august falling
I can touch and taste the coming of august, with lips sealed and hands closed, each and every year. No amount of distraction or distortion can confuse my bloodlife, which slows in dread of its presence.
Psychology 101 might blame the intense motivations of sensory memories and cues. I’d have to argue that I’m too aware of this sub-conscious trick to fall prey to it. I’ve been to the classes and studied its lingo; I’ve even crawled inside to watch it.
Then again, maybe I missed a fold?
This sweltering terrain is where endings and losses and trauma surround me. My blood throbs pain and anguish while my body breath races to catch itself. Sixteen years ago, after years of grand disappearances at shopping malls and toy stores, she had her grand finale. For days and weeks and months I expected to chance her striding through the front door - apologetic and scared as usual. But it never happened that way because it never could. My mama was gone. Worse yet, she left me alone with him.
Sun-scorched brown landscapes, heat with heavy air, and no rain. The stillness holds and presses and chokes until all that I have outrun comes to beckon. My soul pleads freedom in the darkness, spawns dreams of the bayous where water is endless and life is still moving. I long to be where this life has learned to thrive in such conditions; in a place where there are guides and reclamation.
This year there are aspirations and growth which desire to break these ties that bind. There is anticipation that the butterfly will finally emerge from its cocoon wreckage and be set free. By college and family, a new business and life. By a relationship that threatens to stay.
Louisiana’s boodlife has blown north where we call to it; the bayous thriving green and unmet. There is a slackwater terrace hidden deep which belongs to us, where we both stake claim and crave love. It is here that we’ll discover what has yet to be seen and here too we will leave it as we go. Its name is august falling.
It seems strange, Freudian, and often unfair to say, but our relationship has been a salvation. As I gasp with my losses, she is there and not leaving - even when I sink away to give opportunity. She climbs down the ladder, and takes me back home. While it takes several trips to instill faith, we are getting there. And ever so slowly I am learning, she is teaching, that loving doesn’t have to happen with such fear or such pain.
Psychology 101 might blame the intense motivations of sensory memories and cues. I’d have to argue that I’m too aware of this sub-conscious trick to fall prey to it. I’ve been to the classes and studied its lingo; I’ve even crawled inside to watch it.
Then again, maybe I missed a fold?
This sweltering terrain is where endings and losses and trauma surround me. My blood throbs pain and anguish while my body breath races to catch itself. Sixteen years ago, after years of grand disappearances at shopping malls and toy stores, she had her grand finale. For days and weeks and months I expected to chance her striding through the front door - apologetic and scared as usual. But it never happened that way because it never could. My mama was gone. Worse yet, she left me alone with him.
Sun-scorched brown landscapes, heat with heavy air, and no rain. The stillness holds and presses and chokes until all that I have outrun comes to beckon. My soul pleads freedom in the darkness, spawns dreams of the bayous where water is endless and life is still moving. I long to be where this life has learned to thrive in such conditions; in a place where there are guides and reclamation.
This year there are aspirations and growth which desire to break these ties that bind. There is anticipation that the butterfly will finally emerge from its cocoon wreckage and be set free. By college and family, a new business and life. By a relationship that threatens to stay.
Louisiana’s boodlife has blown north where we call to it; the bayous thriving green and unmet. There is a slackwater terrace hidden deep which belongs to us, where we both stake claim and crave love. It is here that we’ll discover what has yet to be seen and here too we will leave it as we go. Its name is august falling.
It seems strange, Freudian, and often unfair to say, but our relationship has been a salvation. As I gasp with my losses, she is there and not leaving - even when I sink away to give opportunity. She climbs down the ladder, and takes me back home. While it takes several trips to instill faith, we are getting there. And ever so slowly I am learning, she is teaching, that loving doesn’t have to happen with such fear or such pain.