And the rocking chair soothed the aching child of 5’2
This was in a time when that curtain of chaos drew around me like
A storm in florida hurricane season
The chaos was inside, like a merry go round that turns while the world stays put
I wish my world stayed put
You all had footholds that do not slip – within –
You all had paths straight and free from inner vertigo
You all know nothing of this
The more chaos inside, the more the ordinary would quake
Until mundane crumbled
A job melted down a mountain, the sludge of lost stability
Locked doors and banging fists
You know nothing of this
I’m clutching the earth
I’m rooting these toes
Stand tall in a storm
Against benevolent foes
I couldn’t cut the memories into construction paper
They’re not clear enough.
I couldn’t cut them out of my history
They still steer too much.
I find years in bunches that pacify
Some soul aloe
Some antivenom
Allowing me to be
Just be
This rocking chair of night and day
This see saw goes up goes down
The equilibrium they measure
Pinning down
Anchoring normal
You prizers of gravity
I’m rooting myself in your gravel
I’m nurturing my scars into the toughest bark
And my boughs will sway your canons of dismissal
From this planet I will rise
A wooden sanctuary
Rock inside and sap of sadness
You bang against these walls
You dug this mote
The gate is up and armed with armor.
I’ll build a fortress to the moon
Until the current of the ocean decides to lick my face
The smallest ripple of a wave will laugh at me
And touch eternal concrete.