LOVE AND WHISKEY

 My head melts into your chest.

The old familiar smell

Of stale tequila and cigarettes.

A bottle of whiskey rests

On the old wooden table.

My escape to a far off place.

 

We lay there together.

The stagnant air like a blanket.

Two hearts beating as one.

Two minds so intertwined

We think as one.

 

In the stillness of the night

Questions keep buzzing

Around me like flies.

Doubt creeps through me

Like a worm in my veins.

 

I take another shot of whiskey.

My head finds its place with you again.

The old warmth of familiarity.

The gentle rhythm of your breathing.

It keeps me held down.

It keeps me from myself.

 

 

THE LOSS

I drove with questions swirling in my head.

A dream the night before hung over me.

What if my baby were already dead?

The answer I was too afraid to see.

The ultrasound screen hung up on the wall.

My son and laughter danced around the room.

A movie-like experience for all.

I took a breath and braced myself for doom.

The doctor waltzed in full of hope and light.

“Let’s take a look and see the fetus now.”

Nothing to fear for all would be alright.

I took a breath and wiped sweat from my brow.

The wand swept over my bare skin to see

A lifeless baby floating inside me.

 

 

MARRIAGE

I wrapped my arms around you.

The slow, strong beat of your heart

Like a call home to myself.

Your arms like a steel gate

Keeping out the uncertainty of doubt.

 

I felt the strength of your breathing

Against my face.

I felt the firmness of your feet

On the earth.

An anchor on this ground that shakes.

 

My hardness melted away.

My anger turned to grief.

I let it all pass through me

Like a breeze through the trees.

Like sand slipping through my fingers.

 

You gazed down on me

As you slowly entered my heart.

I breathed deeply into myself

And on that hot July night,

I fell in love with you again.

 

 

GLACIER

When in the dusk you said to me that

I was wrong, things weren’t that bad,

That you were a good father.

When you told me you had

Never lied, never disappeared,

Never humiliated me,

I felt the blood freeze

In my heart and the ice

Worm its way through my veins

Until I was paralyzed

With cold.

When in that moment I began

To feel the heat of grief

Rush into the bottom of my feet and

Climb my glacier body

Until all the ice began to melt

And fall away,

I looked at you as though you

Were a child – small, naïve,

And searching for a place to hide

From the tornado of reality

Making it’s way toward you.

And in that moment it came to me

That you were as lost as I had been.

Both of us, a single flower growing

Through a crack in the ice –

Vulnerable, lonely, beautiful.