and I held the ocean within my bone marrow
and could leap on the back of an unbridled gust of wind,
without tripping out of my own skin.
Suppose my prayers did not hiss out of corners of my teeth
like calloused hands and fall flat on the earthen ground
like a spilled glass of red wine.
Suppose the stain were not wine, but blood.
When I pricked a needle into my skin,
I had not expected that part of me to burn
Like a bruise waiting to explode.
Say, when one says that, “true happiness is to be found within,” does one not expect me to dig into the depths of my being?
Am I not meant to prick and sting and prod at my flesh
Till I reach that part of me where happiness lays silent
Like a dormant mat?
Suppose happiness hit me flat against a hard brick wall.
Clawed at my face,
Popped out my eyes and said, “look!
Can you not see how unconditionally your family loves you? How blessed your life is, how merciful your God? Why do you corrupt your mind with such musings so?”
Suppose then, the sun no longer lashed at my skin,
but instead tickled it,
and I walked down the street with joy as a living bubble in my stomach,
with a smile that did not paint my face into a painful statute carving,
And instead played happily at my lips.
Will doubt then, no longer gnaw at me?
Would my prayers then, no longer an anchor weighed down by my misgivings, float featherweight to heaven?
Will my heart then, open its arms wide to let all the light the world has to offer,
and all the love my good God has to give, selflessly in?
