Thursday, August 31, 2017

Reassure Me

My head spun with anxiety. All I wanted was to be in his arms but I didn’t feel like I belonged there. I looked at him with torn emotions and bolted out of the room without any explanation, running down the hallway and collapsing against a closet door.
Why did I always have to create such drama? If I just let things be, we could be happy…
I cried at my own weakness, my inability to let things go. My personal refusal to accept his love. I wanted to die. As much as I didn’t want to let him go, I felt guilty for having him. He was better than I. Curling up really small, I felt immature and stupid. My fears and incompetence swirled in my head and crawled to the back of the closet, feeling the cold walls touch my skin as if to further accentuate my point. I was alone.
Tears blurred my vision not that I would have seen much anyway in the dark armoire I had escaped to. Just kidding, it was a closet. My ears rung in my sorrow so all I could hear was the soft noises that were escaping from my own person. The shuffling of my limbs against the ground, the unsteady beating of my heart, the small release of each new tear as it fell from my face. I buried my face in my hands as if hiding into layers of darkness as if I was the center of a matryoshka doll set.
I didn’t hear him enter the room.
I didn’t hear him come to the closet and sit outside.
I didn’t hear him place his hand onto the wood, as if to reach out to me across an unbreakable boundary.
I didn’t hear him sigh as he questioned whether or not to open it.
I didn’t hear him slide the door open slowly so as to not startle me.
I didn’t hear him.
Not until he sat next to me and pulled me into his lap and asked me not to cry. He stroked my cheek softly and made sure that I felt his arms wrapped around me tightly like a shield of protection from the outside world. I looked up at him with shame and only saw concern and love that wouldn’t let me refuse his offer.
We kissed softly and I’m not really sure who initiated but it was wet with my tears and gentle with uncertainty. He pulled me in closer and pet my head to reassure me.
“I’m not going to leave you,” he whispered slowly, as if answering a question that I forgot to verbalize. “I love you.”
“You’re too good to me,” I protested with gratitude.
“I know,” he said with a smile as he kissed me again.
I wrapped my arms around his neck and hugged him tightly, not wanting for the embrace to ever end. He just breathed me in while nuzzling my cheek affectionately. I forgot that we were in a closet. I forgot my fears and my doubts. Caught in his embrace I could only think of how much he made me happy and how much I wanted to please him.

Cut

She gasped slightly at the sensation and felt a single tear fall straight from her eye to her shirt without touching her cheek. Her hand trembled at the completion and a wave of cold passed through her as she dropped the knife onto the ground. She heard its metal vibrate against the tile floor and quiet as a small drop plopped onto the blade after running down her hand. She stared absently at the pool forming on her flesh, unaware of everything except its color and warmth as it grew. Her arm became numb and it fell to her side but her eyes did not follow.
It’s unclear how long she stood there but she snapped back into focus when she heard the front door open.
Time to clean up.

Physical, Love

The people who associate physical action and proximity with love are in as much trouble as those who completely disassociate the two.

Poetry: My Decision is

He was resolute and she knew that she was unable to change his mind and knowing that fact alone caused a spear of ice to pierce her heart and make her tremble. Her mind couldn’t decide what to do, her body couldn’t choose how to react. She may have remained steady but on the inside she was unraveling and all she could think about was how to self harm. Not that she necessarily wanted to harm herself but she did not know how to deal with this. He had closed his mind, her heart ached in its uncertainty in whether it should break or close. She had never felt so alone as she did, standing there listening to him declare his course of action. She wanted to vomit.

Poetry: Virginity

She didn’t know what to expect but that wasn’t it.
Nothing lasts forever.

Poetry: Sorry

Sorry heart, for facing all that hurt. Sorry head, I thought I could change the world. Sorry tears, you shouldn’t need a reason to fall. Sorry soul, you were destroyed. Sorry brain, you couldn’t think of the right thing to say. All I have to do now is face the consequences.

