CALL ME BELOVED

it dawned on me last night that I’m living a parallel life
through these poems, carefully breathing words from
behind a keyboard. this is how I communicate with
those closest to me, I write and I break my silence
not with gentle sounds but a pretty cacophany –
each line break falling like cracked and tumbling glass.

to the few that follow me through my mornings
and afternoons, carved out of blank screens,
understand I only wish for comfort and peace.

the sounds never sound right as they wheeze
from my throat. they get stuck and mumble forth
like so much nonsense, distorted by some
self-sabotaging instinct that twists them up
into anxious knots and cold, aching monotone
before they dejectedly fall off of my lips.

to the few that scan down the page, those
who glide through these cryptic syllables, please
understand it’s never what I’m trying to say.

so instead I speak my mind through this obscuring lens –
it magnifies and distorts like so much light refracted
through wavy, imperfect glass. my words, eroded and shaped
by the friction and pressure of time. these lines
become my elephant in the room, the testament of my
good intentions as I carry myself through the wasting weeks.

to the few that seek out these poems,
those who share that fleeting minute in the day
where I leave these bread crumbs behind me
for someone to follow – to the few who commiserate
and comprehend the haunting sense of dull sadness
that lurks in every conversation before it has
a chance to settle into the corners of our memory,
I welcome you, I welcome you –

understand I only want the best of myself
to leak out into the world, waves of compassion
and peace to ebb out from me and crash into
those I love – for them to become overwhelmed with it.