Three doors open, two click shut again before her heart has even absorbed the joy that was building around it. Collection of sighs and affirmations become homeless in the space of two emails. Such a fine line between what the heart imagines and what it can actually contain.
Left to swim in uncertainty again, she puts a hand on a nearby piece of driftwood and extends her arms and legs as she knows to do in a swiftly (or slowly) moving current. She fills her lungs with air and believes in her own buoyancy. Lets the water kiss an oval frame around her face as she lifts her eyes skyward again, always on the lookout for the truth that might spell itself against the clouds overhead.
She thinks of Ophelia, singing her snatches of old tunes, but only as a passing expression of despair--Ophelia sinks in the fidelity of the story, but not she--she rises, her garments fanning around her like pale wings. There is gratitude here. She immerses herself in it again, lets the thoughts of her love, her boys, her friends, her family swirl into the negative spaces of her body against this mottled blue. She surrenders to it.
Lungs fill with air, push sternum to the surface. Ribs are a sweet little cage for the pulsing aspirations of a seeker. A lover. A writer. A teacher. This soul straining heavenward, asking the question again and again--how? Not why--That is the wrong question, says the angel. But how? Yes, how to be the thing it is in her to be? How to believe. Her willingness is all, and she does know. Knows it will take shape in time. Knows that the softness of her heart is all. Is all.
Left to swim in uncertainty again, she puts a hand on a nearby piece of driftwood and extends her arms and legs as she knows to do in a swiftly (or slowly) moving current. She fills her lungs with air and believes in her own buoyancy. Lets the water kiss an oval frame around her face as she lifts her eyes skyward again, always on the lookout for the truth that might spell itself against the clouds overhead.
She thinks of Ophelia, singing her snatches of old tunes, but only as a passing expression of despair--Ophelia sinks in the fidelity of the story, but not she--she rises, her garments fanning around her like pale wings. There is gratitude here. She immerses herself in it again, lets the thoughts of her love, her boys, her friends, her family swirl into the negative spaces of her body against this mottled blue. She surrenders to it.
Lungs fill with air, push sternum to the surface. Ribs are a sweet little cage for the pulsing aspirations of a seeker. A lover. A writer. A teacher. This soul straining heavenward, asking the question again and again--how? Not why--That is the wrong question, says the angel. But how? Yes, how to be the thing it is in her to be? How to believe. Her willingness is all, and she does know. Knows it will take shape in time. Knows that the softness of her heart is all. Is all.
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