Skeletons in my Spine

Doubts fetter.


A line is not an ocean,
Though it will be.


And a line is more divisive than a sea.



You are still a bell unlocked in your tower,
Your tones and chimes reverberating
Through ice blue leagues
Of hunger.
The claw marks of the griffin coil at hems
And somehow amplify.
I fly to you
As an ugly egret turned phoenix
By the amber sunrise.
Yet, I must tell you,
I must whisper to bells amidst the icy sky—
October, with stars at the end and dreams at the peril—
That I am a Juliet who failed to die.



That love and death don’t intertwine
Except eternally.


That doubts fetter.


That I once saw the stars brighter for the darkness
And someone whispered “Shoot.”
That the mauve passion plummeted across me
Until I stretched my tortured, spin-sliced body so high
My fingertip touched God’s,
And He Himself wiped towels across my face,
Down my hair, which darkened and smoothed
With the proximity of death.



That it was the second star to right,
And I rode there like a man.



That I fear the darkness for who might kiss me in it.
That I fear the rain for the memories and messages
It might drop into my skin from above.
That I fear God for his reminders that I am more than me.
That I fear to look over my shoulder
For the wings.


Doubts fetter.


But I can also tell you that I reached and flew so high,
That I felt so long and deeply.
That I took up the swords that sliced me
Shrill as whistles
And fought desperately to return
To my own pulsing body.
That I fought to be here,
In this green lake
These gray streams,
Under this blue sky,
Breathing yellow light,
And it is all beautiful to me.
That Ihave earned the right to live my life
And love it, love with in it, love all that surrounds it
And everything that touches it.


But that sometimes I lose touch with that fight,
And I weep at the thought of looking you in the eye.


Doubts fetter.


But that I was driving after crying
With haze still in my eyes but coolness in my breath,
And I remembered
The light that hung against my blades and bullets
When I put every thought in strength behind them.
That I prayed with my best reseviors of faith,
And God gave me a choice:

I could live without, or I could die and have it all.

And I chose to live.
That I chose to surf the amber sunrise once more.
That here I am now, weapons sheathed,
Wrapping my arms around you
And never looking back.




That you can’t let me forget
That I earned the right to love again.