let lemons be angry

Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth. (Psalm 46:10)

I'm learning what it is to be still. Learning that I don't have to say yes to everything. Learning to love smart. I've been so tired that tiny things made me cry, such as Orpheus and Eurydice, and Joyce's photo presentation. Even though everything is better than it was two weeks ago, I'm not half as happy. So I'm depriving myself of all the happiness that is already rightfully mine.

I sat still and read my striped book. And i remember now why i was so romantic. I'm grateful to myself for keeping all those memories; i'd continue being a monster if i hadn't seen tonight how gracious the times used to be. Suddenly all the past and all the present has disappeared, and you are that faceless figure from the beginning of time, asking me to return. I wish i knew some angelic tongue, because human language cannot begin to articulate the hello i'm thinking of.

Perhaps if i set this right, all else will follow suit. Perhaps i've lost my bearings because being cold is unnatural to me. I see now what your eyes made of me, and i wonder who else will ever see me that way. To somebody else i'm a hopping mad cherry, to somebody else i'm a black motorcycle, to yet another i'm a wise old tree. I'm all of those things combined, but only in your eyes am i the child who creates the moon. I'd rather be a cherrymotorcycletree, but how can i tell you to change the way you know me? I used to be frustrated that your interpretation of me was so lopsided, but i know now that i cannot demand anything from anybody.

I remembered you too late. But here you are, when i'm finally still. "When somebody you love dies, you die too," and although i laughed at the melodrama of that line which i wrote a long time ago, i suppose it's true. There is no longer a part of me that is what you used to know. The girl has changed and run ahead for miles, while you are sealed away like a fictional character, bound by the story's ending.

All my questions about life remain unanswered on this quiet saturday night. All the people whose voices i want to hear are not thinking of calling me at midnight. But i come to you secretly, because somehow only you will understand my waning moments. Do you know this?