Tuck That Shoulder

I have this heart, my rib cage has proven time and time again that it is inadequate at keeping it safe from harm. So I carry it up my sleeve.  Sometimes I write it into a journal; abstract and digital, a false vulnerability.  All may view it, but unless you are amazing at code, you cannot touch it.  I quickly stuff it under my pillow as he walks into my bedroom.
Sometimes his hand will graze it in the early morning hours when he tucks his arm under my head.
I have been known to walk around with my heart in my hands, but do not let that cliche fool you, it merely allows me to stash it away quickly at any sign of danger. It's best to know where your heart is at all times.
"Don't fall." He warns me...
Like anyone wants to fall with their most precious cargo held out in front of them...

Solids and Liquids

When I put something in print, it's like that piece of me is solidified.  A snapshot taken on a particular day.  Interestingly enough, the days I write are the ones in which I am working through emotional transitions.  Like an open shutter photograph with blurred movement.  Ani Difranco put it best when she said she didn't take good pictures because she has the kind of beauty that moves.  So as people peer through my snapshots of the year past, they may see 20 different women in various states of undress.  If they run their eyes over them fast enough they may see her dance to personal victory.

I give you today a snap shot of a woman smiling.  She is cross legged on the wood floor, back straight, her face tilted up to the camera.  Her eyes are dry and her heart clear.  She has taken a moment to pause from her dance and her legs are the good kind of shaky. She is radiating gratitude.  She's grateful for the music that came into her life over the last 6 years, because it has shaped her steps, made her muscles lean and strong.  It has given her something to share and use to connect with the new people in her life.  She has remembered the good stories and no longer fears their effect on her heart.  She knows that her past dancing partner is as ever evolving as she and wishes him nothing but the best as he too moves through his own melody.  Though they will never resonate again, she hopes he has found harmony in life with others.  She has removed the greatest obstacle to compassion; fear.  Though, she happily accepts that dissonance creates character in music as well as life.

Moving forward to the parts that cannot be captured in full as of yet...I am learning to love unconditionally.  I love so many people in my life, giddy-hard-to-contain-myself-when-I'm-around-them love and deeply-relaxed-lean-into-them-love. Romantic love is no longer a looming threat on the horizon, but a billboard in the distance with peeling sun-bleached type stating the number of kilometres to the beach.