I. It’s all about me.
Blood-thirsty she is
Burning up like a fever storm
Less of a star or a twinkle and more of an infection
Red-Hot, swollen and injured.
II.
Gathered in the living room
of a woman whose serene face hides a whole life (not so serene, not so, not)
Five minutes for every person to speak on
listening, on expectations, on rolling away the stone.
I am usually excited on the drive home after – excited and a little lost. Like someone who had an epiphany while high.
I’m trying to remember the key I heard.
II.
Prior Walter asks for ‘more life’
He would, wouldn’t he?
All those white Prior’s before him, woven into privilege – his money is a mystery; his gnomon the conversation of being able to afford illness.
For Belize it is already almost unbearable here. Too sweet like a stomach-ache; too shrill for harmony. He rejects the very premise:
We never get to ask for ‘more life’ – it is here until it is not.
IV.
I formulate solutions for my struggles
I recreate responses. I identify self-fufillment.
I stand at the top of a burning ladder calling out,
“More Life!”
Just give me a little more and I will take it all into me, the sublime and the pain.
I would, wouldn’t I?
V.
DO YOU?
VI.
If I have made a mistake, my wounds are light.
If I have stumbled unknowingly, my landing is soft.
If I have been lost and scared – it have never been for long.
If I have hands full of small splinters, a head full of anger, heart-broken, my brain misfiring.
I still ask for more life.
But I’d never shame the person who chooses instead to be the prophet.
And I’ll know the people who did not have a choice.
PAPER PLOW FURROW 