Back and Out

Boxed in.

Your letters, your handiwork, your loving endearments, underlined with rage, with jealousy and possession.

Sent to me, not to be uplifted, not to sit proud – up there on my shelf. Not that.

Sent, instead, with intention; the intention to download, to crush, to weigh me down, to hold me in servitude – to you; to prevent me – from stepping out.

The weight of it, of the box, of the dark place full of letters, of the letters full of little bits of you. Little, bitty, disposable. Insignificant.

I step up to the box and knock it

down, seeing the truth of it,

treading on it and

crushing it, at

the same time as recalling light-hearted moments, the child in me, gathering up sheets of soft snow; squashing them into snowball heads, and I take care to not quite lower myself down to your exact-same level,

I gather you up, squish you, and pack you – into a ball, a head. Straightening up, I dribble and kick, dribble and kick, dribble and kick, and then I shoot

your head, your mashed-up paper brain. I shoot it out; out and into my garden, out and into the open mouth of my chiminea.

A goal.

I light the flame and

celebrate.

Ecstatic.

Copyright owned by Jay Cool, March 2019

Inspired by a reading of ‘Love Letters – A Poem by Gabriela M.’

Image by 41330 on Pixabay.com