Unbreaking The Vase

After death spat me out of its dark belly—
I had to learn how to breathe again, 

had to walk through the forest, willing my pain to drop 
                through the soles of my feet 
                               into the dirt, the earth 
transmuting my troubles
with its tender
indifference. 

The wind has picked the sorrows from my hair, one at a time, 
and blown them like dandelion seeds 
into the air, whispering, 
make a wish. 

I have lain in the meadow, letting the sun beat the regret out of me,
like water pummeling a stone until it’s smooth. 

Fed by the milky moon, 
as I lay under her fullness 
until I saw 
how everything 
is draped in iridescence. 

We have been trained out of seeing it. 
Just as we have been trained out of seeing 
that the sky 
                             and the earth 
                                                               and the forests 
are all part of us. 

No molecular distinction between my hand and yours, 
our separation like the lines between countries. 

When faced with the grandeur of your true beauty, 
don’t turn away, thinking, That couldn’t be me. 

When we don’t claim our light we get lost in the dark.

I have tried to treat my brokenness 
like the Japanese art of kintsugi,
                                 mending vases 
                                                with veins of gold—
damage as history, 
honored, 
not concealed.

I call my fragments 
                                             back to me, 

like a vase 		
                                              shattering 	
                                                                               in reverse.

[image: Expansion by Paige Bradley (in Joshua Tree)]

Tai Woodville will be reading this and other poems from the same batch May 16th at Valentines – 7 pm.