To be seen

The path

to myself

leads me

away from 

someone else.

I’m beginning to feel how the barren 

lake’s waters gulp

as they hit hollow

spots in the rocks on the shore.

A stable yet moving force, balancing

the energy of draw 

and drive and

meeting the boundaries 

uncarved.

These boundaries may be love

and they show us 

where to go

and sometimes they look 

like an unlit

exit sign covered in lichen.

I’m learning to lose 

my attachment

to the center of the poem 

and to radically accept 

that the end of one 

leads 

to space,

and space

is the hollowness in the back

of my throat

where the breath comes in.

I watch the jumping 

spiders to release

my fear of endings.

Not everything needs to be created

in preparation of offering. I receive

and I let go, ungripping

my shins, spreading 

my toes.

My sentences.

I open myself to the waves

made by other selves in another

time and wish

them well as they soften

into themselves. Into myself.

I release 

my fear of being seen

as a mind within a body

and my prayer

to be known

as a soul.