Category Archives: charity

#69

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sometimes staying in bed or just disappearing
feels like a better option
than one more pull on the bootstrap 
or half-hearted acknowledgement
of just how silver the lining really is. 
we are tired.

it does not seem fair that while children are starving
simply because they are not our own
and people around us are ailing and dying
simply because its "part of being alive" -
that we should have to also put up 
with some hack job politic or crumby job
or even a hurt of our own.
we are really that tired.

i'm hoping it will be okay someday
for you to tell me how broken you are
and for me to just hold you
without trying to fix you
or telling you how fortunate you really are. 

and i am hoping that once we have all admitted
we are worn to the bone
by all this busy-ness of being alive
we can go back to feeding people
simply because they are hungry
and caring for people
simply because they are ill. 

i'm not sure there is much more to figure out than that.
maybe feeding and caring
would be enough to change the world.

 


					

		
		
	


				
					
	

		

						
#68

			
						

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<>they gave me a little pill

so they could rip from my mouth

a word hoarder –

a shell of stories –

my having tossed caution to the wind tooth –

my ouch.


that taking made me think of giving

and how much there is to give still –

today, this very minute –

even as each of us hold our wounds,

ice our breaks, disguise our weaknesses.


i like that the lady who drove me home

gave me a one armed hug and said

no you are not fine

because she recognized there were bombs falling

and lights flashing and sirens blaring

behind my swollen crooked smile. Behind my face.


PTSD lingers around like an easy lover you cant quite forget.

You know how to handle her. You’re friends now. You can almost love her for having left. Then BAM! your sweating tears and lips are trembling. the heart – like an upside down fishing lure that has lodged itself in your throat. you’re fucking eyes all crying like a baby you don’t even know. Bitch.

Im trying to pacify her with a heating pad, sad coffee, slippers. no looking at mirrors. no noises. check. no sudden noises.


I tell you what; if I could get high without giving up 22 years of sobriety, I’d be all over it. As if something outside of me could make what’s inside of me right. Nah. But i can still see my brothers and sisters downtown, holding on to their treasure chest of traumas. and its cold out. PTSD is cold. maybe i can find a way to share these blankets under which i am finally starting to sweat.</>