Moss and Mushrooms

Monday sunrise

TW: mild blood mention

Almost, maybe, I think so
I don't know how to sit with you, what you are, what you have done, the role I played in it all.
I am often tempted to ask you to tell the story, if you were being honest I would listen.
I sometimes think I might forgive you, maybe, that even if you hurt me, you did for a reason.
Someone told you that story, they showed you how to, you were not born this way, but taught to be, maybe.
I am beginning to have empathy for you, it's strange, I don't recall holding all of this at once, holding in one hand that you did not respect me enough not to hurt me, and that you were also a child.
I know you were hurting. I know you still are. A surprise to myself is that I don't want you to hurt. I don't know what I want from you and for you, but I wish you well.
I feel like I become less angry as the days pass, that you are becoming a person, and more than an entity.
You are not what I thought you were, I don't know what you are, I don't know what I perceive you to be.
I sometimes wonder what it would be like to speak with you. What it would be like to call you, to tell you that in this strange way I do not yet understand, I forgive you.

Modes of existence
Looking for the person I should be and finding a way to be that person in every moment.
Excitement that cannot sit still, happy about everything, endlessly talking about my favorites, telling you my thoughts, asking you for yours.
Frequent exclamations of excitement, passion and curiosity, everything is something new, something else to look at and be, listening to hippie music, wearing sweaters I painted.
Quiet love, telling you I love you in small ways, listening to the smiths, writing poetry, talking in a soft and almost feminine voice, dressing in clothes I got from the thrift store.
Following the rope of where we started, wondering, remembering, analyzing. Asking questions. Digesting the same things endlessly, wearing dress pants, collared shirts, and sweaters.
Remaining unimpacted no matter what the external world may present, thoughtful, thinking about the world before telling about what it appears to be, self assured, I do not need to tell you what I am, because I know what I am.
Dressing the way everyone else does, listening to what's on the radio, being no one and nothing unique, simply another idiot on the bus.
Realizing that I am not supposed to be the same me everywhere I go, that I am not to feel the same way all the time, knowing that there is no single person to strive to be.

Words from me to you
Sunday, the day of quiet perfection, the day of slow growing moss, the day of peace.
Sunday, the day of dreading Monday, the day of preparing another week to grit your teeth through.
October, what I am, my name if I were not named Elliot, every part of me.
October, halloween, the word that makes your stomach drop because that's when it happened.
Flamboyant, the way I've always been, the way I like myself, authentic and excited.
Flamboyant, something you've spent your whole life being told not to be, something you couldn't ever exist as safely.
Poetry, my method of understanding myself and the world around me, something that burns like a fire in my stomach.
Poetry, something you've never thought much about, something you learned about in english class, pretentious and abysmal.

Honey pressed letters
A bag decorated with rainbow beads, a heart shaped pop-it, and an oddly shaped teddy bear, inside you have your blue AA book with an envelope.
The beige envelope has tape on every edge, small holes, pieces missing, it is less of a place to store something and rather a piece of paper with loose parts.
The prayers prevent the book from closing, the first page has small cuts where the paper folds, decorated in wear and tear, references to highlighted text rather than something written in your own handwriting.
The concept of rewriting the exact words in different sections of clovers on your to-do list, finding beauty in the metaphor of it, but staring at the item on the agenda with an understanding that something like this is to be completed.
You begin reading your blue book, writing quotes on the front pages of your notebook, a notebook used for moral inventory, a notebook in which the pages are to be ripped into small pieces, unable to be read, handwriting illegible. You write in a large font your favorite phrases.
You begin rewriting your morning prayers, your night prayers, and all the moments in between, at first pushing up against it, but the honey feeds you.

Meadow
The sun rises blissfully, you see its reflection in the river water, shades of dark teal, yellow, and orange.
You watch as the world awakens, never was it dormant, but in this moment it is coming back to consciousness.
You feel the sun warming you on this spring morning, you reread a list of the things you would like to do and people you would like to be.
The world becomes full. You sit with people who have never seen this bench. You try to ask them questions they have been waiting to answer. You stare at the bright green grass as they tell you.
The ground is wet and you know it is but you do not feel your socks become damp. For a moment you hold children as they climb across the monkey bars. You talk with people who have seen you through many hopeful sunrises and harrowing sunsets.
You ask yourself one hundred questions throughout the day. You close your eyes and look towards the sun, asking for guidance, asking for guidance on how to hold the hand of someone who is bleeding, you ask for guidance of how to stand up after tying your shoes, you ask for guidance on which lily pad you should write love letters to, you beg the sky for another day of this.
You play with your locket, you try to make eye contact without thinking about making eye contact, you lay in the grass for more hours than you should, you go on lovely and lighthearted picnics.
You run up the hills just to roll down them, you play pretend, questioning what moments like these mean tomorrow, you try to hug someone from behind, you give your lover a daisy you've been watching grow, you carry a clover in the front pocket of your t-shirt.
You tune into the stories people will tell tonight, you watch as she waters the sunflowers, you see her highlighting words of poetry in a textbook, he tells you he likes the poems you read yesterday, although they would be better if you wrote about something else, you watch him as he wins the quiet war for something better than what once was.
As the sun sets you sit in a circle. She tells you she is tired from working on the garden all day. He gives you seeds for a tree that will grow tall if you let it. He tells you about the woman he held hands with while watching the fish.
The sun begins to set and you depart from your tribe. You sit under the stars, you rock yourself quietly and think about it all, you try to capture the day onto a piece of notebook paper, but words do not exist in a way that holds the meadow.

Expressions of joy
You remembered the moments of innocent excitement mortified, a type of embarrassment that encapsulates you, spending months praying that moments like that lived in bedrooms with locked doors.
You always found it beautiful, when someone was happy to the point of elation, excitement that demands expression. You found it beautiful when someone moved themselves in a way that made their rapid heartbeat slow. Thinking to yourself that people who behave in such ways are doing the people on the subway a favor beyond what a family tree of strangers can explain.
You found it such a pure kind of joy, memories of it were saved to relive, I want to see you exist in these ways, I found it deeply admirable.
The shame slowly lifts itself up, and out of me, I did not feel my heart become sunnier until it went from a medium brown to a Sunday shade of yellow.
I love you so much that a letter from you instills excitement that does not need to be contained. I am so passionate that my body tells the story as the moment begins and moves through time.