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Two months to know that I love him, or that I will love him, and it shall be the death of me. This, I know now, is a wonderful thing.

It has taken two months and I remember not any plight of angst or insanity that plagued me from years past. That of my childhood remains though, and more clearly now.

I need to be better, as I am but in best pursuit of the self God has for me. To be his through the night and all time, may it be likened to a tranquil sea’s surface.

I float and float and so on, God all around me. I know not where I go but there is no worry creeping about. It can not swim!

This is how it is supposed to feel, this stillness. I keep still here, floating, and he will be surprised!

I tell him I only am still in nature or the face of God as I know Him, but this is a lie. With him I am still, too. Does he know?

I weep the grief out of my system, and thank Christ alone. In silence him and I drive, not too often, but growing. I have nothing to say, and this, I find, is a great gift.

Dear God, what am I to do with this longing? I want it to be him, I want him to capture me and never release me back to the listless realm I walk. I want him to take me in and care for me, to watch over me and check in with me as if I were a wounded dove. Dear Lord I have been so lonely in this life, in ways I fear a woman should never be lonely. I cannot imagine the passage of his own life, years spent in solitude praying to the heavens for proof beyond. Here I am, is it not me, O Lord, that you have sent to quell his suffering? To aid in his journey and support him faithfully to the end?

If not Your will, free me, Dear Lord, for I find myself unable to cope. I turn to You, seek refuge in Your Holy Spirit, and still am not able to settle my unrest. Lord, as I hope, if he is from You, make that clear. My heart aches at the thought of a passing day without his glance and guidance, without his earnest protection. Lord, I have done this alone for so long and I continue to falter. My youth precedes me, it is a long, sloping and dark hallway. You know better than all my lonely trials. I pray. In his grace, in his guidance I know true safety in a way I have never known before. Lord, I pray to you with soaked cheeks and ruddy, swollen eyes, clarify the intent of his spirit and may You work across us both in all steps.

If you do not wish us to trek forward, rip the bandaid or fortify me with immaculate apathy. I am hear, bleeding fully and begging to let go. It is not a cloak I wear well, nor one I’d like to, nor one You advise, but dear Master, I cannot be subject to this suffering, not in the face of Your grace. Each other time it was a man not concieved of Your spirit and wisdom. But from him, O Lord, You trickle like oil. Do not let me know him as I have began to if it is all to be ripped away. I am a mad mess over here, can You not see? I am disheveled and unwitted. Let Your love cascade and silence the heaves of my soul. Candlelight morning and night, may You not lead me to suffer so.

Dear Lord, forgive the rampage of my aching heart. I know not the thoughts of his mind, nor the will of Yours, though I know you move lovingly towards a life of mine in You. Thank You, and Amen for Your patience. I know not how to weather this all, but in prayer I turn to You, thank You, and let tomorrow be soft-winded and clear.

In the nights long stretching did woe creep in, did my aching mind ponder of a better intent in this life, one of righteous pursuit and trial at the torments of a moment.

Dear God and Holy Jesus Christ I thank You, for in the moment I turned from foul sin of self and open my arms to accept You, strive for You, away all that ever had been question flew. I beg to share an ounce of the mercy You spare me. Ye, in the face of Your all-consuming love has each prayer unraveled in ways I did not know it could. Shame on my own ignorance and ego to doubt such Universal wonder as it pertains to You! Dear God, ever holy as You are, You have rained grace and kindness on my wretched soul that till now only sought to evade and wound You. A soul whose mission was to make numb itself and turn to shadow in every move, cold and bluing with each day.

In the morning I rise early and light a candle in prayer to You. Stiffness ravels up my core and cracks in my hips. Even in the smallest, my mind is renewed. It takes some time, enough to rise early for, and yet it feels not a moment has passed and I am onward. You have shown me the light, and my fear to You alone leads all worry of this flesh away. I prayed for a love deep and real through You, before I honestly spent time in Your Graces. Even in my insolence I have received! What merciful, loving, compassionate nature You have to bless a soul so bogged in turmoil and self-flagellation. I give my life to You! In one year, nay less, have I let go of the tethers of love not built upon You, have I released control as I had known it before, full in fear and confusion, and here You are to cradle me and ensure the goodness that lies beyond.

Dear Lord, I pray You bring me a love hardy and resilient, patient as You have been with I, and rousing of good humor too. Dear Lord I pray You still my quaking and insatiable heart, and lead me to a meekness and a submission unknown. There is one whom I know little but admire greatly. Dear Lord, if this bud is from You let it be so. Guide me in comfort and in thine footstep to implore and bring about the best I might offer to him. And dear Lord, I ask the same of him. If it is Your will, let us bring about You in all things we pursue.

