Tides and Time

How do I transverse

Amsterdam’s canals

With the knowledge

That its streets are always sinking-

But its buildings are made

So beautiful

By their reflection in the

Rising water?

How do I reconcile

With Venice?

What can I say,

If anything,

Of a city that is drowning-

But has been made

So much more beautiful

After learning to swim?

That which breaks you down

May not always be

Of Tsunami strength,

It may not be a menacing man

Peering into your eyes,

Lips curling back over those weighted words

Which seem to constantly swim

Inside your psyche,

 “You are not good enough,”

That the single drop

Of redeeming rain

Which kisses your cheek

For a beautiful moment

Could just as easily be
The torturous drop

That will drive a man mad

As it drips

Riotously against his
Forehead

For what feels like

Echoing years,

It will be the girl who loves you,

Swinging on the boughs of

This promising landscape that is your life,

Smiling through her sunglasses,

Swinging, swaying,

Saying,

 “Be realistic,”

That which breaks you down

May not be obviously caustic,

But still it may

Render your heart,

And like the whispers of water

That over years

Wear away whole coastlines,

There will be that subtle

Something with the power

To silently erode

The Achilles heel of yours

That they’ll be holding

As you’re plunged

Beneath the rapids,

No,
You cannot sear this out
In the shower,

In fact,

Some days

You may no longer

Be able to decipher

What is simply scorching water

And what are your streaming tears,

As both will seem to

Have been made salty

By your suffering,

But

You may have showered

On that dreadful day

In the same water that

Once sustained

Van Gogh’s sunflowers,

And you may have brushed

Your teeth this morning

With the water that once buoyed

Monet’s lilies,

So when the water burns my skin,

I must remember that hot chocolate,

And watercolors,

And oceans,

And I

Share the same

Primary component,

Oh, that I might be soft

And stolid as the ocean,

That I might find the strength

And the solace

To hold up ships

But slip through fingers,

When I am in transition,

When I am converted
From river to steam,

Into clouds and to rain,
Will you guide

The scattered sum
Of my parts

Back into some semblance

Of this same recognizable

Body of water?

Because 70% of me-
I am mostly water,

But did my birth certificate ever denote
Whether I was meant to boil

Or freeze?
Because ice,
Ice and precipitate and cloud matter-
And steam,

They are water too,
But maybe not the kind you’re thinking of,
No,
Not that kind at all,

So maybe,

Just maybe,
I’m simply not the kind
They all were thinking of,

But still, and forever,

I know I will be water,

That seventy,

And seventy,

And seventy percent,

Of the earth’s surface,

Of the human brain, and

Of my body

Is water,

No wonder seven

Is such a notable number,

Yes,

They told me seven was lucky

Because I was born on

The Seventh of March-

The luckiest day of the luckiest month,

And what a lucky Irish-born baby

I’d be.

And on the seventh of this year,

It will have been seven years exactly

Since

They drained the fluid that

Took my mother’s brain

From seventy

To ninety percent water,

And although they got it out
She will never stop

Wading in the rip tide

Of that irreversible pain,

But March seventh made me a swimmer

With the constellation of the fish,

So it should be easier to endure

My certain sea of suffering,

Because I have gills meant for this,

And with that, at last I could see

What a feisty born Pisces

I’d be.

And I knew it was selfish to ask

But in seventh grade

You are selfish-

So I asked anyway-

Would there be anyone

There

To answer me

When I asked,

Why,

When the inside of my eyelid

Is surely pink

I see only black when

I close my lids?

And when I can so clearly see

That the blood in my mom’s

IV is red,

Why do my veins run blue
Whenever

I look inside of myself?

Do not search for suffering,

As it will find you,

And it may flood you,

But time,

Time is a solvent-

It may not cure all things-

But if you're patient enough,

Your suffering will crystallize

And my god,

What a dazzling mixture

That’d make.

They warned you

Life would not be fair,

But they did not warn you

About this part,

Can you love me for

The subtle suffering

Something

That I hold

Within my heart?

I feel truth anchored

In my sloshing stomach,

And I know I cannot blame the tide

For drawing me in,

Just to push me away

As now I’m on the edge of the edge

Of the first of seven seas,

But starting today,

I refuse to stop swimming,

As the waves that rocked me

In daylight hours

Return as I lie down to sleep,

Singing, singing, singing to me,

"All there’s left to do in this world

Is hope, help, and forgive,"