Quand il pleut, ça coule.
When it rains, it’s flowing.

It’s pouring, flooding, overwhelming—
Oui, tous les mots pour intense,
All the words intensely bombarding
Votre réalité dans un petit instant.
Drowning you on land.
The rush of falling water creates a river
That shoves les personnes like waves,
Crowding into shelters en masse,
Shoving through exit doors de la métro
No matter how loudly the attendants scold
Because the exigency of the sky est plus fort.
It forces you to confront forces beyond your control.

Or it can push you to play—
Pour trouver une réalité dans laquelle
La pluie est un jouet:
Finding the rain a game, a toy, a joy.

What if you laugh as life pummels you
Like a waterfall?
Et si vous avez une aventure ?

It never goes how you think it will.
That much is given.
But if you don’t let go—releasing
control—it won’t take off at all.

Forget what looks good on paper.

Forget the mounds of logistics
burying you like paperwork.

Forget the litany of self-betrayals
that sting like papercuts.

Forget how battered you may feel,
like a secondhand mass-market
paperback tossed carelessly
into too many bags, pages dog-eared,
spine creased from bending over
backwards to please others.

Remember only the sensation
you’ve felt in your dreams—
how incredible it feels to fly.

In a wilderness with more dead trees than living ones, is there still beauty? Is there beauty in death? In embracing ashes to ashes? In laying yourself on an altar of stone to do away with the old you? In rising phoenix-like into new life?

There is transformative peace to be found in Death’s embrace. There is profound acceptance that both life and death are all around us, moving through us with every inhale and exhale. We stop shutting out half of existence. We open to everything that is.

This adventure brought to you
By that tiny irrational voice
That nags, “Go west,”
Or other such nonsense
Without providing a destination.

So you drive with your eyes open,
Senses alert for reasons
That might dot the landscape
Like giant boulders,
And you exit the highway
When sparks light in your mind.

Perhaps the lack of logic
Makes it more of a game—
Guesses appearing like grins
As you ask each other why
You’re here and then stop
Worrying why, playing around instead,
Cranky adults transformed
Into curious kids climbing high.

Intuition isn’t about end-points;
Infinite experience is the true purpose,
Each stop altering you
As you step through whatever
Portals called you to find them.

She decided one day
To stop breaking her own heart
And to open it instead—
To fall madly in love
With radio and bird songs again,
The taste of mango on her sushi,
Her fingertips brushing leather or velvet,
Lilac bushes permeating the air
Beyond where she could see them,
Words strung in poetic cadences,
And every genuine smile she glimpsed.

She decided it was time
To claim herself and her life
Exactly as she was, as it was.

She knew how she wanted to feel,
So she felt it without apology.

And she laughed as a bee circled her
Thrice, as if to say, “Oh yes, my dear,
You’re blooming!”

I lost her
For almost a year

She was drowning
Drowning
Drowning
And I didn’t know how
To save her

When she surfaced
Drew that first gasping breath
Soaked and shivering
Traumatized and skeletal
But alive and whole
My tears were a river
Of relief

I vowed never again
To let her sink down
Down
Down
Like that

From now on
I will love her
As she deserves
To be loved
Buoyant and free
Floating and flowing
Unafraid and unapologetic
Of who she is

She will never
Have to earn it
Never again be expected
To swim upstream
To keep others afloat
To avoid all wrong turns
To predict every danger
To stay quiet when hurt
To smile through pain

I will let her live
The life she wants to live
Ride the wild current
Of her emotions
Know her own humanness
Fierce and brave
Safe and loved

A caterpillar wraps itself tight
in a fragile cocoon of silk threads.

What will serve as my chrysalis?

I feel wings of transformation
bulging on my back,
anxious to spread out
but unsure if it hurts more
to stay folded or break through skin.

—

I feel the desire to nest
though no baby is growing.

Still, there will be a birthing.

My body knows it.

Labor pains are imminent
and the fear of them is rising
as instinct sets in.

—

I want to retreat retreat retreat
out into wild mountain forests,
crawl into some crevice,
shut myself in like a tomb.

I want to hide where gems form,
enclosed in sheltering darkness
for ages before cracked open
to expose them to light
that will make them shimmer.

I want to bury myself like a seed
insulated under months-long blankets
of geometric snow until warm sunshine
penetrates the ground.

I want to stay locked in my closet,
alone and meditative,
safe from outside interference
as I surrender to this sacred rite
and its passive passage
that seems to play out for me,
beyond my own control.

—

I’ve read of living death
but had no appreciation
for the intensity of being trapped
a second time inside a womb,
waiting to meet the newborn woman
who will emerge from her winter cave
with shoulders back,
hair wild, feet firm,
heart expanded,
power crystallized,
aura radiating wide.

I can sense her bright charisma,
her playful optimism,
her feminine strength,
her intuitive wisdom
the way I sensed each child inside me,
though now I am strangely
both mother and offspring
and there is no incubation due date,
no spring hibernation timeframe,
no deadline to predict
the length of this gestation.

—

I weave patience into my self-made
metamorphosis chamber,
hoping it seeps into my wings
in colors and patterns
as deep and dazzling
as a monarch’s robes.

Sometimes
I am in awe of her bravery
Because I look back and see
Everything she was up against
And remember how impossible
It all felt

Sometimes
I am in awe of her bravery
Because I look forward and see
All the obstacles that lie ahead
And how overwhelming
It all seems

Sometimes
I am in awe of her bravery
In the exact moment I recognize
That I have chosen joy over fear
Right here and now
No matter what comes next

Hop to that rock
And then the next
As you spot each
Best move—
Even the ones
That stretch you
To your limits—
Until step by step
You get to where
Either you aimed to be
Or were meant to go,
With all the synchronicities
Aligned in your favor.

I prayed for a bigger heart
and God sent circumstances
that shattered my heart
into so many fragments
that I couldn’t gather them
so I cried with hopeless rage
and people who love me
heard my terrible sorrow
and each picked up a piece
of my broken heart
and told me of their own
so that each tiny shard
came back to me doubled
and each shared sorrow
healed a part of me
and a part of them
until I began to recognize
that through our griefs
God had enlarged our hearts.