Inwardly Re-arranged

I got absolutely nothing done today.

Yet.

I had astounding, life changing things happen.

All over the span of a few minutes.

All in a day.

Clear the decks.

Make way for change and with my heart in my throat I leapt.

I don’t know where I’m going to land.

It will be in new territory.

It will look exactly like what it looks like now.

Except.

That everything is different.

Violets covered in sugar crystals.

Like the best sex I never had.

Like spangles of star dust and fireworks and quiet.

An inner knowing.

An inner depth of knowledge about myself, my disease, an awareness of old pain that has settled again and instead of pain, is now stronger for having walked through the unbearable lightness of love.

Sunlight on my face.

My hair up today, the breath of the ocean warm on my skin as I got ready for work.

The books I haven’t read enough of, the paper I still need to write, the things all put on pause so that I could navigate through uncharted waters.

I know better than to go to alone.

I tearfully surrendered this morning to finally after days of being quiet, telling.

I told.

I was terrified.

I already knew the answer and I had worked through the big emotions and had the big talk with God, I knew.

I know that where love is concerned there is no choice.

However.

I don’t have to see it through my eyes only.

I get to see it through the perspectives of others, who may have a different point of view, a different way of seeing.

And he did.

And he was kind.

And there was no shame in the telling.

And I cried.

And it hurt.

And then the relief.

And then the sorrow.

And then the tears again.

And then.

Well.

I knew.

And even though only a tiny bit of the story came out.

The bones of the narrative.

It was enough.

He understood and we talked about talking more and I just did that too.

And it was kind and there was no judgement, no shaming, no making me feel bad, a warm heart, a sort of support that I have, that I am so lucky to have, that I am so grateful to have that I can keep healing and getting better.

Not that I am fucked up.

Well.

Hahaha.

Maybe a little.

But.

There’s hope for me, always has been, I’m not in this alone.

I have no details for you.

I have only the inner workings of my heart and the assurance that I am loved for who I am without question or repercussion.

That I am seen and held and loved and taken care of.

Because I asked for help to work something through, to see where it went, to untangle the knot that I got tied up in.

Glorious knot.

So sweet was it to surrender to that binding.

A surrender that lead to further surrender, further release, further soft acknowledgement of who I am, where I have come from, and to whom I belong.

To myself.

To what works best for me.

To love.

I was saying the St. Francis prayer.

Yes.

I pray.

Hush, this wilding woman with tattoos and tales of Burning Man does spirituality too.

Surprise, surprise.

There is a line in the prayer that gets me every time.

To love, rather than to be loved.

That is what I can do.

To know that I have a God.

And you have a God.

That I can only take care of myself and sometimes, a lot of the times, I don’t know how to do that, so I do, I turn towards those with more time, with more experience, with wider perspective.

And I get what I need.

And my heart, so high in my throat all day today, finally starts to ease down back into my chest, my breath back into my body, my soul careening about, high on a taut string like a diamond kite in the sky, softly, gently, sails back down, no tussle in the tree tops, nor tangled and stuck in the high wire.

But.

Soft.

There.

A gentle, sweet landing in the tall grass.

The summer grass.

The grass in the park behind the apartment building on the North East side of Madison.

The grass not yet mowed and higher in the last push of summer, the blades warm, cradling the kite, the long string I wind back up and as I turn the handle of the spool the loose fabric of the kite slides over the top of the grass and back to me.

The call of the red-winged mocking-bird.

The high blue sky.

The sun patter down on my shoulders now more freckled as I turn from the girl to the woman.

My soul, myself, my heart.

My life.

All this purposeful trudging.

It matters.

I have changed.

I stood on the roof tonight.

I held a warm little girl in my arms.

She pointed at the sky.

“Star.”

“Yes,” I said, pointing across the soft midnight blue, the last light of sunset fading behind the hills of Twin Peaks, “and plane, and satellite.”

I remembered when I was little and how the lights in the sky moved me so much, the flashing planes and the story of flight.

I have had a sort of flight today.

A lifting of my spirit into that vastness and through it all a song in my heart.

I have no answers for you.

I just have love.

Like the foam left on the beach after the waves have crashed in and rushed out.

A soft melting memory of desire seeping back into the sand, a lace of bubbles upon the shore, a dream shimmering there.

A moment.

Then gone.

Ghosting kisses on your face.

Grace in the hallway.

Swallow song in the barn of my heart.

I would take away your pain.

But I have my own to carry from the shore, across the bridge.

And into the land of a brand new day.

One foot a time.

Into the light.

Into the sun.

Into the love.

Love.

The only place left for me to go.

There.

Just there.

Love.

Tags: brand new day, child, divinity, flight, god, grace, inwardly re-arranged, journey, life, living amends, love, one foot at a time, pain, poetry, postaday, prayers, spiritual flight, St. Francis prayer, surrender, swallow song, woman