Original 25-Line Poems

O body, you magnificent disaster, you creak now getting out of chairs and take the stairs a half-beat slower than the body you remember being. But look what you have done: you carried children up to bed when they were heavy with the world's first sleep. You held your ground in hospital corridors at 2 a.m. when someone needed standing. Your hands—those rough, ridiculous instruments— have built a bookshelf, failed at soufflé, held someone's face between them and said stay. Your knees remember every garden, every frozen pitch, every kitchen floor where you knelt to mop or pray or both. You are not what you were. You are what you've done. And the scars? Each one a door you walked through and kept walking. The grey hair? Every strand a year you were alive. O body, splendid wreck, my oldest friend— I'm keeping you. I'm keeping you right to the end.

In every room I count the exits, measure the windows, choose the outside chair. My body keeps minutes no clock has announced. A cup touches a saucer. Someone laughs too suddenly. My shoulders answer first. I tell them: not yet. I place both feet inside my shoes. I name the blue wall, the warm cup, the rain beginning. No miracle follows. The room stays a room. The door stays available. I take one slower breath, then one I do not grade. Across the table, my friend keeps talking about an ordinary Tuesday. I listen to Tuesday and let the door remain a door.

I love you without locking the door behind you. I love you without calling every silence betrayal. Bring your whole weather. I will bring mine. We can name the storm without becoming it. I will not praise harm because love should endure. I will not make distance when honesty is needed. Stay when staying is kind. Leave when leaving is safe. Return only by choice. At this table, care has a backbone. Forgiveness has a memory. A promise has conditions: tell the truth, repair what you can, listen when no is spoken. I love you beyond perfection, not beyond consequence, and never beyond yourself.