Poetry: Mood Swings

He didn’t understand that high maintenance didn’t mean clingy. Even though I was. It didn’t mean constant crying. Even though I did. And it didn’t mean fastidious even though I am.
How could he have known that my ability to accept simple facts of reality would change depending on my disposition? That sometimes I’m confident and strong and can take on the world but there would also be times when I would question my worthiness to even know his name. When some days I can clean house in three hours flat, accomplishing in bounds the feats that even my imagination lacks when I’m low?
I’m not bipolar. I suffer no mental instability. But the call of my hormones is too strong to resist and I bend as they see fit, making me a puppet on a string, battered and broken, functioning as I’m moved but with no capabilities of my own.
Would he leave me if he knew? He protests that he will never leave me and that I’m his forever. But he also doesn’t know… doesn’t understand. This is how weak I am.

Poetry: When in Love

For a good man, a woman will drop all standards.
But for the right man, she wouldn’t have to.

For a good woman, a man will work for her favor.
But for the right woman, he wouldn’t need to.

Poetry: Together

We knew our love was meant to be when we realized that alone we were just two broken people but together our faults were cancelled and our fears released. That’s what we mean when we say, ‘you complete me’.

Poetry: Why do You Love Me?

I ask when upset, mad, happy, or content.
I ask with fear or excitement in nervousness.
I ask to determine my worth or just because I’m curious.
I ask at night, midday, morning, in the evening, or while cooking.
I ask as we kiss, before, and after.
I ask nearly every day.
Why do you love me?
The answer always seems to change, day to day.
Oh, darling of mine… it’s how I know you really love me.

Poetry: Feelings

You can never stop loving someone, you know. You learn to deal with it differently over time but the feelings remain.
Just as you can never stop missing and grieving a lost loved one. But after time, their memory no longer brings tears to your eyes.
My feelings are unchanging and always will be.
So, honey…
Don’t you ever say that you stopped loving me.

Poetry: Right



The right person at the wrong time is still the wrong person and it can only destroy the two of you if you come together is probably the stupidest thing I have ever heard. There are no perfect moments in life where things are just right to make a change. There’s only this, there’s only now. Either you step up or you don’t but don’t blame your failure on timing when time is what you make of it. It’s about sacrifice– particularly self-sacrifice. So don’t give me the whole ‘we were moving in different directions’ spill when we all know that it was a lack of effort that lead you thus. Don’t blame your actions, your choices, your decisions on timing. Time doesn’t care enough to pursue your life.

Poetry: Exacerbated

You think we’re friends because I have a few pictures of you and you brought me my rover… or abandoned it at my doorstep? (Not really sure honestly but I love the little guy) Sorry, Earth… but that doesn’t count as a visit and I’m tired of you stealing my rocks. I’m not fond of being romanticized and the fact that you can’t see that I’ve lived through your present and have understanding of your situation is beyond aggrevating. Not to mention, every year I hear your false promises that you’ll come up and see me. Well, I’ve been waiting. It’s been years. I think I’ll hang out with Venus instead.
I’ve lost my ozone by my own stupid choices, I’m not about to let you worsen my life for me too. I’ve seen the way you treat your own moon. (Phobos and Deimos do not approve) You are a cruel mistress to the bodies closest you and I’m not going to let myself get drawn into a closer orbit when I can see what awaits those that do. You’re so narcissistic that you won’t ever notice that it’s me, Mars, that doesn’t like you. You’re the younger version of me that got spoiled early on and now lives corrupted.

