do i?

I come back to my

Childhood home

And sit on a new bed

I still don't fold my

Laundry for five days

And wear my old Duke shirt instead

Last week I went for

A walk and it was

Like going back in time

Coming back to 

This place

So familiar

And changed

They cut down Mom's

Dogwood last week

Without even asking

Last night it was stormy

When the farmer in the tractor

Was mowing the field

I tried to walk

Fast enough to miss him 

At the corner

And I didn't wave

But I still walk 

Barefoot over the ruins of a

Once paved gravel road

I still look at the

Sky unflinchingly

When I can

Pad down the dirt paths

I still strain to keep the curtains

And windows open and let all the

Light in that will come

I still worry too much 

About my younger brothers 

And what a year will bring

I still bask in the sun and

The velvet blanketed dusk and 

My husband snoring on my arm

I still laugh too loud and ride

Bikes occasionally and make breakfast and

Floss when I think about it

And I know 

I'm ignoring the question 

Again

But it's just that

There's too much to unravel

Tangled up in the trees and the pine needles and the cicadas scratchy legs

Lately I answer you in a different

Tongue and it comes out wrong

Do you understand me?

Do I?

what i don't say

What I say:

I love you

What I don't say:

I love your beating heart 

I love that you are here,

Steady, beneath me

That your heartbeat is

A lullaby that sings me to sleep

I love that you are warm,

Solid, that it is so

Easy, an afterthought,

To have you here so safe

Beneath me

I love that you are still here,

Still mostly completely good,

And yourself and more yourself everyday

I love your beating heart

I am still trying to learn

How to say it out loud

disillusioned

Disillusioned

I am disillusioned

With you

The way you send me home with groceries

Only to have them go bad in two days

The way you told me as a child

Not to be afraid and now give me new, and old,

And real reasons that I should fear every day

The way you lie to me

Trick me into 

A facade of control

The way you take

Without once looking back

Or offering any kind of collateral

The way you brutalize your guests

Leave us crawling forward 

On our knees with no 

Where else to go

And 

I am disillusioned

With you

And yet

Am I?

I still pour myself

A bowl of cereal late at night

And eat it on my couch

Against all odds

I still go by the library

To pick up my books

And watch the kids laugh and run 

While their moms tell them to

Slow down

I still listen to the music

Reaching from his

Open door 

I still like the softness of my lips

The wide openness of the earth at sunrise

The ache of this pen in my hands

I'm still fascinated with the way

You don't make up for any of it

But here I am still

Writing and romancing 

The disillusionment of you–

The beauty

And callousness 

Of this awful earth