.skyline.

Please explain to me how anyone could not see the sun-dappled beauty in today.

There is something to be said in quietly observing the actions and nuances of others; I find it is quite like a porthole into their lives and their vision.

As I paced across campus today, my feet pounding the familiar grain of the concrete, I noticed that no one was looking up at the glorious sky like I am so apt to do.

The sky is a palette of beauty and the panoramic view, oh, it could never be captured through human attempts. The hints of gray at the horizon were in bold contrast with the dark lines of the bare trees today, and though winter is slated as the season of dying, I thought it beautiful.

Walking with my neck craned skyward makes me prone to stumbling, but a mere sidestep is worth it.

At times, I feel like clasping my hands toward the sky in a feeble attempt to capture the moment, but, though I cannot, I rest assured that tomorrow will bring a scenery just as spectacular.

Students were staring into a cell phone, the eyes of another, or at their feet as they walked to class.

Me?

No, I was staring at the sky again.

Won't you come and join me? See His beauty and talk with me for hours about how marvelous this creation is? Will you sit beside me and caress the fold between my thumb just how I like it and really, really listen to me?

Most importantly, will you look toward the sky with me?

Will you?

Autumn Leaves in December

This room, this girl, these hands.

Everything is just the same and as it should be and the usual balancing amount of chaos clings to the corners of everything I touch.

Just as well, as this is how I choose to live.

A different feeling looms over me today, but it is not the hulking shadow of fear; it is more like the creeping path of the rising sun, eventually reaching the zenith to cast a beautiful ray on my forehead.

It's something unpredictably out of place in my usual flurry of actions that is the touchstone to my days and, inevitably, the key to my still-beating heart.

My ballet flats beat to the time of the canned Muzack fluttering about in the background as I sat in those plush, overstuffed chairs waiting for another hurdle to be cleared in this mad rat race I've chosen to participate in.

The slowly rotating Christmas tree caught the flourescent light, ridding it of its dull pallor and breaking the glow into a thousand tiny silver sparkles as the silver tinsel reflected across my eyes.

The entire room dripped of holiday cheer and of the rushing winter that would soon engulf me with chapped lips and dry lungs.

However, a smear of burnt orange caught my wandering eye, searching for something out of the ordinary to comfort me.

One lone leaf topped a black pen, speaking of the season past and valiantly defying the sickeningly excessive amount of fake snow, jewel toned spheres and Mariah Carey carols.

That touch of autumn evoked a kind of soaring joy that only you can relate to, as I was like a lone leaf panning across your vision, blown in from the west.

I twirled around and settled on your shoulders, and instead of chalking it up to fate, you stared up at the sky and remembered.

Comfort washed over me as I rose and ran my fingers over the false fibers that made up the cloth leaf and I remembered.

I remembered how all our actions, no matter how arbitrary and out of place they may seem, may make all the difference.

beauty in books

Words dance on my fingertips like fireflys daring to escape the confines of a jelly jar.

Sometimes, I let them free but other times, I am selfish, letting their light play across my face for awhile longer.

Writing is like giving birth, confessing your deepest secrets and pouring out a part of yourself all at once. It's making the private public, the secretive well-know.

At times, it feels like extracting the part of me that is the darkest, but often, I am capturing a bouncing fragment of light from my soul and trapping it long enough to understand it well enough to cement it in words.

The pen is mightier than the sword, and the written word can move mountains, end wars and express emotions.

Poetry can capture the beauty of nature, the passion of love or the devastation of death. The rhythym can release a tulmultuous flood of feelings over a reader, and, with each recitation, a new facet is revealed to cherish and to explore.

Me? I am content to read Anne Sexton's confessional poetry and marvel at the images it incites. Her image of Jesus in the grave provokes me to thought. She says she could never bring herself to believe, but oh, I think her poetry is her version of praise...its beauty is undisputable. Whether she actually came to faith remains uncertain, but her suicide tends to make the needle point towards the negative.

If only she had believed!

Well, maybe her poetry would not have been so melodramatic and twistedly beautiful, but it's a small price to pay.

I would sit there for hours, in my soft bed, reading her poems over and over to press the images into the folds of my mind permanently. Fragments of her poetry hurtle at me from time to time, but the context is often lost. How I love to revisit that dusty, slim volume of poetry and pour over the dog-eared pages to dip my fingers into the genius of a tragic poetess like her.

