"I Will Never Have A Husband" I Tell Her, As The Sun Peeks Through The Branches, Turning The Dark Blue

I feel far from you for the first time The first time the oceans have mattered The first time the world has felt large And vast, and endless, and where are you?

When you have been here in my heart And I am searching and scavenging Scouring and raving mad in my uncertainty Like you are around me but not here

Like we rowed in separate little boats Me by the shore, you off on the horizon You were always just out there by the sun But you have drifted into the light, away

I always felt you in my mind but it is quiet I tell you tales that you don't hear You have interests and friends I don't know For the first time you feel like a stranger

Ashes to ashes I'll get your ashes next week And hold you as dust

Christmas to me is a quiet warmth Background music, spicy candles, My favorite blanket at home.

A comfortable kinship with family, A respite in celebrating alone.

I untangle with the string lights, A gentle glow I feel deep in my bones.

Christmas is a gift I unwrap slowly, With delicate hands and a softer tone, These silent nights are all my own.

My body won't hold me There's too much of me for one, I'm more than just a face or skin Changing, never done.

I am a heart and a mind And the worlds in my head, I wasn't made by hands But sparked from fire instead.

Maybe I am energy Am I a spirit or a soul? So just being physical Is never really being whole.

Arms and legs won't cage me I am not grounded by the land, I know how it feels to fly When all I do is stand.

You say, "A boyfriend sounds nice"

So now I'm sitting Here, Embarrassed For thinking that's What I'd been All these years

All these Years, years, years

All this time Our romance had been ancient History

Ocean, I have a confession to make. I am just a small bird, a very small bird, You are endless and vast, How can I tell you I love you?

I have fallen in love with you deeply, As deep as your floors, your trenches; But you are so grand and I, Well I am just a bird, would you wave me off?

I have this fragile, mortal body And I am jealous of your infinite waters. How could you ever love me back When I exist for just one of your moments?

I am standing, twig legged, at your shore, I am watching the clouds kiss your horizon And I have never felt smaller, yet I am drowning in my adoration of you.

Since we are being vulnerable, And my feelings are likely unrequited, May I ask, Ocean, who is it you love? For whom does your body ebb and flow?

A lyric in a song speaks To me, it lights my mind Clicking my pen And I will think of those words Just two, or a phrase Mulling them over Ruminating on an element The same one I always think of The idea of water Again I'll think of the ocean Or of beaches, of swimmers, Just the word "dive"

And I won't end up writing About diving at all Not about hearts in the sea Nothing at all nautical But the word "dive" It just sounds so nice Saying it aloud so softly Rolling a wave in my mouth And then silently I'll retract the pen Put my headphones back on Thinking, thinking, zoning

Instead I will write about Writing, or a process About listening to music Thinking about words that I don't put down, about Images of swimmers with tanks Reaching the ocean floor To find a lover's guarded Buried treasure, but I won't write about that I'll keep it locked up Safe in my mind forever Unsaid, unwritten, remembered

I watch the spider Weaving fresh webbing Because spiders don't Have five day forecasts This spider doesn't know How soon it will rain That all its hard work Will have been in vain

The wolf spider Accepts the advances Of her strongest suitor Knowing as she snatches And savors her final meal Soon her plump body Will feed her children Dozens of her a copy

I watch the spiders My eight legged allies I see them hatch Love them living here Knowing in a year Or much sooner I will Find them delicately Crumpled on the ground Lifeless and so still

Clear blue skies over the snow caps A calm, the rustle of branches Their snow thudding against the ground snow Thump, says snow, as it falls

Then a cracking sound, not unlike a tree falling A rumbling not unlike an earthquake All the birds take flight at once One black plume of fearful retreating

Shifting, sliding, crashing and rolling Snow is peaceful, it is gentle Until it breaks in the trembling Until the mountains shake it off to bury us

It is a beautiful day as the avalanche forms Serene even, as ice and snow thunders down Or it was, before the gentle thing became a terror Like all of earth which strikes awe, it does strike

Frost came and bit the earth, Snowflakes fell like feathers. Crystals landed cold upon me, Some were just the weather.

Icicles dripped upon my heart And froze it for forever, I think it beats in winter squalls, Although it's just the weather.