Ode to Grief

You’re a bitch. You’re a temptress. You tie me up and put stones around my ankles to only then just push me into the ravaging waters. I am helpless. I gasp for air. I ask for relief. I collapse under your weight. I drown in your cold dark waters. I hate you and fully know that the only way to heal you is to experience you in your totality. I hate you and yet know you’re my healer.

Now and again you let me rise to the surface to take a deep breath, but sometimes it is only a fleeting moment before I am yanked back down to the depths of my pain. When the desert winds come and dry the waters I can still stick my finger in the dirt and feel your presence. You live just under the surface of my skin. You have woven yourself into my DNA. If only I had choice about when you visited and for how long, but I am powerless to your strength.

But listen up bitch I do have choice on how to navigate and float in the wooden boat that I will create out of your destruction. I will rise again like the phoenix. You may have torn down every solid oak that I know, every place I called home but from the debris I will build a vessel stronger than any I have sailed in before. So hop in you crazy bitch that I call grief. Let’s hold hands my old friend and ride these waters together. For it is the only choice I have.