Literature and poetry are two of my greatest loves. The written word can be skewed, twisted and molded to say whatever you want. Never take that for granted. I know I never will.

Silver lining: 2

Hooray, hooray.

I'm your silver lining.

I tend to focus on the bad in myself and the infinite good in others. Trust me, I berated myself endlessly and built him a castle in my mind to rest his laurels and his ego on, even though the leaves were withered and his head could not cross the threshold.

If I focus on whether or not I'm prettysmartcharmingwittyendearing enough, will they ever be able to see what I am instead of what I am not?

Or will they see me, perpetually bent over a microscope, examining and charting up my insides for everyone to see the good that won't come out of me? I will highlight and circle the good, shaking the transparency, but all they will see is the me on the outside, terrifying and lifeless.

That's what I truly fear for you. I have poured out my good for once. Usually, people say it's the opposite. The good on the outside, rotten on the inside, like an apple. Me? I know it's there. I talk with it, mold it and take comfort in the fact that there is some good in me.

But my outside, I fear, isn't a clear indicator of me. I focus on the negative, relinquish the task of finding the good to someone else. I gave up on going to the doctor to prove that my good is indeed there.

But today, oh, I got over it. The good WILL come out of me and frankly, I don't care who sees it.

Why hide something beautiful? Why run from the puzzle pieces that snap together so perfectly? Stop saying that it's too perfect, it will never work, it's too hard. Just breathe, wait, and stop depending on the doctors to show the world how good you truly are.

Silver lining.

There's that tiny spark again. How I missed it.

Have you ever met someone who makes you feel so very alive? Like every nerve ending is a sparkler, shooting tiny stars throughout your body? I feel like my very fingertips are glowing lately, and I am slightly terrified that someone will discover my well-kept secret.

I honestly don't know how they can't tell...I feel like I have the tell-tale flush creeping over my cheeks and the familiar gleam back in my once-dull eyes.

I've spent days tussling back and forth with myself in some sort of highly stigmatized battle of wits over whether or not my other half is truly out there.

Well, I'm still not sure about that, but the silver lining is so very apparent today.

The sun hit the edges of the clouds just right and shapes popped out in three separate dimensions as I fixed my eyes on the heavens.

The cacophony of greys swirled together in a syncopated dance, thrilling me as the slates and silvers melded together in a final crescendo of perfect harmonization.

We were looking at the same sky today, and the rays of sun bounced off those beautiful, chaotic clouds, richocheting until the slivers collided with our hearts, connecting us across the miles.

Exactly one year ago today, your mom loved me.

She exclaimed over how cute I was, how helpful I was and how "unlike your last girlfriend" I was.

I thought that was a good thing...apparently not.

Exactly one year ago today, your grandfather, with brown age-spots splattering his veiny hands, clasped my tapering fingers in his, telling me that his grandson had chosen well. My intelligence impressed him, and in parting, he told me that he hoped he would "see me again."

Too bad that didn't work out, huh?

The truth is, I am amazing at making great first impressions, but when you dig too deep, like you did, you tend to come up clutching the bones from the skeletons in my closet rather than the secret and adorable nuances you were hoping to uncover.

Oh, they are there, but you always find the stupid bones first. Stratification has left the good underneath the bad, but just like a walnut, you've got to get past all that to find the real me.

Too bad you didn't stick around long enough to pull out the nutcracker.

Oh well. I prefer that your parents remember me as the witty and helpful girl I was when I skipped my family Thanksgiving to eat with yours. I loved your mother and her crazy ideas and tendency to start a million art projects but still manage to finish them all. Your dad was delightfully unconventional, and took us all for a ride in that ancient model A that made the day perfect and archaic at the same time.

But, like that rusty but exquisite car, time changes things and feelings fade, change and get twisted by lies.

But you already know this. We've rehashed it enough. I'll stop.

I'm thankful for my family this year. Never again will I skip our ridiculous games and hilarious teasing.

you

I've been having restless dreams again. I wake up in the middle of the night, my throat burning, and reach for the ancient bottle of water I keep by my bed for situations like these.

It was full last week, and now I barely have enough to make it through another tumultuous night.

I see faces in my dreams and I recognize them, but the context is wrong. You're a teacher handing me a test to go take in another room, sending me away to be alone with my thoughts. You have been an evil carriage driver, a detached waiter and, most remarkably, a loving priest.

