, with those who loved us first, thinking that’s the you I know or where’s that smile these days or I wish I could’ve saved you. Not needing saving because how else will we experience how the world works? The ebb and flow of everything. The good parts and the bad parts. When joy wanes we don’t flinch; when life looks us in the face despite everything we’ve done we say, here. Take it. There will always be more. Palms up, hoping to see ourselves in the crevices. Understanding that everything breaks. No matter the softness. No matter how hard we care. The ground rises up to meet us. Isn’t that a comforting thought? Knowing it would all end someday. An inkling, settling into the rawest crack of dawn, that maybe it won’t.
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Ahh this is one of the best you've written, Marla! beautiful!