from the earth to you
dear lolo m.,
you are long-crumbled bones. and this how i've always and only known you, as bones.
my mom tells me you were a striking presence, beautiful, tall, a lawyer. she says you poured your energy into captaining your children from shore to shore. she says you carried your father's family on your bareback and buried them whole.
you raised her to think the worst of the world, but even in her wiliest, she admits you meant well, knows you always just loved like that.
it's easy to see that you were so alive to her once, that once was enough. memory made you into an eternity, easy. i never mourned you like she did, and always thought i was lucky, until i realized it meant that you were never alive to me.
and maybe that's why i insist that there was always an itch, a missing sliver left empty for you in me. maybe that's why i'm attempting to fray the ends to make a bigger seam. why all i can really ever say to you is this:
thank you that i need to ache in order to be full, whether aching before, after, or during fulfillment. thank you for the slowness and denseness of this epiphany.
thank you that i regret knowing people for their flesh and hair alone. let me realize that i want to know you, never mind that it's too late for that. being that it's always too late for that somewhere in the world. let me realize that i want to know everyone beyond what makes them human, so they can finally be human to me.
thank you that i was gifted the best, most searing thing all these years ago, now, and until i or the cosmos decide it's high time to pass it on.
thank you that you are alive to the people who are alive to me.
happy birthday.
you are long-crumbled bones. and this how i've always and only known you, as bones.
my mom tells me you were a striking presence, beautiful, tall, a lawyer. she says you poured your energy into captaining your children from shore to shore. she says you carried your father's family on your bareback and buried them whole.
you raised her to think the worst of the world, but even in her wiliest, she admits you meant well, knows you always just loved like that.
it's easy to see that you were so alive to her once, that once was enough. memory made you into an eternity, easy. i never mourned you like she did, and always thought i was lucky, until i realized it meant that you were never alive to me.
and maybe that's why i insist that there was always an itch, a missing sliver left empty for you in me. maybe that's why i'm attempting to fray the ends to make a bigger seam. why all i can really ever say to you is this:
thank you that i need to ache in order to be full, whether aching before, after, or during fulfillment. thank you for the slowness and denseness of this epiphany.
thank you that i regret knowing people for their flesh and hair alone. let me realize that i want to know you, never mind that it's too late for that. being that it's always too late for that somewhere in the world. let me realize that i want to know everyone beyond what makes them human, so they can finally be human to me.
thank you that i was gifted the best, most searing thing all these years ago, now, and until i or the cosmos decide it's high time to pass it on.
thank you that you are alive to the people who are alive to me.
happy birthday.