I know the pain of separation. Dissension.

I feel it everyday, the quaking ache of my throat. My voice and my feelings stuck inside for so long. The ache to not look to please others, the ache to say exactly what I am thinking, to sing out, to shout, to cry, to explore the possibilities of sound the endless stringing of vowels and consonants elongated and popped into something, something different and new. Poems and songs dance at the periphery of my mind knocking on the door from my heart to my mouth. The throat, a song birds stuck in the chimney of my body flailing burnishing the insides with its down, I am beginning to deeply pity that part of me… how do I open the flute and do I really want to deal with the mess? Years worth of dust, charcoal, debris just imagine the parlor after that bird takes flight.

Smudges, images crudely draw with the brush strokes of tarred feathers. A winged master piece…or a smutty crude thing shedding its unworthiness in socially media-nistic ways. Whatever the case, I’m sliding the flute and if that doesn’t do it…the whole door is opening and we are gonna have us a time. What’s in there? I ask myself that all the time. I mean I feel like a pretty open and honest person…so is that an illusion, a glamour I have cast on myself and others and this other new real self, is the truth. A self made whole, a self without illusions, a real mirror or meeting my doppleganger only to find out I am the evil one. The one stuck in old patterns, doing the same things expecting different results, acting outside of my integrity, dancing the devils dance and pretending otherwise. And this other side is so beautiful, compassionate, daring, fearless, loving with all people especially herself, understanding, caring, has impeccable follow through, planning, organizing, and preparation skills, is in a loving relationship, freely giving, speaks up for what she believes and thinks, is cultured, knowledgable about the world and its ways and yet still is kind, still trusts and sees the best in others, sees their innocence, their grace, the humanity, the divine desire bound up inside, she sings it’s like hearing your soul speak a deep intimate melody that rises up and holds you in its truth..your truth. My truth. Our Truth. She draws the land, people, and people as land, and land as people, the two are all we have she knows and we too are bound up in each other. The two are all we have she knows and we too are bound up in each other, She is me and I am her.

I am grace, I am unfolding perfectly. I am a doer, a seer, a seeker, and a pathfinder when I remember to look down for I am always on the path. My feet lay it out before me every step on the way, I am never lost I am stepping into my true self, each step sheds something untrue I believed about myself and it all falls away…all the ashes. There is a mess but the good kind, the kind after a food fight, or a sleepover party, it is the messiness of birth. Paint splattered and ruining good shirts but there is a painting, the work had to come before the creation. The fine mist of hairspray, hair, and product a layered starburst radiating out of the majesty of perfection now mounted atop a head. Sometimes you must get dirty to get clear. Clear in intention. Clear in selfhood, Clear in creation. I may make a mess, but I will clear it up. Wipe away the smudges, polish up the glass and take a good look in the mirror and recognize that, “We too are bound up in each other, She is me and I am her.” I am the best of even my most idealized self. I am not the worst of my least desirable self, I can forgive those falsehoods, for taking an action to mean I was forever stuck in the chimney of my body, my life, the universe. There was always light at the top, hope that I would let the light all the way in, to look at all parts…to finally see where I kept my focus. And see that in keeping focus in the dark, I stayed in the dark. Separate from God, my divine self, my soul.