un-mastered

I am not a master of anything; I only pretend to know what I’m doing. Mostly I learn by failing.

When I peel my eyelids away from each other the almost god-like beams of the winter sun remind me, yet again, that I am alive. It is as if they come from my dreams of constantly pressing the self-destruct button, and make sure I know it’s not time yet.

I spent the third month of my twenty-second year of life relearning how to walk. My unused bones shook, my tear ducts flooding, I picked myself up. This was the last time my father held me like fathers are supposed to hold their daughters. This was the last time I cried tears of joy.

I am a battle cry. My limbs and lips make the sky shake with fear. I am a war zone with my scars and fought-over territories. My legs belong to the sky, my shoulders-the grass. My hands are my own, forever, and ever, amen.

I remember the sun rising over the Columbia river, a photograph-worthy morning. I chewed my nails and watched as the early summer stars disappeared, being replaced by a shine I’d only ever imagined. It was like the darkness would never reappear, nighttime would become a fond memory, like childhood games, campfire songs, or youthful innocence.

Once I sang to the trees, high on hash on my back in the middle of a field of purple flowers. The clouds felt like owl feathers and I could feel the bugs antennae-sensing my skin. We were all hippie and tan. Melanie said she loved the trees. We sang for minutes until we had been singing for hours. The only words to our song were “we love you, trees. We love you.”

I am not a territory in the midst of battle. My skin encases not a battle cry, but a soft whisper of surrender. I belong only to myself, forever, and ever, amen.

I am ivy. I have been cut back time, and time again. Torn down from the bark of trees, snipped from my grasp on every last thing I have loved. We have thrived together. I am known as an invasive and poisonous species, but my many green arms have grown to lift everything around me. I am raising you all to the sun, yet somehow and always I am ripped away from you, suspected as a trespasser. I will return, however. Thank god no one has ripped me out from my roots, I don’t think I could survive that.