Poetry: Young Love

I don’t think I remember the day that we met nor the moment that I fell in love with you. But I remember the early days of being in love with you and how much I craved your attention which you so readily gave to me. We would hold long conversations and never get along and it would make my heart spin in excitement knowing that you desired to hear my words, as contrary to yours they may have been. I remember how shy you were to reach out and touch me but how desperately you wished to… and I’ll never forget the nervousness I felt the first time your hand rested upon my thigh all those years ago.
I speak to you now and we’re no longer young nor shy about our embraces. (But we were hardly shy then once we began) Yet, there is a spring time in our romance that most loves our age no longer possess. I abandon reason and my life for your love and I trust it all to you.
I promise you dear this one thing only. As long as you keep on loving me as only you can, I’ll make you the happiest man alive and through this happiness created, the most wealthy.

Feelings

1. Figure out what you’re feeling. So many problems occur in life because people don’t stop to think and evaluate their true feelings. There is a reason you’re acting the way that you are and you need to straighten out what you’re scared of.
2. Girls are way more in tune with their feelings than guys are. It’s a biological brain thing (frankly no one’s interested in a biology lecture) and it starts very young. As such, girls are responsible for telling the boys in their life how they feel and the boys are responsible for deciding how to act based on this information. Sometimes a boy needs this wake up call to understand how he feels.
3. Girls, let boys pursue you. Let them play the role of gentlemen and accept their actions with grace and gratitude. Do not expect nice treatment but do not turn it away if offered. Everyone expresses their feelings differently. Do not be so cold-hearted or selfish that you have to be loved a certain way.
4. You do not get to be jealous or hold resentment towards someone for not loving you– ESPECIALLY if you never directly told them how you feel. Feelings are never owed.
5. Feelings may be emotionally based but they need a root in reality to thrive. A person’s background, actions, beliefs, and goals have an impact on your longevity as a couple and cannot be ignored. The initial spark of a relationship does not last forever and you need something to connect you together again once the kids have moved out and you’re alone in a large house with just each other to console.

Poetry: You Think

Do you think you’re being funny when you insult me?
Do you think you’re being funny with that childish behavior that no one appreciates?
Do you think you’re being funny using sexist rhetoric and putting everyone around you down?
Do you think you’re being funny highlighting your superiority complex?
Sarcasm isn’t funny.
Insults aren’t funny.
Generalizations never will be funny.
Inflated egos are pitiful.
I feel you believe that if two people are close that they can rag on each other.
If you were close to me you’d know that I never appreciate that.
Then again, you know very little about me.
Our friendship is a one-way street towards you.
I wonder if you understand the impact you have on others.
It’s gotten to the point that I empathize with your enemies.
The people you leave behind you leave wounded.
Sometimes I question how you’ll leave me and I hope that I leave you.
This is what I think.
What is it that you think?

Poetry: Easter

You dress in pastel and laugh and dance and eat an abundance of chocolate and fatty sweets, socializing and decorating and gathering together to spread your joy among the group of people that you care about, saying that it’s all in celebration and love of the Lord.
Did he really die and suffer so, bearing the weight of the atrocity of our sins, opening the entrance to heaven to us unworthy so that we could decorate eggs, eat chocolate rabbits, and find an excuse to hang out with the people we love? It sounds weak.
I don’t know what, but we’re missing something. The weight and urgency of the action falls short of our ears and we let ourselves party instead. Is our happiness really so important to us that we let ourselves believe that his sacrifice was so we could find a reason to smile in our artificial reality? It concerns me that so little can make us believe that we’re living out our discipleship correctly. There must be a better way than this. Than pretending today is just another day. Than hearing a sermon that pumps us up but yields zero action the rest of the day.
We are an Easter people. Tell me. How are we living differently?

Poetry: Cry

Nothing happened. There is no reason for this. Nothing negative is dragging me down. Today is just another day. Nothing special. Nothing that should cause strong emotions in either direction. So why, why am I…?

