Jody Gnant

I wander through the rooms of my existence

Challenging the things that I’ve protected and kept safe

From the outside world

All while mistreating them myself

They are dusty and cluttered like the window sill

And I have not let the light in for years

The sun burns an image of clarity and transparency

That I am not ready to let collide

With the real world

Where people bustle along at a furious pace

Making snap judgments

Of time and space

Leaving me that one moment

Where I succeed or fail

To be part of the energy

That will carry them forward

Into the void

That we are all so desperately trying to fill

That I have filled with the many trinkets

In the many rooms of my existence

I look at them longingly

Picking up each and every one

Well most of them anyways

Except for the ones I’ve yet to admit I harbor and hold

Mainly because they be the ones that do not what they’re told

Intangible trinkets

With wills of their own

Not just a doll or a book

But real life pictures hung up on walls

Built long ago

As a means to define myself

And hide myself

This is not the picture I had painted

But it is of my design

And it is hanging along with yearning

Ever present in my mind

Ever meaning to do or be the right thing

But not finding the strength to say yes to myself

This is where I sit alone

On the proverbial shelf

That I have built of my own volition

And my own accord

It was the only way I knew

And yet I knew the way to be untrue

There was always more

What was I afraid of?

There were no forests with trolls or witches or wolves at my door

There were no white-winged fairies or wizards on a yellowbrick road

There were no princes and there were no toads

I am on this road alone

And yet alone I have never been

For I would never leave myself

My sacred traveling companion

There were dark times, yes

But I never left

And yet that does not always serve as consolation

Because it is myself that deserves the blows

I am the reason the path has been slow

I am the one that keeps me alone

Below where I stand in the light of my mind

Where I am not forlorn in time

Where I have the courage to step forward and shine

Open the window

Let the air fill the room

Breezes blowing dust off shadows

That without light only grew

Into demons and monsters

And big burly men in trench coats

Ready to defend the existence

Of an energy I never wanted

To know

To let in

But I did

I gave the energy a place to nest

To grow

And rest

To become stronger

And I nurtured it

Fed it

Like I do all my friends

Believing it one day would in turn protect me

But instead led to a false end

A false friend

That never cared for me

Let me love

Then let me down

And the amount of my pain

The sorrow that I would feel

Would be direct

With amount of myself that I gave

For they were always meant to let me down

But just let in a little too long

I can not fight the wind

For it comes from a source that is one with me

I would be fighting myself

And my own direction

So I stand at the bow

Of my vessel

Leaning into the particles

Embracing the way they land on me

With the air and the sun and the freedom and the danger

Filling my lungs

Carrying my spirit toward the light that enfolds me

In me

Of me

And in that one moment

I am