consider a life in fealty to futility:
it is staring down a mirrored hallway
it is mistaking deflection for definition
it is a stumble on the clipped tips of a waking wingspan
it is those sheds piling deadly at the bedfoot
and discovering in their toppling midsts one can not –
despite promise and practice –
lift off, let alone swoop or soar
this is a life lived groundlocked, flapping halfly whole
wrapping twisted digits ‘round handfuls of grasped-at ground
this is collecting desperate pebbles cast by careless, creeping waves
and letting the self abate in those crawling tendrils
unedged and undefined
consider instead a life freed from fret:
having once hated this soft body, this reeling mind
I can instead stretch upward from her and our sorely rested nest
I find in her a loving wisdom
she and I aligned in sideways symmetry
I find in her a knowing affection
could and would not make her choices twice
hold love respect understand that woman who did