ticket home for the soul

if my words could speak

thursday afternoon, the hands of the clock felt lighter, more agile than usual. lingering 3 pm drinks slipped drunkenly into the shadows of 6 pm musings without my notice. my darting eyes scanned the waves of movement looking for familiar shadows, familiar faces, familiar colors to devour with a glass of impending tragedy. the painting on the wall above me quivered impatiently, irritated by my need to clutch the passing seconds between aching knuckles. 

your children, wow! they grow like sunflowers! i remember when i was a little girl  with big eyes and heart with lots of love to give, 

dancing on the kitchen table of an apartment with gaping, hungry holes in the walls and ugly green wallpaper that screeched for repair, my clumsy rose thorn hands clutching the stems of my grandfather's calloused fingers. the walls suffocated, but the room always screamed in melody

i grew up so big and strong because of you, baba. your flour coated hands guided my lilting, dancing body through childhood, taught me how to raise mountains with my heart, how to till the soil of patience with forgiveness. all those days we sat to watch the sunset, you nestled my shivering, blue heart in your warm hands. you taught me how to feel okay

when i was stripped of my roots, chopped off from my foundations, packaged in plastic and sold across the ocean for the dealer's price of an economy ticket how to feel okay

when my mind ate itself alive, my alcoholic insomnia stumbling through my brain and colliding into my sense of self; knocking all my brain's belongings off its shelves, pooling murdered consciousness at the back of my skull

how to feel okay

so, let me warm your hands baba, 

let me sit beside you on this night at the local bus stop when the street lights flicker in intoxicating impermanence, lie your head on my shoulder and sink into my arms that weep with gratefulness. don't worry if our roots tangle

at least mine are growing back again

11/19/20