A true story about a guitar

 You look into the audience and ask

"Who's not from around here?"

and with no warning

my crazy hand shoots up.

It moves as if propelled

by a will of its own.

This renegade limb

is lying,

contradicting my life.

I am clearly from around here.

I was born on this very spot.

 

You point towards me

and laugh,

"Where're you from?"

but its too late,

my lying hand has fallen

fluttering

dying

across my lap

uttering not a word of explanation.

 

Silently, I can only shake my head,

I furrow my brow and shrug,

the universal sign for “no.”

As if I've forgotten

momentarily

how it is exactly

that I have come to be here.

But the pulse in my left wrist

is pounding out an SOS.

                      Save me.

This place is not my home.

After the show,

punch-drunk,

I follow you backstage.

You smell like distance,

like light and heat,

like the city,

like escape.

My heart is an insect

beating wildly against glass.

I want to run away

and join your carnival.

My unruly hand

wants to touch your mouth

and your eyelids.

Instead,

I watch you leave.

The rusty sunset

written on your back.

 

Later, alone in the bath

I float, weightless,

pretending you'll come back.

Come back for me

and my crazy lying hand.

The hand that told you

I'm not from around here.  

God is in the details

It is my blessing and my curse, that I am no mystery to myself. I have learned to anticipate that I will choose badly and fail often, in most things. I am aware of my habits and patterns. I know myself inside and out. Sometimes, I wish I could say, "Oh my, I didn't realize." but sadly, that is rarely true. I usually realize.

When things fall apart, other people seem so surprised. They say, "How could this happen? How could this terrible thing happen to me?" It is my habit when things go to hell to simply reply, "Well, of course they did." because they usually do, eventually.

Still, defying everything I know, realizing just how deeply fucked up I actually am, I dig in and push forward anyway. I bring people in knowing they will leave...or I will. I adopt a pet knowing it will die or I will. The sun will set. The leaves will turn. The milk will go bad. The car will break down. The relationship, which was lonely and quiet, will end with a fizzle. 

…but just in case the sunrise is pink and the coffee is dark and rich and the pretty barista smiles at me across my latte, I think I'll get up and have another day. Because I’ve heard that god is in the details and my life is most definitely fed by a million tiny unremarkable details. Perhaps these ordinary moments are the ones to grad and hold, the ones whose buoyancy will keep me afloat later, when the leaves turn and the milk goes. And maybe, just maybe, if I’m very lucky, a pink sunrise and dark, rich cup of coffee and a pretty, smiling barista will be just enough. 

Rock, Paper, Scissors

your past is not a place

you used to live

but now do not. 

it is a rope tied to a rock

it is
a thousand ropes
tied to a thousand rocks
dancing behind you
in the dark
skimming asphalt
bleeding sparks
like "just married" cans
tied to a bumper. 

it is
a thousand tiny anchors
cutting grooves into the earth
like rows
of rich Alabama soil
waiting to be planted 

it is
your history
scratched into the dirt
like sanskrit
the original story
of sin
and retribution. 

it is
a thousand paralyzed moments
anchoring you
to yourself
with chains
sticky and yellowing
woven from cobwebs
and old hair
and dead flowers
crushed
between the transparent pages
of the family bible. 

your past is not a place
you used to be
but now are not.

your past
is written
on your body

it is
every scar
stretch mark
laugh line or
wrinkle
every dimple
age spot
yellowing bruise
or graying tattoo
that maps on your skin
and whispers to me
the origins
of your birth.

Your Beating Heart

I want to lay myself bare at your feet.

Open myself

Collar to belly.

Give myself to you,

and all my bloody sins.

I want to turn myself inside out

for your inspection.

Show you my clockwork parts.

Bleed my history onto your smooth surface. 

 

It’s not the comfort of a passive observer I seek. 

I am already a slave to the part of me

which longs for your confessional.

I need the absolution found

only among survivors of the same war.   

I want you to shove your hands inside my chest

and recognize the rhythm

of your own beating heart.

Ballad of the Laundromat.

I am the spider

suspended like an apostrophe

in the space

between the dryer and the wall.

I watch

quietly

spinning spinning spinning

my own translucent tapestry

as a million stories

unfold 

and tumble  

together

in a cyclone of dark dry heat.

Propelled

through each 7 minute cycle

by life’s dirtiest little secrets

caught up in the drunken dance

of old panties

and tattered socks.

I sway with the gentle sucking of air

as the door opens and closes.