I am like a child on a car trip so eager to arrive. Lord, I know your will is not of haste, and so I pray You steady me through the moments of unrest and bustle, I pray You welcome discernment and patient witnessing upon my head, and allow the man You have to take my hand just as You did in my insolent, childlike moments of unbelief.

For how am I to believe it could be so good? You have made me new. Allow this to transcend across my life and transform me each moment. Wholly unworthy as I am, shape my soul to be that of Your will. Head not my own ideas, for they are shortsighted and flawed. In You will all be made clear and loving.

On this morning as I walked at the riverside, prayers done and the candle breathing only a smoketail back at home, I hovered my eyes on the small buds. Each was frosted over like a single, deafened image. They glittered and in small moments I could see the pinks and reds that had been so bright before. For one fleeting second, I worried of them, of their spring ahead. And quite soon after did that thought leave me, and I walked on. They are tending and growing more resilient in this frost. They are patient for the sunshine, and in this cold moment they are made stronger and richer for the season ahead.

In every old familiar place. Out the train car window, across the marsh where the gulls scatter and the sky looks flat. Roads winding along ferny foliage and down to the quarry that looms like a lightless portal. On the highway where the air outside is hot and dry and red and silent aside from the engine. At the levy where the steep slabs stairstep down to the river. We were like cave paintings, or cave people, pre-historic and pre-destined, they’d say. No one is bothered by our revised past, by the retelling or blatant rewrite. Smile and not mention it, this part of my life involves so much pretending.

I cannot remember, I complain, but it isn’t that, really. I cannot remember because when I do it is a suffering deeper than I fear I can hold, and in it’s glance I cripple to the floor. I cannot remember because it was a different color then than it is now and I do not want to tarnish either side. I do not want to wish it gone but it cannot stay here with me. If it did, it would consume me so quickly I would come out the end another shape. How would I recognize myself then? In these moments when I cannot remember, I will look to the moon.

The room has red walls and is near entirely made up of windows. Outside of which a torrent of snow wafts down, and has since yesterday. The world is white. One radiator-like space heater chugs in the middle of the room. The floor is covered in paper clippings and thread. A dark teal cabinet rigged not to collapse sits under a plant hanging of the center window. There is no noise, aside from a seconds ticking on the clock.

This whole room must be drawn, must be known, she thinks. The snow outside lights up the room like a fuzzy dream. Her pink sweater is tattered a bit. The girl owns a dog who tugs on it when playing. Time is moving more quickly now, and for the first time I am wanting to slow down, she thinks again, hours do not feel long like they used to. It is nice to savor. The snow falls towards the window now. Icicles hang like teeth on the house across the street.

“It wasn’t supposed to be like this”

“It wasn’t supposed to be like this”

Heaving through breathy sobs

God above me, holding my shoulder

It was always supposed to be like this

This pain like vomit, an exorcism

I am nearly choking, then I am quiet

Like a child curled on the bathroom floor

I have no memory anymore, the tiles are cold

The years pass by me like train cars

So I pull my limbs closely onto the rug

As the radiator hums I breathe slowly

I put each one of your letters in the river

.

It was morning and the sky was quite clear

when I trudged through two feet of untainted white

down the streets and all the way to the edge of the embankment

.

A long sheet of snow not yet tread on

and several dozen yards across

stood between me and the water

.

I never meant for you to read these, really

At the cold, churning edge of the rivulet I scanned each letter

quietly to myself, handwriting done in pencil

.

I don’t know how to love you either, if I am honest.

Despite this, I have tried to, even when you’ve been cruel,

that is the difference between us

.

Down the stream the pages billowed one by one until

each snagged and rounded against a rock

below the waters surface their words fade and they glisten like snow

The tree is coming down tonight

All ornaments off

Even the cranberries

But it is the lights that linger

I can’t help it

What will go there

Or brighten the room

What will fill the void in the window

Between the records and the chair

Can I bear it stay empty

Sit in the discomfort of the darkened house

No one home and no tree lit to welcome

I dance to old music and avoid looking 

In its direction, avoid decision 

Inevitable, it is dying 

Have mercy, Christ, but it is really 

The perfect tree.

