a birth, a death (life)

tonight, i die to the past.

i die to the past, and am born to this present moment -


this gift, this fresh rain-smell, this empty box, this early morning, this child's laugh, this midnight snow, this quiet stone, this single star, this shared look between friends, this warm promise.


it is not that i do not honor the dead, i do. i am thankful for the path i have walked to here, and every colored stone it was set with.

i may, now and again, fondly recount these steps - the conversations, the laughing, the hurting, the joy - embracing their memory like an old friend.

but i was born to be no grave-robber. i will not dig up what time has past and try to give its chalk line shape a place among my present dream.

and i will not play the puppeteer - working hard to carry both sides of a conversation no one is having.

my friends, my loves - these cannot be hidden from me. i will know them always when i see them.

the measuring stick? i threw it out. i burned it. it was made to calculate finite things, and so always gave an inaccurate reading when i tried to use it to measure life.

now, i keep an eraser, held loosely in my pocket. each morning before i speak, i erase the boxes my mind drew around everything lovely the day before.


i am newly in love with everything i love. this is me crying from seeing its beauty for the first time, again.

i am newly alive, with all the wonder and magic due those who have just come from a long darkness.

i am newly alive, unbound, unchained.

i am new.

i am.


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