chunky lentil soup

regret like the lumps of underdone carrots remain in my mouth for far too long.
this extra lung of pain cannot just dissipate, it ruminates to the contrary.
oh no
oh no
sometimes we dig our own graves.
i wish i had wanted to eat this soup as much as i wanted to make it.

the flowers all pop up in rows without me
and they don't even know.
that this fame and glory and guts has all been for naught.
i don't want to win.
i just want to rewind,
to the place
where i was in that brief moment when our eyes matched
with windows finally open to souls that were full
and on the same page.
for that one moment.

but i can't get that back
and i can't sit around wanting that back.
because it is not my chair
it is not my window
it is only my soul that is left
frankly,
and i know this way well.
i have made my soup.
and now i must eat it.
tears and all.
oh,
if only they would come.

on to the apologies

do you know?  this one little mistake

is eating me alive.

the guilt could survive on very little

does not need to be fed often

or more than once, really.

it can be left alone and unattended

yet it will flourish

not like a flower

or a carrot

but like a weed

a prickly, defensive cacti.

it consumes the smallest part of me that holds onto

regret and shame and dishonor

that i have strung up around my neck like

some pretty pearls.

but these are not to be adorned

or adored

they are to be shunned; blatantly reminds me of the 

choices i have made

not in that one mistake

but in every moment after ruing the decision plucked from a thought line

made only of and for myself.

this place is ugly.

i want to leave.  

but the only way out is where i entered.

back

through the regret and into the room i should have sauntered bravely into

the harbor that holds difficulty and peace side by side.

i cannot choose the easy life.

i cannot ever change that.  sorrys cannot make it better, but maybe they can make me think

more, next time.  will that the thoughts on the line be about them.  the others.  the ones i love

claim to

hold claim to

and push the block of self out of the way.

only with your strength god, only in my weakness.