Getting to Seeds

Thunderstorms grate a predawn sky and rattle windows in wasting sills. With each turning day, the compulsion towards words, public or otherwise, becomes meager. Dad sends photocopied articles on Fibromyalgia management and on a sticky note writes, “Best overview on fibromyalgia I've seen - Bibliography complete and current. Love Dad.” We care how we can, don't we?

B. comes home to show us his new guitar and my god, it's gorgeous. Out of seemingly nowhere he is teaching himself Nirvana and Pink Floyd songs. His hair is the longest I've ever seen it and he seems . . . happy? If not happy, content. L. teaches him about time signatures and theory, and when they work together, my love and heart cannot be contained.

Pewter rain drives hard, expanding to pools of moonless night. The poet speaks of “romantic equipment,” which would have meant something to me in the past but now just seeps into hardened ground. There used to be pedestal upon which Psyche and Cupid embraced, but statue and plinth have been destroyed to make room for something new. It's not a big deal. My hands and heart are busy gouging the earth and getting to seeds.

The world flickers in the snapshot of lightening. I cup lukewarm coffee before heading to work. These storms – these transitions from winter to spring – these reluctant forays into the last half of life. When the sun arrives I am held in a clamp of light. How one flowers by lessening.