Forgiveness, the Impossible Mountain

 

On a crackling electric April morning,

outside by the glowing

translucent

paper thin purple azaleas,

in a pollen wind,

amid grey thunder

and thrashing cherry blossoms –

 

The mushroom girl told me secrets.

 

I’m sorry

Please forgive me

Thank you

I love you

 

If I say those words I could be free.

Impossible my heart says. No.

 

If I’m to climb

that muddy treacherous

vertical slope

I’ll have to open my chest.

Emptiness and hope.

 

The only way I can see how from here -to open like that-

is to ask for the exact thing that I want to give,

and face the injustice of that.

 

Make my skin and lungs and bones like a sieve. I’m sorry.

 

What a muddy mess

to open up like that.

Please forgive me.

 

It seems so simple but if you have faced injustice then the fears are like the weight of mountains clamping your mouth shut and binding your hands.

Thank you.

 

Roll away the stone.

Put on these strange shoes, and walk for miles.

Pride, be martyred in this storm while the blossoms turn their faces in a trance.

 

Every year spring comes out of nowhere and the mountains orbit the sun.

 

She’s right, just say the words,

then the waters will spring forth in the desert. The tongue of the dumb shall sing.

The lame shall leap like deer.

 

Why not? I love you.

Art by Peter Sugarman