An Evergreen Soul

People think that I have an Evergreen soul.
They do not think that deciduousness
is a possibility for me.
You stand so tall,
they say.
Your branches are so green,
they tell me.
We admire your tallness
and sturdiness
and resistance
to the deathly cold
air of winter.
I do not want to disappoint
them with my browning leaves
and freezing trunk
and withering branches.
So I stand tall,
solid,
unyielding
to bitter winds
and the tempting sun,
and Evergreen
evermore.

November 3, 2015

I waited too long.
Longer than all the others.
Every morning I braved the increasing cold and
wasted precious minutes before work and
finally memorized the code to my mailbox -
all in vain.
Because each morning, afternoon, evening, and late night
I was greeted with an empty mailbox
and the anxiety in my heart kept growing-
feeding off of the emptiness.
Finally,
after running around the neighborhood -
getting my heart rate up prematurely-
my mailbox was full of paper and
my heart was full of lead.
I waited until that night to open it in front of the Timpanogas temple,
standing tall and strong
the way that I wish that I was.
I remember the minute my mind read over the words,
I thought maybe I had caught a sudden case of dyslexia
because that work couldn't have been in English
and this couldn't be what was happening to me.
Didn't Heavenly Father know that I took 6 years of French?
Didn't He know that I feared walking out to my car in the parking lots in Orem, Utah?
Didn't He know that I believe a good winter is when it snows only on the weeks surrounding Christmas and that my toes turn white and go numb after only an hour of being out in the cold?
Didn't He know I could barely teach the gospel in English?
How was I supposed to learn a new alphabet?
How was I supposed to survive every day when I could see my breath and fear walking down the street to buy groceries?
How was I supposed to go running every day when the temperature high is 5 degrees Fahrenheit?
And How was I supposed to teach these people of salvation when I could barely explain it in my native tongue.
A night passed.
And a day passed.
And another night and another day
and maybe even a week passed before I realized,
He did know all those things.
And He does know how.
And He will never leave me alone.
He will give me his love and His aid to do all the things that
I simply don't know how I am going to do.
Because my Father is a God and He knows that I need to go and tell the people of Novosibirsk that their Father is a God too.

Sidewalk Cracks

I didn't see the crack in the sidewalk as I was running down 600 east this morning.
Maybe it's because it was dark-
but I shouldn't blame the sun. It's my fault for shutting Him out.
Maybe it's because it had never been there before, that crack.
I hadn't prepared myself for what was about to happen.
I had prepared myself for the cold and the hot and the dehydration and the chance of rain or snow or lightning,
but not this.
Not the fall.

I didn't see the crack in the sidewalk as I was running this morning,
so I fell.
Sprawled out for the cars driving by to see.
I tried to hurry up and correct myself.
Pound the pavement like nothing had happened.
But something had happened,
and I couldn't forget it.
It weighed heavy in the soles of my shoes each time the rubber hit the cement.
It skewered my breathing, made it uneven and sharp.
Someone asked if I was okay and I said yes,
but that infamous lump was making it's way up my throat,
bringing the water with it.
I said I was okay, but in reality I was falling apart.
I could feel the numb pain on the palms of my hands and the rawness of my knees under my pants.
I tried to suck the blood off of the wound on my thumb,
drink the pain away,
but someone already drank it away for me,
and sometimes I forget that.
Sometimes I am ungrateful,
even after I fall.
I tried to clean my own wounds,
but rubbing alcohol couldn't clean that deep.
The only thing that could was nails and vinegar and hours of praying.

So, eventually, I put away the alcohol and pulled out the books and made a decision.
But in the process of scraping my knees and the backs of my hands, I broke your heart.
I tried to stop it, you must know that, but I couldn't.
Because I once contributed to a broken heart that killed someone divine, and so to Him I owe my life.
And that is why I have to keep on running,
because I love the one whose heart I broke.

Burning Hands

I'm waiting on a messenger
to come visit me from the mountains.
My fingers are trying to stay busy-
tapping walls and flipping pages and pricking themselves on thorns just to feel the blood run slowly down.
I am waiting, waiting.
My heart feels like it might explode from anxiety
and litter my walls with thoughts of death and broken backs and hospital rooms.
It's been too long since a pigeon has flown over my head,
and I might vomit if I don't see one soon.
I'm waiting, waiting-
and I think I've been pretty patient.
I've held my tongue and only let it slip away a couple of times,
I just had to try,
just in case.
It's the first cool night of autumn and I wish you were here to hold me.
The rain has cleaned the world, but I hope it hasn't washed you away.
The leaves on the trees are changing and I hope that you stay green.
It's the first cool night of autumn, and autumn air always reminds me of you.
Your hands, your laugh, the way your arms fit inside sweatshirts and around me.
Leave the miners alone.
Let the animals run free and alive and intact.
Put out the fire and come home
to me.

