Notes on a monday

​Thursday: You collected rock after rock and argued over shells. You heard your ancestors calling you home to the great city of hills.To villages on the sand. How you danced and danced to the songs that only you could hear.

Saturday: I ran my fingers along the creases of your fevered brow. Spreading my love onto your skin like butter on warm banana bread. I assure myself that you will remember how our bodies were stitched together, boat and anchor, two heartbeats, so very connected. My truest loves, it is you I will come for each lifetime. We stood together the first days of Ile Ife, we sailed across oceans, climbed from heaven to earth and back again. I can see that you remember, giggling together like sisters, guiding one another as elders, our souls have danced together since sand and soil were poured from a conch shell as we descended the golden rope from the spirit realm, into this raucous and exhilerating marketplace of life.

Sunday: I spend the day in the rain, smiling at strangers and helping them learn that mint cannot be tamed (it must take after you!) and that moles and groundhogs have a right to a maddening hunger just as we do. After work I run to the grocery store for a few supplies, milk dripping from my breasts in the same pattern as the hale falling outside. Kind strangers pretend not to notice. I zip up my coat and continue shopping. 

I love you, I love you, I love you. When the days come that my lessons evade you or my love frustrates you I pray we’ll still feel the truth of each other, with the sureness that you know the names of each tree you pass. The ebbs and flows of your moods will be a reminder that I taught you the phases of the moon. These affirmations are spells my love. Our lullabies are incantations, ancient itself. Like every great mystic and hero, you’ve had the magic within you all along. Our rituals grew across the great sea in red clay. 

Monday: There is more work than I have heart for and I am anxious for Peace. My feet are tired from the weight of this heart. This is the kind of night where I wish I could peek at the ending, just to make sure it all turns out alright. You are patient with me, even as you demand as much of me as I can give, and then a bit more, a bit more, a bit more. Your laughter makes me laugh to spite myself. Your crying steadies me. It is not my turn to fall apart. This moment belongs to you.