I cannot stand, nor walk or fly
Only collide in my barren yard
In stunned moments of clarity
Soil still clutched in my hands

Taste this despair and wormwood
Still bitter on my tongue; I bruise my flesh
On bark, dead roots and cold abuse
My face still stings with toothless song

Puzzled by where I am, how I got here
Lost in the looming darkness, I am still
Fragile as a pressed oak leaf
Pain the only constant

My mind maroons itself in some
Dismal place between earth and sky;
All around a river of noise is flowing
Indifferent to my pain, my suffering

Strange, how I fall into my body
It’s my tears that bring me back,
Spilling out like drops of blood
On radiant ground

My spirit, once soft as summer sand,
Lifts one wing to embrace the frigid air;
When hunger finally has its sway and
Trembles like a woman nearing ecstasy

I rise; my bones sing like mist over the creek
Pain is blurred by time and healing
The outlines on my body softer now—
Truth, at last, ascends towards light
Selena Howard, 2013