Friends of Bill W.

[LeftWriteFemme]

November 7

DETAIL DAYS



Detail days seem like lost, soulless days. I sort the piles of endless junk mail; catch up on bills, letters, laundry. I don’t leave the house, but in some way I feel like I’m not in my home. It’s like a day of pulling out all the needles, splinters and thorns that accumulate under my skin from rough weeks and road rash. I steel myself to the pain of relief and rescue. Cleared counters, emptied baskets, finished worry lists leave me with that newly moved in feel. Piles overwhelm me, but sometimes, details define me.


Can-can in your head.

*
Thief in the Night


The moon ran off the night you left.
Instead of west it headed south with you,
but I doubt it will stay.

You are learning to play a new part,
another ill-suited role
which I don’t believe you will carry off
with much aplomb,
Bad actors have no leg to stand on for critique

You may have found yourself
a kinder critic or a more likened mind.
What you have taken I can’t expect to return,
but what I have gained I will never give up.

I don’t think you ever intended me any harm,
but protection is something you never provided;
something which I was sorely in need of.

I was fortunate to return to the house of my father
for that is the shelter in which I can breathe.