Dangling precariously

on a single thread

stretched taunt

between an empty egg sack and

a dying body

tied up

and waiting to be consumed

what a convenient distraction you have become.

when i am too much,

when i question my voice,

when i am lonely,

when i worry that i have become unlovable,

i relive the gentle way you told me no

and no again.

 
i recall the weight

of your silence.

 
i think of all the places

that you are

and i am not.

i imagine you,

slightly drunk,

finding comfort

 
in my absence.

 

i am happy much of the time,

but i find on my most human days,

you have become the weapon

with which i punish myself

for my own failings,

real and imagined.
 

we don't speak

or see one another anymore,

intentionally

or even accidentally.

still,

when i feel my worst,

you're the whip i use

to count my sins.

we take up so little space

in each other’s lives now.

i am not sure what is left

to give up.

Before and After

 When I consider my life, it is usually divided into two parts: Before and After. Before – before a proper diagnosis. After – after a proper diagnosis. This distinction isn’t some fleeting thought I have when I open a scrap book. It’s the way I tell my story, to myself and to others. I have rationalized a dozen different reasons for this distinction but, privately, I know that only one is true. I want to draw a bright red X on the calendar and say, “This is the day I stopped being a terrible person.” That is how shame operates. Shame is a liar. Shame will steal a memory and replace it with a sharp pain in your belly and a tightening in your chest. Others can foster shame, but it feeds on your hurt and regret. In my desperation to distance myself from Before, I ripped my life in half and gave the big piece to shame. When that happens, shame becomes emboldened and far less afraid of the light.

During Before, I lived an entire life; a rich and complicated life. I reached out for help so many times over the years, but never with any real conviction, or perhaps just never in the right direction. I did a bit of drinking and drugging, searched for comfort in the bodies of others, and made impulsive, sometimes self-destructive, decisions. Later, seeking something more ethereal, I joined a women’s collective, studied Sufism, and moved to a Biodynamic Farming Community in New York State. In between, I got married and divorced, raised an amazing step-daughter and a willful little beagle, traveled, ran a marathon and went back to college. Still, no matter where I was, each of these experiences, though important, brought me no closer to true wellness. I was sick, and as the years went by, I was getting sicker. In spite of all my efforts, eventually, Before became unbearable.

When I finally found help, it lived an entire state away. I understood, that for me, I couldn’t stay well under the same circumstances in which I’d become sick. Over the course of a single weekend, I packed my belongings into a U-Haul and drove across state lines, into an entirely new world. That began After. I found a psychiatrist, got the right medication and began therapy. With the support of my husband and family, I settled in and began building an entirely different life – a life lived with care, education, and intention. I kept my appointments, took my meds, made healthy choices, and created a support system. I read, listened and talked to the anyone who would share their story. Every day, I learned something new. I thought because my old life was becoming smaller and smaller in the rearview mirror, that it was also becoming less and less important. That’s not true, you know?

A few days ago, someone I care for a great deal unexpectedly decided it was time to walk away from our friendship. She was the last real connection between my two lives. I am sad; so much sadder than I expected. This moment is very fresh so I am trying to remain present. In moments like this, if you aren’t careful, the past will grab hold and drag you back. This parting means I am no longer tethered to her or the hurt I caused her, but it also means I am also no longer tethered to the me that she loved. I am self-aware enough to admit that I held onto her much longer than I should have because I wanted to be forgiven. That isn’t her job. Her job is self-care. She needed to move on and I cannot begrudge her that.

As I sit here, trying to process this (what should I call it?) loss, it occurs to me (why wasn’t this clear to me sooner) that I have voluntarily given shame the entirety of Before. That is more than half my life! That can’t be right. No wonder shame has made himself so comfortable at my kitchen table, eating handfuls of calendar squares. Somehow, along the way, my memories got tangled up with my illness and it simply became easier to let shame take it all. But here’s the thing, THE MOST IMPORTANT THING, about Before and After: everything Before wasn’t terrible and everything After isn’t perfect. It’s a mixed bag. Life is messy that way.

A million amazing, ordinary, terrible and wonderful moments happen in a lifetime and they’re all connected. It’s all one story. Let me say that again – It’s all one story and it’s your story. It may be complicated but it belongs to you. Don’t let anyone else tell it for you. Maybe I can find a place on my calendar for this moment: a bright red X to remind me that loss feels terrible but you can’t go back and change anything. There are no mulligans in real life. What you can do, instead, is find somewhere safe to be, identify your allies, embrace your past, tell your own story, fight like hell to stay healthy and be gentle with yourself when you fall. Your past isn’t a minefield, it’s a history book. Use it!

P.S. To the girl on the bicycle, I will miss you terribly.