Poetry: Heart Broken

There’s a change in you; a shift. I’m not even sure that you’re aware of it but I’m not blind even as you push me away. The way that you used to speak was happier, had more hope. I would not have befriended the person I see before me now and the transition I’ve witnessed saddens me. Your harsh jokes have become your actual way of thinking. Your current view on the opposite sex is soulless and unforgiving. Resfusing to admit the emotional motivation that impacts your actions is childish and weak. Pretending to be unaffected by a recent heartbreak, pretending to be moving on, damaging future men as a way to lash out against the ones of old, viewing people like cattle to be used and manipulated to your will… you are not who you used to be. There is no hopeless romantic left. You don’t ship your friends and you don’t believe in love. The way you treated my man so callously was not ignored and your unforgiving attitude towards me was distinctly noticed. Are you aware of the pain you cause as you build your defences against feelings? I see your alteration. You have become someone I cannot recognize.

Poetry: Familiar Contemplations

I want to kill myself.
But too many people would blame themselves and be sad so I can’t. But it’s not like they’re doing anything to make my life better currently… I cannot list them on a chart of my happinesses. The only one who makes me happy is unreachable until the end of the year. Is wanting to cry weak? I wish I was strong enough to defy God and hurt myself badly enough that I could die – forgetting everyone else even if just for that moment. I am weak.
I want to kill myself.

What is Love?

I was watching the musical Grease again and as I watched it, I recalled a conversation a had with my mother several years ago about my unease of Sandy changing so much for her man in a way that I had deemed as inappropriate. I could appreciate Danny changing for Sandy seeing as I saw him as a rascal who needed to earn her affections but I wasn't really okay with her change. Explaining this to my mother, she explained softly that when it comes to love, both parties have to be willing to compromise and change. When it came to love, you are willing to bend your boundaries and your standards for them.

It's not one perfect person fixing one bad person... it's two broken people whose broken pieces fit together so that they can build each other up... realizing that you have to take care of yourself before you can take care of others.

I didn't really understand this until I was within my own love journey and became dissatisfied with every man that was offered to me. They weren't bad people. But they weren't people I could fix. I could not heal their brokenness... and they did not understand my heart. I became tired of explanations and trying to modify myself to their needs. It was physically tiring. I gave up and let myself be waste. After all, if I couldn't find what I was looking for, maybe it didn't exist. This pain was intentional so even though it was more extreme, I could call it mine. My choice.

I knew I found love when he found me in that low place and saw me glorified. He did not intentionally fix my hurt nor tend my wounds yet... wounds scarred and scars faded under his gaze. He called me beautiful not for my sake but as a comment of thought when I felt unworthy. He never said anything for my sake and he never lied. This was a person I could trust my thoughts, my life, my heart to. I dedicated early, 100%, and he did not reject me. Guiding, teasing, tormenting, leading. Never rejection. Never 'no'. That didn't mean 'yes'. How did he know? I didn't know myself that well yet... here I was. And his pain was mine. His heart was mine. His thoughts were mine alone to know. I brought out the man in him as he nourished the woman in me. So I could do things that I could not accomplish with any other because he gave me new strength, new confidence. I am his. His woman.

So I re-evaluated my priorities and I changed. I don't regret it. He's changed too.

Wednesday, August 30, 2017

My Faith

You are the salt of the earth. But if salt loses its taste, with what can it be seasoned? It is no longer good for anything but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.
Matthew 5:13

I have always believed, as far back as I can remember. There isn't a day I can recall whereupon I have doubted or wouldn't fight for what I believe. I have lost friends, been severely bullied, and falsely stereotyped all of my life. I remember in kindergarten this one girl named Jade was popular. Her mother was a model or something and her father was terrifying due to his build and massive amount of tattoos. Her prissy attitude annoyed me and I wished that she were transferred to the afternoon section on a few occasions. When she found out my faith, I remember the look of horror that passed over her eyes. The next day and every day after that, I played at recess alone. I didn't mind so much because I didn't really like playing with other children (especially since I wasn't close with any of them) but I still felt the impact. In elementary school, several of my good friends refused to talk or play with me after they decided that I wasn't worthy of their time because I was not a Mormon. I developed a few nicknames then that I didn't understand and in an effort to not feel their betrayal deeply I dove into my love of literature even further, consuming all of my time so that I wouldn't have to face my lonely reality.

