I return to what is actually here, as if naming a pattern once should excuse me from meeting it again in the flesh when it arrives wearing a slightly different face,
I return to what is actually here, even when that predictability is sorrow in a familiar coat and nothing inside it is actually helping,
I return to what is actually here, am I meeting this moment or just repeating an old explanation,
I return to what is actually here, and each honest second asks more of me because memory wants closure while living asks for attention I cannot prepay…
I recognize the quiet misstep, because some part of me remains terrified that one crooked mark will expose me as less gifted than I privately hoped to be,
I recognize the quiet misstep, whispering that if the moment has already been disturbed, which is such a dramatic lie and yet one I still swallow too quickly,
I recognize the quiet misstep, am I grieving the mistake or the image of myself it disturbed,
I recognize the quiet misstep, and begin to understand that the true wound is often not the accident itself, but rather the part of me that insists things go my way…
I hold my place beside the flaw, and I remember how many worthwhile things in my life arrived through detours I had first named late, or beneath me, or evidence that I was losing control,
I hold my place beside the flaw, but some of the truest movement in me has come from being forced off the polished path,
I hold my place beside the flaw, do I want discovery or do I only want to be right,
I hold my place beside the flaw, and the longer I do not flee, the more the damaged place starts revealing a door I would never have found through caution alone…
I learn from my own stumble, because fear makes such a tiny room and then calls it safety while every living possibility waits outside the locked door,
I learn from my own stumble, and I know how often I have postponed the real attempt simply to preserve the illusion that never once arrived,
I learn from my own stumble, am I protecting a covered flame more than I am letting it burn,
I learn from my own stumble, and each imperfect act loosens the rigid little cage that fear keeps building around my hands and calling wisdom, until I realize I was never protecting anything, only avoiding the cost of becoming, “ME”…
sorrow in a familiar coat
the vanity that cannot bear
a door I would never
fear makes such a tiny room
the rigid little cage
