On Grief
If you could hold all the grief in your soul
Wrap it in a cotton ball
And unravel its contents to passersby
How would they describe its appearance, taste, and feel?
It looks like wily wet earth
Coating an old-fangled sparkle dank
It looks like shattered seashells
A safe place reduced to rubble in brittle shards
It looks like a tilted horizon
Jittery grey skies hurled upside down.
It tastes like the brine of metal
Drying up words scratchy in a limp larynx
It tastes like a forgotten mom’s blueberry pie
An all-too-familiar scent caching mouse-grey fungus
It tastes like month-old opened wine
The joy of summer pickled tart and inedible.
It feels like a sudden dip in airline pressure
Head rush racing into raging trigger alerts
It feels like the mist of a cold haze
The transit of seasons standing still in winter
It feels like a hungry tide
Swallowing me alive
Wrapped in the foam of a see-through bubble
Until I just cannot care anymore
Until I just cannot…
