...what a time for recovery.
Not in the "productive" sense, of course--
--the inertia hangs far too heavily in your room and mind and life for that,
and the prodigal son's return is ignominious in its inevitability--
But in what some would call the trivial one,
The reestablishment of a baseline,
The return from negative to zero.
And yet still, it feels almost sacreligious,
This stacking of piece upon tentative piece as the rest of the world crumbles.
But it takes strength to accept this gift horse on faith.
Perhaps an exercise in faith is, indeed, what this is,
Or else what it must be, or has become,
A small step of the mind necessitated by the giant leaps of the world.
In order to bake an apple pie from scratch you must first create the universe,
But the scale, here, is reversed--
Trust in the entire chemistry of the self
Baked into the one simple pie of another.
The odor of the last one's festering remains still lingers.
You can only pray that this recipe is different enough.
It is a process of degrees.
The muscles of mistrust take time to slacken,
A clenching of the chest even as the arm softens.
Conscious effort eases it only so far--
It must sit with the silence, the absence of the other shoe and its descent,
To reluctantly loosen its vise grip on your heart.
Even the most gradual release feels threatening, after so long.
And so doubt twists about your spine yet,
Even as you yourself yearn to twine and be entwined.
The ache is not only lack--it is fear.
It is fear, and the longing of fear, and the fear of the longing of fear,
On and on and on in a bittersweet recursion of want.
Ultimately, the space above your head where a sword would be
Refuses to yield answers.
You have only the fog and the hand emerging from it,
The anchor chain and its blessed slackening.
It cannot be incontrovertible, after what came before,
But you must choose to let it be enough.