“If you always do what you’ve always done,
you’ll always get what you’ve always got.”
I remember hearing this from a woman
whose face and name I’ve long forgotten,
sitting a few seats away from myself
in our little circle…
Fear moves through me.
Anger moves through me.
Each will pause for a time before moving along.
Each will always return.
When they move through me,
I must remember:
They visit;
I do not become.
When they return again,
I must remember:
They are smoke and wind.
They come to me.
I am neither.
December 16 – 18, 2025
My thoughts are not really mine but they are internalizations of all the things others have said, even without always directly saying them.
Re-reading calmly:
poems written months ago
feel like yesterday
Old words remembered:
today they make me wonder
if I’ll ever change
Carrying silence like it’s my birthright
…
In this stillness
I choose to imagine myself
…
This year was a bit of a fucking mess, honestly. Important but painful lessons were had.
It was in the springtime when
I decided to do an important experiment
I had a hypothesis to test
…
Today I look at my hands
My tiny, small, woman’s hands
And run fingertips over the
Small callouses beginning to form
The skin beginning to dry
And crack in places
And I feel happy
For everything I can do now
All these things that younger me
Wouldn’t even dream of
November 22, 2024
Will I be tempered in the crucible
Of this cutting new awareness,
Maybe even sharpened to a razor’s edge?
I have had enough with being met with angry responses to my attempts to be helpful, kind, and considerate of others.
I will no longer engage or pursue. I will distance myself. I may forgive sometimes, but I will not forget.
Those who bite the hands that appreciate them can get absolutely fucked.