Ten.Sixteen

1. The sun always beats through the upstairs window but this time I was in bed late enough, and the door was open wide enough, for me to see the light float into the room. 

2. Make the bed. White on white on white. Red wine stains on his side. 

3. Six teeny firm and green buds on the pepper plant. Grow little babies, grow.

4. The texture of the paper in this journal. The way the ink sits on the pages. How every line I write feels like prophecy. I am laying out my bones. 

5. Because I know that I am destined for what's better than good.

6. The pit in my stomach because I know where we are going. 

7. The coolness of this day in mid-July. A gift. I am breathing. The sun is here and then gone again. 

8. Cold water. 

9. The same question over and over. My answer each time is the same but I wish it wasn't. Even if I forced out different and new words, I think the corners of my mouth would still be lined with the truth.

10. How large the hydrangeas have gotten in just one season. So big and green and white. We rented an old farmhouse once, in Kansas City, from a family who had moved on to something more grand. But occasionally I'd see the wife sitting in front of the house in her silver Volvo smoking a cigarette, staring intently, before rolling away. I think I understand it now - the way the heart is always pulling you back. You return again and again until the healing is over.