sometimes/ { grief & love }

sometimes i don't want to go to sleep even though i am weary
sometimes the grief makes a place by the fire with me, shares the covers, and makes her home inside of me
sometimes no one can see

sometimes i'm transparent

sometimes it's like i have x ray vision and no one wants to be around me/ no one wants to hear what i have to say/ sometimes they're afraid
i'm afraid too

sometimes, even through the darkness, i can see possibilities
sometimes i am moved to tears by a conversation/ it feels amazing to be trusted
    entrusted
i wear it heavily
but not like a burden/ no

/

sometimes i think the crush knows
how can x not?
what does x get out of my silly little crush?
sometimes it's not little
sometimes x is oblivious and i'm mad

/

i've fallen in love with the kitchen again
with the portraits, the people caught in motion with the light on them just so with their faces deep in expressions they don't know anyone else can see
it is the face of passion
of thought
/ prayer

sometimes i fall in love with everyone
even when i'm being hard on them
i'm proud
of our efforts
sometimes i'm so proud i think i will burst
sometimes i burst
{i try to do this when i am alone}

/

sometimes i miss her like i lost her yesterday
sometimes i pick up the phone to call her
sometimes i speak about her in the present tense
/ no one, but one who has lost like i have, can understand

it's anniversary time
i'm brittle and sandpapery
sensitive beyond reason and drunk on a lot of fuck yous/
sometimes,
well, most of the time
i'm so happy to live alone
in the trees boughs
in a canopy of shimmering leaves
in a silence under the moon
sometimes i forget how i grew up on a diet of sirens and gunshots and the thousands of tiny sounds vermin make every second of every minute of every hour

i'm grateful beyond reason for the quiet
for my own heart/ no matter who loves me back
sometimes my crush is wondrous and i feel warmed by it
sometimes murder is on my mind

sometimes i wear her clothes/ sometimes her scent is on my skin
sometimes i talk and i know it's her
and yet
i am someone unto myself, someone i never met until a few years ago

        i am watering the garden that is me/

sometimes sleep comes when it wants, not necessarily when i want
the words-- if they want to come out, they force me propped in the chair, until they're done
sometimes the words exhaust me
but they always feed

/

sometimes i ask of my crush/ my heart, "why?"
but in the end i always know
it is the padded crowbar
the gentle shove
the loving slap
the searing pain that is welcome and despised
/ my heart opening
for whom it is not for me to decide
{annoying, but true}

now sleep can come
an anniversary coming to a close
the holidays heavy on the ledge
sometimes taunt/ sometimes touch/ sometimes tears/
sometimes isn't all the time
anymore

Comments

[Anita]

I'm glad it's getting easier. it's so hard to retrain your mind to speak of someone in the past tense; I try to be gentle on myself about this, but I wonder if people feel I've lost my mind.

[Brian]

"it is the padded crowbar
the gentle shove
the loving slap
the searing pain that is welcome and despised
/ my heart opening"

So beautiful!

Thank you for posting this.

[lisa dee]

hello lovely

lisa dee

I'm sorry

[hungrygirl]

Lovely writing.

Banal to say, but I found it does get easier, although in a way I didn't want it to get easier. At the 5-year mark (this year), something did shift.

Still, anniversaries are hard, and important, too.

[Aaron]

Hungrygirl, that's a lovely admission. I often feel the same way, like making it easier would somehow mean I had lessened my respect/love, like making it easier would make them drift further away. Thanks for being brave enough to admit that, and I hope you are brave enough to let go and heal.