When I visited the houses of my friends and saw their differing spiritual practices, I wanted to learn and understand. This one friend of mine in 5th grade would pray before each dish in a meal. She prayed over 10 times when we sat down for dinner and I had only prayed the once before and the once after. I didn't know whether to be impressed or what. I highly suspected that she was just showing off but... still. She had shown me something that I didn't have and I didn't know if I should be grateful or mourn. I came to the conclusion that her religious regime was "too strict" and I left her ways to her. I didn't need that kind of nonsense.

When I was still in elementary school, I decided that I wanted to read "The Golden Compass", which if you are religious you would know was written by an atheist for the intent of converting the faithful away from God. My mother allowed me to but with the warning: Be careful. Perhaps I was too young to fully see his plan in action, but caught up in the story I only saw glimpses of this malicious intent. But I read with fear and prayed that I wouldn't lose my precious Lord from ink on paper. (I didn't) However, while reading the series, I visited my great aunt's house. Her children (my father's cousins) were several years younger than I due to her delay in marriage and she freaked out that I was holding something she considered so evil around her children. As a Calvinist, she is pretty extreme about the type of content allowed near her young. I couldn't understand her extreme reaction as I believed even back then that knowledge and understanding is essential to "holding your own". Why live with such fear? I knew then that I as much as I loved her and her family, I could never be a Calvinist because those with the Truth should never fear any lie.

During my middle school years, I started to attend the youth group at my parish. We met weekly and usually discussed some topic that was chosen while munching on snacks. Every month or so we would do a service project but most meetings were just the group of us sitting in the basement discussing faith and enjoying each other's company. I've always seen a difference in amount of devotion between me and my peers in Sunday school but it really started to sink in here. The flippancy of faith, the embracing of social lies, the desire to no longer be virgin. When I was the only one who knew how to locate a section of the Bible, when I was the only one who had our basic prayers memorized, when I was the only one who actually knew the hymns that we constantly sung during mass... these things become apparent. Summer church camp was even worse. These that were supposed to believe like me, desperate to give away their morals to the world in an effort to belong and feel connected. It scared me. It made me indignant.  How do I convince them to listen? I couldn't. Not when our peers spoke of loss of virginity. Not when they described the sensations of being high. Not when they knew the answers from experience which lay unsettled in many a heart.

High school was almost worse. I started my own dating journey and there is a lot of confusion in trying to navigate romance while holding onto purity. It was very hard to stay out of the trap of thinking that my worth depended on a man instead of Son of Man. When everything in our culture is based around romance and sex, it's very easy to get pulled into thinking of sin as "not that bad". It was a struggle to stay pure and it always was a cause of argument that ended with everyone bitter.

In addition to that drama, many of my friends in faith started to fall away as they had already gone through Confirmation and therefore no longer cared. (more accurately, their parents no longer cared and therefore they no longer had to put up a facade) Many others got torn between social justice and faith doctrine... usually choosing to stick with their political views over their faith. It's when I really started to appreciate atheists. They know where they stand and they live it. Too many Christians are cafeteria-Christians. Diet Christians. Choosing one thing to believe and rejecting others. Not actually following through but rather morphing their faith into their lives for purposes of comfort. It's also when I developed a strong distaste for evangelization. When the Mormons of my childhood who abandoned me due to faith reasons started coming at me from all sides, from all sorts of tactics... it became obvious that their intent was my conversion. Getting in some practice before their mission trips, I suppose. Their ways were numerous and highly devious. I wasn't given a chance to trust any of them because literally anything and everything was a tactic and I had to be on high alert in order not to fall victim. To this day, I cannot see "The Great Commission" as anything but a heartless, ruthless attack to force perspective upon others by manipulation. It feels so wrong to force another to come to the Cross. Let them get there without throwing Bibles in their faces and talking about Jesus as if he is dead or no longer a man.