For a few weeks I smiled each time I strode by

And for several more I avoided it like plague

Embarrassed and mournful in its sight

It is an odd gift to give myself

The gift of a beautiful thing you know won’t last

A beautiful thing that is dying in your hands

A thing I did not need to kill but had to in fact

It’s made a mess of the whole room

And it hasn’t even begun to shed needles.

Tonight I sit in the soft light like a lonely child

Trying to remember, trying to hold it all here before it goes away

Just shy of one year from now

More lights, a new tree

I will smile again and mean it

• Coffee broils up to the top compartment of the pot on the stove

it is a dish that is never clean

washed quickly for each morning use

• I am a bag full of sneezes and greasy hair

a poufy deep brown mesh like a cloak

• The sky across is murky grey

earlier, during my morning prayer, a faint blue held out above the yard

I suspect it gone now, souped up into the low clouds

• While playing the piano (not well) the dog howls or yelp

slower when it is melancholic, I swear I hear him cry

• Maybe to dance is how I will spend the day

push off further my work but no one will mind

• one year back there was a wonderful dinner and hands held over me

like I was a new born, was it happy then? must have been two years back, actually

memories are not the way I expected them as a child

• This year, in my plea to self and plight to God

I shall be supported in this lonesome march

know better, act better, becoming each day

life occurs in 12s, and with two under the belt I am fresh again

• My sister called to tell me of her dream

a great grocery themed wedding in the yard out back and an unfortunate,

unlikely suitor and unfortunate, downright ugly orange kitten heals to escort my fate

maybe I have something to look forward to this year

• Let not all be forgotten and lost, for this year I have come to write again!

what they say about age is true, rather aging

there is more to say, rather more ways to attempt to convey our inner chasms

• The dog and I (man in my life) will head out soon

first thought was a ski but looking fairly miserable

oh middle of January it is a cold day to look in the mirror

• Next year I might be kissed again, what a thought!

there still stands a Christmas tree that needs to be dealt with

lest I not get too ahead of myself and forget the day at hand

• yes I am resolute – it works in 12s

twelve years back I believe it was I had a bowling party (I am no good)

twelve long years I can hardly recount

on with it then! this year I chrism her new

There are so many things I want to say to you, so many I’d like to ask you. Instead, I let silence sit in the gaps between our speech, a little longer each time. I have not decided if I should say anything at all, for is it your answer that might free me or the opportunity to tell you of my take of our plunder? I am undecided, and whether it is both, neither, or some portion of one, I hold off. I am fearful of opening myself again. I am fearful of finding myself with the rug pulled out and resenting a girl who stood foolish as she watched it happen and fell to her knees again, eyes glassy and aware. It is this state, one of self-flagellation and yearning, I’d like to avoid. (poorly thus far) – watching these things happen knowingly and moving though the aftermath of emotions much more slowly than I admire. I do not want to resent myself for trying to love, especially in the moments love looks like frankness or desperation. I do not want to see myself unworthy of love so as you had treated me in my moments of boiling over. It was not the first time and will not be the last. For this I cannot hate myself.

The years past drift in my memory as dreams now. I cannot be sure anything happened. I am rebuilding the holes of myself left empty in your absence. Every You a lover gone to waste.

This week I reread my own writing and let it be someone I hadn’t originally wrote it of. For a moment this changed me and changed the pace of healing the mess we’ve made. How do we care for those we love? To care for another, in the fog of heartache and settling of parting souls? At times I fear my rigidity.

In the evenings I am haunted and vulnerable. Sobs, a respite in the choked-up, back-ordered mound of my feelings. The nighttime bedroom has dark windows that are shadowed with moonlight and I do not want anyone to see me this way, I disdain myself for the waste of my loneliness. I long not to be alone.

I struggle to accept the parts of myself that saw it all with you, parts that earnestly believed in an us across life. Nothing exists now. I shed my skin like a snake and come out as a baby. The memories only with me as if I watched them on a screen. Missing is a kind of suffering words do not contain. I use English too much to speak with, rather than use it to speak through. New song in the mix. 

The sun will still rise and create that beautiful splatter of soft morning pink across the eastern mountains. I will see the buttes on the plain raise up in wintery willow purple and remember a part of me from back then I am not sure is real. I will think of you and struggle to pray for you. I may cry, and go on with the day. Summer will come again, but for now I will bear this. The weight of thousands of useless words and tears, I will bear. The smiles I can only offer to God, and loudly long for another who lights up with me the same. In the evenings, I will bear all this, and awake again tomorrow renewed by a dream more real than all these years.