Truth is Stranger Than Fiction

wet and innocent like she is,

soft and new unlike the boy  whose metaphors leak unkindly  from his bones,

words he  won’t learn the meaning of,

she is fresh no sandals, spread toes

the sun basks to be in her shadow stretching herself out her curves the waves  of a new season

many days I wake up I do not want to be Wonder Woman didn't ask for a cape of responsibilities and titles to hang heavy on my back choke the hallelujah from my throat

many days I wake up I want to stay in bed have grown tired of always practicing how to lift my feet to learn the steps it takes to fly and hold myself up

many days I wake up the burden of woman itself is enough never wished on myself a Superlative that makes me into super anything but what is my choice? with so many things to do and places to go I hesitantly strap my costume on and armor my heart so at least the first person I save each morning is myself.

but there are only so many times you can speak a word like "hero" or "trying" before you begin to resent it, before imposture syndrome starts to creep in through your strong hands that try to keep your whole world from caving, starts to crack the surface of your invincible skin and cushioned heart,

some days I wake up I do not want to be anything I do not want to be anyone I am tired of trying.

and still— I carry a superlative I want so badly to live up to I walk out the door I put the cape on,

in a past life, did we run in circles trying to find each other? did we get it wrong every time and wind up in places opposite of where we thought we would be where we settled for the ease of pre-written promises and nothing new to memorize or commit to, did we take the shortcuts that might help us find ourselves sooner but only killed our souls quicker?

I wonder in this life did we get so close we ended up on the other side of each other like touching a two-way funhouse mirror that contorts love into something sly and hard to look at, to confront yourself in?

and will we always play an unnamed game of who can come closest to filling the shape of where love is with something that makes us more comfortable, less caught,

must we always act like letting someone in is a match of tug-o-war?

darling, listen. no matter what we do our fingers will end up blistered, our palms bloody if we look into the mirror long enough to know anything, if we pull the rope harder or let it give,

trying to figure out why your eyes gloss over how they do by searching books for pages you’ve turned down, which don’t mean anything at all because they are all dog-eared everything means something to you--

in high school, the girl I was in love with  told me to stop putting meaning into goddamn everything, “goddamn” in the middle of the sentence, there is no philosophy in the way the moon waxes over the water, no philosophy in my footsteps onto the divide between the pier and the sand,

when I was young I knew everything had a hidden identity now I am not as young and question whether anything has an obvious identity to begin with, that is to say I think your sadness tells the world it does not exist,

not everything has a nametag.

everybody feels something walking down a street they’ve never been on.

the years “I love you” felt an ice rink all artificial solidity  to hold you up the promise of floating the reality of bruised knees

the years we held each other when we were still too young to know the worst  our hands could do

the years your mouth  was a bad excuse for a fire alarm I called you sometimes at 1 am  when I felt smoke rising, your voice never calmed me

the years we clung tight anchors dragging each other through a salt water that should have been our release

I do forgive you for the words you used before you practiced meaning

I do forgive myself for the abyss I thought love was supposed to erase

I do forgive  us for the bridges we have built since we learned not to be ice rink or anchor or emergency exit

the full galaxies that won’t rip through my skin by themselves  that stay dumbly tucked between my tongue and teeth

which make my fingers tremble at night make my eyes wet  with frustration my bones screaming for the life they feel  but cannot write into existence

I am a million angles to look at in an art museum on the subway I am something else entirely with a tilted head

you too darling

maybe our conversations have occurred  at a crooked slant

and asks me what I like to suffer for,

asks me a question: to recover from what?

these things never happened to us but we take them so personally like constellations  and old canvases are foolish enough to exist just for the wonder in my eyes,

the world offends you but it speaks without caring  if your ears catch all its howling

and you sit and wait for some sign  meant only for you

I hate when I smell the smoke on you like a burned down dream 

like someone  who doesn’t want to rise from the ash  but sit in it

I hate the bitterness I taste on your skin like a seder dinner

the way I feel every tear on my tongue and almost remember the sadnesses you’ve felt in your stomach and veins

