This year the size of a sea 
Sick to its stomach. 
Like a page, we are only legible 
When opened to one another. 
For what is a book 
If not foremost a body, 
Waiting & wanting- 
Yearning to be whole, 
Full of itself. This book is full 
Of ourselves. The past is one 
Passionate déjà vu, 
One scene already seen. 
In history's form, we find our own faces, 
Recognizable but unremembered, 
Familiar yet forgotten. 
Please. 
Do not ask us who we are. 
The hardest part of grief 
Is giving it a name. 
The pain pulls us apart, 
Like lips about to speak. 
Without language nothing can live 
At all, let alone 
Beyond itself.

Lost as we feel, there is no better 
Compass than compassion. 
We find ourselves not by being 
The most seen, but the most seeing. 
We watch a toddler 
Freewheel through warm grass, 
Not fleeing, just running, the way rivers do, 
For it is in their unfettered nature. 
We smile, our whole face cleared 
By that single dazzling thing. 
How could we not be altered.