Speaking of Confirmation, I became a "reasonable skeptic" for the entirety of that year: questioning everything I heard and was told, truly making sure that I believed to the point of torture and death that what was presented was true. It was a rough yet quiet process. The hardest part was choosing a saint. I had a lot of difficulty choosing someone whose life inspired me to become better, be purer. The desire of every Catholic should be to become a saint. I wanted to find someone whose life would remind me of this divine purpose. But they had to be relatable. Someone whose life I could see myself living if God called me. I had no luck and frankly stopped trying after a time because it just seemed so hopeless to find someone to be my guide, my hero, my mentor. I started judging their names instead of their character and settled with one that I was comfortable with. I learned her story and was okay with it yet kept forgetting it when asked. I felt like a failure surrounded by hoards of flippant characters that made it difficult to improve. After Confirmation I felt like I was given a chance to do and be more. I was able to be more involved in the mass and to start co-teaching some CCD classes. We had switched churches so I was no longer singing but I was still active. However, disagreeing with structure had some very direct ties with loss of passion of service and helping out became a chore more than a gift. It didn't help that my own father stopped coming on Sundays for his own and various reasons.

I went off to college around this point in time, desperately hoping to find some spiritual guidance and to form relations with actual believers instead of flippant ones. I had missed the deadline for serving during mass but I went to every service I could and became a part of the midday choir for about a semester. I would bring friends with me to mass sometimes, Catholic and not alike... but, I still didn't feel like it was mine. I prayed and slept with the Eucharist. I went on their fall retreat but it felt so hollow to me-- and I knew that this was one of the deeper retreats offered anywhere on campus; Catholic or otherwise. I tried going to Confession often. But the priest seemed more interested in passively accepting my sins as life instead of giving actual penance and the guidance I was desperate for. Then, when I went through training, I discovered that he did not hold the Eucharist to be sacred and thus Jesus and it broke my heart. Around this time, I was pretty consistently going to a Baptist church with a friend because he wanted me to go to his church and I viewed it as a doctrinally incorrect Bible study. But it made me feel like a traitor to my own faith to go so consistently especially with this new-found news about my priest and my reluctance to confess at all because of my experiences with him. When my friendship with this Baptist blew up, it was almost as if all desire for me to be a God-driven woman died too.

That summer was pretty rocky for me. I learned some things that made it hard to continue forward quietly. My siblings and I bonded over this shared pain. Due to my work schedule, I often could not go to mass which made my mother disappointed. It became a habit to avoid the building. Find other things to do. Remain busy. Put my sleep deprivation above serving the Lord. I went back to school hoping to go to the other church, desperately looking to find something to ignite my faith again. I could not return to the first church because that priest was toxic to me and I did not feel like I belonged to the ones that my family attended. I was hoping for a fresh start.

Well, I went for two, maybe three weeks and I couldn't find anything particular about it that would make me stay. The music played oddly for me to sing to, the homilies were mediocre, and it felt like most of the attendees were just going through the motions. Honestly, it felt all too similar to the one my mother attends-- without me being able to name the faces. Needless to say, it did not reawaken me and despite my internal urgency to confess to the priest, I could not urge myself to do so. It was easy to find excuses to not go or plan my life so that I was too busy to attend. I stopped consistently praying and found it all together too challenging due to lack of motivation to properly fast and devote time to the Lord.

I am not saying that I'm an atheist. I'm not. But all of my spiritual vigor and desire is gone. My spirit itself has died and I don't know how or even if I want to reawaken it. I consider myself a member of my faith because I have yet to see anything to indicate that it's wrong. There's just too much logic and documentation to abandon the beliefs simply because of a dead spirit.

The year ended and I hadn't once gone to Confession. I went abroad to an atheist country and they were more loving and Christ-filled than most Christians I've ever met. They cared about others and lived their lives quietly. It wasn't a perfect system by any means but the government's ban on evangelization in country was only good.

