Am I, then, a bruise?
Wind in the darkness, late stars. Carrying hay to the horses at six a.m., repeating this day after day, following the same path.
A service, a sacrifice, a sentiment.
The weaving of other's stories into our own, and seeing how the weaver is so far beyond the reach of Her material.
Women I name, Goddesses I am not allowed to name publicly.
Rushing up the stairs in my shitkickers because the blind horse is down, the house still shadowed at half past six, Chrisoula and Sophia meeting me on the landing already dressing, knowing something is wrong because who goes upstairs in their shitkickers when nothing is wrong?
What is wrong.
We watch Eddie Van Halen doing Eruption live, then a couple of Zoe Keating's exquisite existential cello solos, then supper is ready and we eat standing around the island, speaking our shitty Greek, making Chrisoula laugh. Greek islands we visited early in the marriage, kisses touched with ouzo, olive groves crossing steep hills we ascended happily as into light.
The dry sun so far from New England's.
A way of reading texts entangled with Freud, kind of like how The Sopranos was written.
At a late juncture realizing how poor I am at setting and sustaining boundaries, and the ones who teach me this by running over them and taking my stuff and picking at my bones. Sadnesses, softnesses.
Crossing the street to give space to the neighbors, a new thing. Egg cartons blown off the front porch. Shivering dogs the neighbors don't let in, scratching their heads and talking in low tones, being whatever comfort I can be.
Waiting until afternoon to do laundry. The blind horse stricken now by wind in a way he was not when both eyes worked.
Mostly but not only alone, in love with what unfolds, and infolds too, gathering unraveling, and lonely in the way one is lonely when one is mostly but not all the way beyond being alone.