My dreams usually have nothing to do with my waking life, but sometimes, I make dim connections that shock me into believing each dream has a meaning. I can safely say you haunt my dreams rarely, but lately, I can't keep you from reaching your fingers into the mist of my mind.

It's you, you, YOU who keep me from sweet slumber. It's you. You. You who keep my emotions kept inside.

You. It's you. Your doing.

I don't know exactly what provoked me to let you back into my life as, dare I say it, a friend.

The gentle nudging of my Father to repair what was once broken softly pushed me closer and closer to your retreating back.

Much to my surprise, you turned around when I tapped you on the shoulder and, though I could not make eye contact, I felt your warmth all around me. Your apology was like a vice had been released from around my heart and my burning lungs opened up again, allowing me to breathe deeply and fully.

I don't know what provoked it, but I was glad to hear of your eagerness to see me.

Two days later, I was literally shaking as I pushed open that jangling door to sit down across from you in that intimate little coffee shop that smelled like home and cinnamon. The dim lighting of the art-deco lamp that sat at our table surrounded you, making your edges blurred and the lines of your face soft. I drank my bitter hot chocolate and nuzzled the rim of my cup to my mouth to hide my trembling lower lip.

Four sets of eyes from across the room bored holes through my concentration because I knew what they were thinking.

"What is she doing with him again?"

I was asking myself the same question the entire time. Sitting down across from you broke the dam that I had built to hold all those painful memories of you, and they all came flooding back over me, eroding the mountains I had built over the graves you dug in me, exposing those skeletons I had so artfully hid from everyone.

The familiar canter of your voice, the golden stubble on your jawline and the piercing blue eyes choked me as I forced my green eyes to meet yours. It was painful. So painful.

I think I did a nice job acting like I was fine. I think I am fine most of the time, but these little rendezvous remind me of how unprepared and broken I still am. You saw me as strong, collected and moved on away from you, which is exactly what I desired.

But inside? Oh, that's another story. The withered heart that still faintly pulsates in my chest from time to time was jolted to life with a electric spasm when I looked into your eyes.

You remind me of a time when we were so alive. Do you remember that? Do you remember that?

You are so wrong for me. So wrong.

But tell me...why do I still imagine us together?

Pour your soul out onto the canvas. Spill it here. Drip it there.

Give a little of yourself, child...the picture is dull without your tiny spark.

I saw a baby today, reaching her hand out toward me, but I could not, oh no, I could not make eye contact because an infant's soul is the purest creation. She would have seen straight through these dull eyes into my diseased heart and she would cry.

Heaven forbid.

I saw a mother today, caressing her child's face and the bond they shared, oh, it was so intense...like two lovers intwined, they have a link, a grasp on the soul of the other. A kiss on the lips joins two hearts, but nothing, oh nothing, can compare to the union of mother and child.

My dying heart gasps for air, longs for relief but I refuse it, oh, I tell it that the pain will soon subside...time is always the answer.

Months slip by but the days are the ones I cannot handle. Climbing that mountain and reaching for a friendly root to grasp, I find the silt and pebbles slipping through my tapering fingers as I fall down, down and away from you.

Witness

Witness it. See it. Feel it. Show it.

But please, just please...at least do something to show you're still there.

It's not faith if you see it with your eyes, but my eyes are blurred anyway, so what good is it?

I wake up each morning and rub the sandy sleep from my eyes but still, I cannot see those crisp autumn leaves against the milk-blue sky. What's wrong with me? Do I need to get my eyes examined?

They won't find anything because the doctors are looking in all the wrong places. The eyes are not the culprit. The heart is. Dead, dead heart disease, my dear...scour all your medical references, but it's not there. No one wants to talk about it.

They push their wire-rimmed glasses up on the bridge of their formidable noses and look to the left but never directly at you when you plead, question about your illness....they leaf meaninglessly through their twenty-tree textbooks but they are faking it, darling...the intellectuals know the answer but they are silent, for no touching evidence backs it up. No one wants to talk about it.

Please. Slap me across the face, pinch my lifeless cheeks, do something...anything to save me from the numbness and the frostbite of the heart that threatens my very being. Oh, I'm sane...sane as the doctors.

Something is to be said for at least feeling a tiny spark when I look up. Fan the flames?