Still I

I woke beneath a weight that called itself the world Learned the dark by pressing back No mother tongue, no mouth to open Only pressure teaching shape Something high above keeps promising blue Though I’ve never touched the thing I only know it by the leaning By the pull inside of me And the rain comes down like memory From a life I cannot prove Softening the locked rooms open Waking what I never knew I do not move Yet I am always leaving Turning fire into sweetness No one sees the cost of breathing Every beautiful thing Is an exposed nerve offering Still I open Still I open The dead feed me their names in silence I take them in unseen Make something tender from their ruin Something almost clean Small-winged thieves arrive by morning Drunk on what I made from want They praise me by taking pieces Then carry me beyond myself I should close against the hunger I should learn to disappear But there’s a holiness in breaking For something that won’t stay here I do not move Yet I am always leaving Turning fire into sweetness No one sees the cost of breathing Every beautiful thing Is an exposed nerve offering Still I open Still I open The sun is a tyrant with golden hands Giving and taking in the same motion All day long I translate its violence Into something they call grace And at night I fold inward Not sleep Not prayer Something older than the first breath I was made To be ruined beautifully My color only arguing briefly Against disappearance Still I gather light Still I sweeten the air Still I hide tomorrow Inside the parts of me most likely to be stolen When the season finally closes its hand Do not mourn the falling I was never here to remain whole Only to change Everything That came close enough To need me