All the Hours

At 3 a.m. one can almost hear the land sigh beneath holy blankets of rain. The drought has kept mosquitoes down but that blessing comes at a price.

4 a.m., between thunder rolls, the train moans westward against thoughts pushing east. A mountain calling. A love birthing The Love suckling all Love unto the end.

Kora sits with me in the garage at 5 a.m., watching rain and hot coffee add steam into the already humid, predawn air. I remember how I never really had a fondness for garages growing up. Why do garages seem to belong to fathers? His cars. His surgeon-like organization of various tools, WD-40 cans and sanctioned, hand-picked materials for washing his car. Our bikes were allowed to be in the garage but only just so – a terrifying game of tip-toe, with kick stands being what they are and all.

Falling bikes – thrown bikes – broken bikes.

Rainfall dampens the mouth of the garage. Chicago Drive begins to hum in the distance. Neighborhood windows begin to blink with life.

At 6 a.m. I make more coffee to make sure there is enough for the day and for the guest-who-really-isn't-a-guest-anymore. I sit in the room of windows and read the sentences and write the sentences and then I have to go.

Fridays are 8 a.m. hikes with Tara and so it is that I push out into the world, putting miles beneath my feet, damp, piney, oxygen into my lungs, and a longing spirit of ascending further and higher into our heart.

At all the hours
Unfolding insists

With or without intervention
With or without self

Always
in us