I hate to see the empty in your eyes like a hole that goes forever 

I love you a vine up the garden wall

I want to stay with you but I need to reach for something else

I’m just a whisper in the wind that took on the atmosphere to tell you I belong in your ear

I’m a ghost trying to come back to  what it means to not be a self 

I don’t wanna talk about how the sky has always felt like an apology to the ground, “listen I’m sorry everyone steps on you, tries to dig deeper only to be disappointed,  but here I am infinite,  take a break from the feet and the heavy hearts and let them float a while,”

I  am my own ground and my own sky most of the time I stay put get grounded by gravity but feel my toes sink like quicksand,  when I can’t feel my spine  I swear to god I am shrinking into grass there is nothing to hold me up but  these wobbly bones  full of a hollow sadness,

and I don’t wanna talk about how I woke up at 7 and found out that my preschool teacher died of cancer, cruel that we live in a world where  the person who teaches you that no one can erase  your light from this world can disappear,

there are things that keep us down and things to let go of, balloons floating to the stars so we can give the ground a break from our heavy hearts,

half of it is this terrible fear and dread over having to live my life and get myself out of bed and go back to school and continue working and having to take responsibility for my life and myself.

the other half is this overwhelming courage, hope, and knowledge that i am strong and can keep going because i have already done so much.

it is terrifying and all consuming and my heart beats hard and steady all the time like a bassline shock to my system that will not allow me not to tap along with my feet, my fingers, my whole body.

surrounded by the flames meant  to keep you going that only make more flames

your feet are hot your heart is  running out of time

do you remember what  love felt like before all the questions

I don’t want you in the way wanting means I want to maybe witness your existence but  you want gripped hands  like slipping off a cliff I am not your ledge not someone grasping to cling

trust me I want to feel your fingers in mine but not because I need to hold you  or suck the saltwater from your tongue find your sweat dug underneath  my fingernails

I love you  like an archaeologist  kneeling by a thousand year old riverbed,

what is its story, how long can I touch it before I am a part of its history too?

you love me like a hunter loves the leopard skin on his wall or an artist likes to look at the mess of colors  on his palette,  almost a masterpiece itself  proud of what you can do with your hands, hang up, keen to take credit for the life of a thing  not keen to let it live its own.

I want you in the way I want to watch a sunset unfold  I can love you without ever touching you  let you come and go,

most days I want to relive the becoming of myself trust me darling there are so many light rains I got lost in  because I was not prepared to jump puddles, didn’t know how to taste a drop on my tongue  without drowning myself on the inside,

I am okay now. I swim in streams of sky and  welcome the thunderstorms that come during sunshowers, sometimes sunshine and gloomy mix, sometimes life calls for light rain to remind us we can walk through the unexpected in the place we are in, in the shoes we have on, as the people we are,

we are capable of becoming with whatever we have in our hands without umbrellas without galoshes without boats to sail through floods and save us.

sometimes the light rain reminds us we are our own umbrellas, our galoshes,

“Woman,” my psychologist says to me on the eighteenth day of April, “you are tough times in tough times but there will be a light soon,” I don’t believe her-- 

I am built of cosmo dust and pulling myself out of sadness of sweat and tears and blood on concrete I have paved alone, though sometimes I forget I have made myself out of myself,

have carved the walls of obstacles to my liking, molded my ribcages to hold more heavy,

I am a woman, I am my own home.

“Woman,” she says to me  on the eighteenth day of June, “you don’t understand what you’re made of but you have built yourself out of  the most amazing things,”

I do believe her,

because sometimes I forget I have made myself out of myself, that there have been times my back should have broken  from all the pain I’ve carried on top of it, no padding, no apologies, no rain checks, sometimes I need reminding  of the arms I wrap around myself at night and the paycheck stubs and 85 hour work weeks, the cruel words and hits to confidence, turning the other cheek like it is an Olympic sport,

“Woman,” she says to me, “it is impossible for you not to succeed in this life,”

I do believe her,