I came back to the States and went to church twice as an obligation. A large part of me doesn't want to go until I have a 2-3 hour confession first... And I've sinned. Deliberately. This past year I've made active choices to reassemble my priority list and God is no longer number one. But this is just part of growing and discovering myself. I don't regret my life. I live without regret.

Let's see what awaits me next.

Poetry: Hawk

This is a direct message to a certain individual. I've written about you a few times, you know my words yet rarely my intent. I'll call you the man in the blue jeans so that perhaps you'll realize. I don't know if you'll ever read this... you are a hawk and I a mouse and dusk has fallen so you'll rest your eyes and seek new prey with the new dawn. It is not likely that you will seek me again. I remember well our time together. I pampered your feathers and measured your talons. Can you tell me apart from any other mouse? If you were flying 100 miles high in the sky, looking down on the world as is your normal to find fresh prey and your eyes glazed over me, would you know me as the mouse that you hunted and failed to capture? I would know you instantly.

You left a scar with your passing. I thought it would be near my heart but I was wrong. It is on my feet. And the weight of my burden is carried by it with each step that I take. A bit more fitting for our situation, perhaps. To look for guidance and find apathetic solitude, when challenged to be seen with eyes that did not know nor understand.

You always did confuse the two. Do you have to understand the science of the skies to know that the moon affects the tides? Do you have to understand the mysteries of a woman to know your feelings about one? Do you have to understand the affects of poison ivy to know to leave it alone? Did you really have to try to dissect me to know who I was? My emotions and thoughts cannot be traced on the carcass that I'll leave behind. I never wanted to be understood. I really don't think that you understood that. You don't have to understand God to know... so why couldn't you think similarly with me?

You never wanted to learn; you wanted to know. Instead of watching us mice dance in the grass, you had to pick isolated me up and peck at my fur, believing that seeing me bleed would help you understand. You would take my blood and put it in a dish and look at it so close that I couldn't believe that it belonged to me. You would take your findings and make a box, thinking that it'd be my shape. And you'd try to fit me in the box but I wouldn't fit. So you'd repeat the process, pulling at my hair; filing my nails; chopping my tail, wondering why your process wasn't working.

I created a mannequin and gave you grass instead of hair; water instead of blood; wood instead of my tail. And your box was close enough to the mannequin to satisfy your thirst. But the mannequin couldn't squeak and couldn't dance.

Everything but what was important. No cheese for the one who can't see.

And I was mocked for not being mouse enough by those you knew and you listened. Picked me up one last time to drop me on the hard ground far away from the fields I called my own and left. I play and dance in a different field now and I don't think you understand why. But then again, I never thought that you understood anything.

I lack all religious vigor that I used to possess and a root cause would have to be the Christian hospitality that I was given. Once upon a time, this would have bothered me but it is a needle in my feet and the constant ache has numbed and I walk forward without feeling the ground beneath me. I no longer care. You are a hawk and your purpose was to understand mice well enough to get more quick meals out of us. And I am a mouse who deceived you and became injured in the process. I won't know you again, my failed science project. I hear talk that you found a new mouse with glossy fur and willingly gives you her blood and fur. Maybe one day you'll devour her up. It's not my problem what other mice choose to do.

I am in a cage of my own design and liking: pampered, proud, and owned. I have a dragon and he owns me entirely-- letting me experience his skies and seas. A master of this world who licks my aching feet without knowing of their pain. Brushing my fur in his teeth, a rodent could not feel more clean nor content. I dance on his spine and he knows my movements well, bringing me sweet nectar to nourish our bond and feed our energy.

I am saying, hawk, you are a mere memory, fading more and more each day along with the things that you took from my life. Keep flying high. No matter how high you go, I will never be in view. All commonalities we once shared are erased. I. Am. Me.