Pulse

‘and the waters are dangerous,’

they told me.

‘the water is raging and fast and wide wide           w i d e.

you can never swim across it,’

they said.

and so what? 

the water has taken more and more from me each day.

what is the difference 

between standing here on the shoreline 

as it takes pieces of my soul, and 

drowning in water opaque with the earth it consumes?

handing over my heart at least allows me the delusion of choice;

I want to meet the river and shake her hand. 

to plunge warm skin into the cold rapids that have stolen from me,

so that the river might feel the pulse of an empty cup. 

maybe if I get far enough, I will find purchase in the sand and stone.

maybe if I tread hard enough, I will make it all the way across.

maybe I knew 

the moment my tears became a part of her, 

the water would consume me too.

you thought the earth was dirt, didn’t you?

when all this time it was blood.

-rapids