Haiku Writing Spree

"Haiku is a snapshot in time. No veils, no mystery- it is exactly as it reads. The mind perceives everything moment by moment. The haiku is a moment in time, pure and unblemished."

-Mestre 

August 17th

You slip home... strong, wrong.

Knowing me as that longing

in our pretend bond.

A Summer Day in the Future

Lazy Love. Sunlight.

Have breakfast in our warm clothes. 

Slip my arms through his. 

A Text at 12:02 A.M.

"Please pretend to hurt!"

he shouted for all her care, 

finally breathless.

Wisdom Teeth Epidemic

Resting in your arms, 

I dreamed of comfort soft as

dark chocolate kisses.

Take a Hint

Boy, no human sees

us ever together. I'll

crush you with dinner. 

Parts

My head belongs in his hands and his lap,
and my tears can be caught only in the
thickness of his faded blue jeans.
My forehead belongs nestled in the nape of his neck.
My hands belong in his hands-
rough and raw and calloused over,
whipped relentlessly by the sun.
My knees belong against his chest,
held tightly to keep out diseases and terrorists and
the realities of life.
My fingers belong against his lips-
warm air bowing life into them.
My feet belong under his thighs,
saving my toes from a frost bitten end.

His cheeks belong under my palm,
rubbing the patches he missed and has let grow too long.
His eyebrows belong between silver fingers,
connected to mine made of flesh,
picking wild flowers-
which have become weeds-
making room for adoration to trickle in.
His back belongs beneath my wrists,
pulling out the stresses of todays and yesterdays
and mostly of tomorrrows.
His lips belong on the cool curves of my uncovered shoulders,
whispering sweetly of strawberries and daisies
and the way little blonde hairs stand up along the dip of the back of my neck,
where brain stem meets spine meets shoulder blades.
His shoulders belong under the weights of my world,
the cover of Atlas Shrugged tattooed nine years deep in his skin.

We are an equation-
an equation to save mankind,
and the equation of a line:
every part matters.
And the sum of my parts is nothing without his.

Nature Valley Granola

"It is in this way that mortals become angels. It is not their fault, they do not know how to go about it otherwise. This hell you have just left is the first step toward heaven. You had to begin there."

-Victor Hugo (Les Miserables)

As much as I would love to say that my short leave of absence from blogging has been because of my busy new job or a flourishing relationship or too many nights out with girl friends,
 it's truly because I just haven't wanted to write. 

I wish I could tell you that during the past eight weeks I've sat down many times with thoughts in my head that I just couldn't get to come out the way that I wanted,

but I never even came near that. 

Maybe I've been avoiding writing-which has caused me torment and grief all on its own, the fact that I haven't felt a need to bleed myself out through words- but I think I've just been avoiding reality in its entirety.
Because reality is that my life is falling apart.
(yes, I am aware that this sounds a bit melodramatic, but sadly it's not. Also welcome to my whole life.)
So I am falling apart at all the most important and concrete places and it terrifies me.

It's a scary thing to feel like you don't know yourself anymore.

It's scary to have dreams about teachers speaking French and not being able to understand them.

It's scary to have your little sister say to you, "Remember when you used to be obsessed with Paris?"

It's scary when your best friend stops calling you by the nickname that made you feel closer to him than even the most intimate moments. 

It's scary to spend hours on Netflix instead of turning the pages of unread books.

It's scary to not have the gravitational pull you have always had toward writing.

It's scary to feel like you're drifting away from the one thing that has always held you together. 

It's scary to feel the need to question something you have always been sure about.
So I am scared and stumbling through my days and trying to find my way through the dark that has enveloped my existence.

So forgive me my jumbled words and confusing antics.
I am still trying to figure myself and my life out as well.

I don't really have much else to say. 

I haven't had much to say for the past month or so. 

And I'm just trying to find a way to be okay with that. 

I know the words will come again, 

they always do. 

"And now that you don't have to be perfect, you can be good."

-John Steinbeck