Dear You:

Remember the orchid you bought me for my birthday?

Well, I killed it.

Not on purpose.  As a matter of fact, I tried everything I could to keep it alive.

Just like I did with our relationship.

I watered that orchid, but then it started to shed its petals.

So I stopped watering it for a little while.

I let it soak up sun and fresh air, but then its broad leaves started to yellow.

So I left it in the shade of my bookshelf.

I stopped smoking cigarettes inside. I rotated its pot.

But it continued to wither.

I looked up how to tend to this plant, how to help it thrive indoors.

Maybe I didn't research enough.

I babied it, but it didn't perk up, so I gave it some space.

I stopped touching it, instead I talked to it.

But still that birthday gift perished.

The death of that orchid made me realize that, sometimes, the more you try to care for something, the more likely it is to extinguish itself to escape the oppression of someone's concern.

Just like we did.

I've thought about what I've wanted to tell you for three years now, but I can't say that I've figured it out yet.

Yet here I am, trying. 

You think I would have learned to give up by now, but here I am persisting.

Since you gave me that orchid, I've tried to nurture other plants--most of them heartier than the one you gifted me.

I was too preoccupied trying to keep that one alive that the rest have either perished or thrived---thrived because I gave them up to someone else's care.

But I think I'm finally learning.

A few days ago, I upturned that special pot you nestled the orchid into last September.

For months its drying skeleton sat perched atop a stack of books--a constant reminder of my perceived failure: my failure of us, my failure of that once beautiful blooming organism.

In doing so, I discovered roots bound and rotted.  How long they had suffered that way is hard to tell.  

In doing so, I finally discovered that I may not have been to blame.

Maybe it was bought that way--flawed and destined for an early death by design.

Maybe you nor I had anything to do with our ceasing to be.

Maybe we just had to cease.

Regardless, I carry our history in my heart, but it's starting to weigh less with every moment that passes.

I carry it with me as I carefully water and rotate the growing bulb I planted in a freshly prepared pot.  I carry it with me so I know how to keep thriving. So I know what to do and what not to do, and how often.

I'll love you long after that orchid's marrow rots into the ground.

And afterwards, I'll still be grateful that, at one point in our discourse, you saw the beauty of that exotic plant fit to share with me.

Yours In Bloom,

Me

Like a lamb living in a pack of wolves,

you wonder why they hurt you when they love you.

You note that your muzzle is not so sleek and sharp.

You tremble at their snapping maws,

hide from their howling yawps.

But the den is safer than the woods outside.

So you believe.

You might think, one day, to venture from the mouth of the den,

through trees, into fields. 

You might push into folds of wool and 

think, "Here is home, here is my flock."

But the sheep will run from your hot breath, your panting heart.

Your teeth are too bright.

Your fingers are the wrong shape.

Oh little fool.

Oh scared child.

You are not sheep.

You are not wolf.

You do not belong in den or pack or flock or field.

Yours is the darkness of the forest, the hum of the craggy mountains.

You are the lonely wandering bear, 

the bobcat on the ridge.

You must walk the narrow trail and drink from cold streams.

Not for you the frenzied tussle of fur and yip,

Nor the hollow-eyed mastication of grass.

For you, the wind against bark, the crisp of dried moss.

Solitude is your pack and pride.

There is strength in numbers but there is power in standing alone.

If you try to run with wolves you will fall.

Your magic is your singular signal, your unique call.

Be the oak, the moose, the peak of the mountain.

There is no loneliness here.

There is no fear, no heartbreak.

With the expanse all around you

and the sky opened wide, 

you will be the freest creature that ever lived.

Other children will steal your work if you let them.

Mr. Eastes at the candy store is a perve.

You will get old too so quit staring and thinking old people are aliens.

Cell phones are coming.

If you wear those tight pants on stage the zipper will hang open the whole time you're singing that song to the crowd.

Try to be okay,

And when you're not,

Try a bit harder.

(note: if all else fails,

stop trying altogether)