I planted my tree in a cemetery and only had eyes for its variegated greens and the wispy white blooms steeping gently in my cup I tended and delighted delighted and tended until I grew weary next to you and sat down on our headstone and wept There was never going to be more life here and I finally knew I’d wasted mine thinking there could be more growth than decay Where had the light gone? You held my hand at first reluctantly and then slowly squeezed until my bones crushing made you laugh

i. I’m sorry to the trees for global hyperventilation and to the sea turtles choking on plastic we don’t know how to stop making. ii. I wonder if the moon knows anything about its phases or our endless cycles of peace and of wars we don’t know how to stop. iii. I’ve started going out with strangers I am afraid to meet who also want to feel less alone although we don’t know how to.

I pull in. Other cars and meandering families fill the gravel parking lot. A smiling teenager in a safety vest points me around the bend, to another teenager pointing me around another bend. I park, grab my bag and get out. Weaving around lines of ticket-holders, I slip through the…

sun’s up I’m not mind tries stretching sleep tears pry eyes open heart swallows another dose sun’s down I’m not mind winds twisting sheets fears keep eyes open heart follows another ghost

The days closest to the sun feel like too many It’s too hot to hold hands before hugging goodbye

At 9:15pm the sky is midnight. I wonder if the hue I perceive of dusk-darkened leaves is really just a color memory trick of my brain. I threw hasty words over my shoulder before heading out of the stiff white walls into the invisible air moving the grass to whisper. It didn’t rain. I wish it would. My eyes pull water from the well of my shadow story and I am washed away until i am renewed.

The house shakes from the spin cycle of our washing machine. I’m perched on the edge of my chair like I’m not staying long. The boys’ conversation drifts from the other room, back and forth, between bickering and camaraderie. I exhale. There’s tension in my shoulders from a day that…

I savor their repose in dusty darkness, before lifting their window shade to partner with the light inviting them to the good morning, while wondering if it will be, once they slide out of covers into roles. The sound of drawers moving in and out to find the favorite shirt and a matched sock are making too much noise for the reluctant brother curled in the top bunk who showers down criticisms about what is “always” done and why, to start the predicted row over nothing and everything.

Let yourself arrive. For whether you prefer it, you are here. Here, invite the mind to stay. Steer wanderlust to places touched now. Now, if perpetually snubbed, eventually invoices ever-lookers elsewhere. Elsewhere is not to be feared or enshrined. Life is meant to be attended.