It wasn’t until the dear ones
Dressed as dragons and bedevilments
Arrived at my door with packing boxes
And things that prod
– bulls heads and bone ornaments-
That I dropped the great and carefully sculpted rock
That I would haul around
An emblem or declaration
“It is all very difficult”
My mother gave me this rock when it was only a pebble
Passed down from her mother and her mother’s mother
Great artifact
Archeologists would discover and exclaim,
“There were women here!”
Formed by waters that ached
Sediment asserting it’s worth
The sheer weight of it!
Walk by any river and you will hear the song
“But I loved you”
“Please don’t hurt me”
What the hard says to the gentle
Come to wash away
Hard headed
There are those of us who need water dressed as slayers
With our reasons both noble and ignorant
A loyalty here
A need to be somebody (anybody!) there
We refuse to let go
Keep tiny reminders in our shoes
Of what could have been
Until one day, a great and quiet revelation
There is grass
Bare feet touch
A groundless ground