Advice to myself .....

Cry if you must

Bury your head in the sand or the pillow on your bed

Scream

till it hurts and the lump that sits in your stomach like a loaf of day old bread rises to your throat and tastes air

Sob

Like a child

Till big drippy tears fall on your desk and wrinkle the paper sitting beneath you

Be ridiculous

like a fool with your nose dripping and your heart aching and your world shattering

Hit something hard

Like a brat

Beating the life out of the pain that keeps taunting you

Yelling unjustly at people and places that have no ears to hear your side

Worry uncomfortably

That you may never love deeply

Or surrender thoroughly

Or invest unwisely

Glare at your toes

Make them feel foolish for dipping in water that was too cold to stand

Swim in your mind

Drowning in the choices and efforts and hopes made in foolish vain

Sink deep

Into the chair of discomfort and let it surround you elbowing its way in to every crevice till you feel like you can’t breath

Cast off hope

Dwell in despair

Shoot down reason

Reel in remorse

Feel

Feel

Feel

And let your heart sit like one of those extra pancakes you make on a Saturday morning

on a plate you are too lazy to clean up

getting harder and harder with each passing hour

There is no reward for strength

And there are no accolades for courage

Maybe in war

Or Sports

Or books

But not in love

Strength is not the victors song

Courage is not the winners steed

Happy endings are not the evidential proof of success

To feel is the only victory one will taste as a triumph of love

So do so deeply

Cry

Longingly

Regret

Honestly

Not for the bow to wrap it all up

And not for the promise of it one day making sense

Not for justice

Or Health

Or Hope

Or Cure

Feel

Because that is the only gift

You are given

And it is more

Than some people taste in a lifetime