Thursday, April 19, 2018

limbs.



it has been such a long and lonely spring
and dark 
and harrowing
and our limbs have stayed dormant
waiting for sunshine 
to send sweetness
up to reaching leaves
and promising 
buds.

but your limbs are slender and graceful
and all the way over there
and cold.

i reach out to you
go out on my limbs
though they are icy and rough
and full of wounds and cracks and memories
not yet scarred over
and i cannot touch you.

i reach out to you
you in your slender grace
all the way over there
all by yourself
and all this wind
between us.

and between us there is so much space
and so many days
and so much blank
and i am not sure that i can reach you
over it all.

but i go.
every day, i crawl along my hurt and 
sorrow
scraping over my broken promises
and cracked memories of sunshine days
i catch my fingers
in knots and dreams
of seasons when i made you happy
and you laughed in the wind
and the world was richer for your joy.

and i go
every night, stealing along my resolve
knowing that my branches will hold
and certain that yours will not
though i may perch
in my longing
and breathe you in
and settle for your sigh.

nevertheless
i go.

Thursday, April 12, 2018

the boat.



on thursday in north york in april of a long and sporadic spring, i sit reading short stories by alistair macleod and wish that i had said so many things so well. there is a blister on the top of my left foot where my new expensive running shoe rubbed me the wrong way, perhaps as a reminder that there is always more to take care of than the simple planting of one foot in front of the other. and nevertheless, i ran. i ran on a tuesday night, round and round a wealthy neighbourhood across from the hospital and tucked in behind an outlying university campus. i ran in front of my reluctant daughter, one so curly and stubborn it is hard to categorize her as some kind of person; she is more wolverine or shark. i goaded her into more steps and more laps, looking down every now and again to check our progress, and i did so guiltily. we had already run more kilometres than i had when i was twice her age, and she had already had a full day of the life of a 10-year-old schoolgirl, and here i was, marching her around a neighbourhood of haves while i tried to suss out my ankle and my stride and my mind. she never complained. so round we went as my thoughts and my motives, and i dropped her off for a rest by the split rail fence in front of an incongruously small house, more fitted to an embankment next to the madawaska, or the petawawa, or somewhere among pine trees and balsam. i caught up to my older daughter, and she grinned and giggled and raced me up the hill, refusing to give in, still genuinely curious as to whether i could keep up, or if it would be the day that i could not. we crested the hill and i urged her on, hurtling smoothly over cracked pavement and all my broken choices, and then i turned into sports announcer, calling her out, sending her to the line. she accelerated then, hair aloft behind her, freckles blurred with the effort, long legs turning her into a horse at full gallop. and then we jogged it off, reminisced the workout, picked up the little sister, and my heart glowed. we returned to the parking lot together. i saved the reveal of their total distance until we were just about done, and their giggling pride could not be suppressed. they raced to the car, collapsed against it to gasp in between laughter, and i knew then that all my broken choices would never undo the shine of what we’ve done right.

Tuesday, April 3, 2018

repetition.



the latest morning shakeout has me reeling.

as usual, fraioli brings us through interesting tidbits and commentary and things to think about while running long, or things to get us out the door to run long, or things to drink before we run. it's good stuff, and i save the reading of it until i'm alone, at work, unrushed, and waiting for a good day. i hope that today is a good day.

but there was a piece that was linked to in this issue, and i read it, and i was struck. this is not a normal tuesday thing. i read bauer's words, totally vulnerable and honest and raw and beautiful, and tears filled my eyes. it's tuesday. nothing to cry about. and everything to cry about.

before, i thought about repetition. you know, that really non-sexy stuff like putting one foot in front of the other, taking tens of thousands of steps in a day or in a race or, usually, in the dark. repetition like laundry cycles semi-cleaning pounds and pounds of sweat-soaked, stinking, synthetic garb, round and round the clicking and banging basin, wearing grooves into the ceramic kitchen floor, wearing grooves into my tolerance, scratching at my patience. repetition like one lace over the other over the other and the other. repetition like breathing in two out one in two out one. repetition like three sets of ten for all the days in a row. repetition like getting up in the dark and going to run in the dark and showering in the dark and going to sleep in the dark and waking up in the dark. repetition like saying goodbye in the morning without a kiss and saying goodnight in the dark without a kiss and going through months at a time without a kiss. repetition like meeting every tuesday night in the rain and snow and rain and rain. repetition like the cracks in the sidewalk or the potholes in the road or the fibonacci fibers of roots wrapt round and round the rutted way, holding up the mountain and my heart.

repetition is a beautiful thing.

and i read bauer's piece about hope, and found myself on both sides of the darkness: the partner wishing for light, the partner in the dark. maybe i am both. and i remembered the importance of fraioli's point: show up, and do the work, every time. it doesn't have to be glorious, every time. it doesn't have to win or take home the prize or look amazing or wonderful; it just has to be done. as AW would say: stay the fuck on it.

amen.