First Sorrow

First sorrow

Like the first scratch on the paint

Remember the freedom you felt,

knowing you could skin your knee

and still run

Threads pulled from the seam where the brambles grab

Tumbled out of the bushes and back on the bike,

riding hard, down the hill and try the turn again-- Again--

The night your father almost left, and the next morning 

you woke up and heard the yelling in your head like a dream 

-- our love has consequence -- the way we love

can wound like so much bramble

Didn't you hug your mother more fiercely

knowing you were both already covered in mud?

Didn't she love you more fiercely, even after 

you broke the vase, her mother's mother gave her, priceless,

shattered crystal on the floor but she swept it up

checked for shards in your fingers

"Things break sometimes, even when we're careful"

Even when we're not careful

Remember the freedom!

Knowing you could belly flop with such force

that it would leave a red slop of hurt on your pale

Stomach, pulled yourself out of the pool 

Laughing, urged your friends to follow suit

Remembering

Usually has some red at the edges

There's living

And there's living after pain

There's a thrill in risk, yes, but that's not the heart of it

It's giving your blood to the outside world

Being alive with everything else

Letting yourself be touched

Letting yourself be marked

Not to be a martyr -- to Be 

Among the Living

I won't wish you smooth rides

Through sunny Sunday drives

Long empty roads

Not only, at least

I wish you

The wind pushing back

Resistance as 

Orientation

Motivation

Support

Pain as an identifier

I wish you sorrow the way

I wish rain onto farmlands and callouses into fingers,

Or wildfire rushed through a forest to start anew

I wish you the pain of birth, of light in your eyes 

For the first time, the agony of your heart

Holding the knowledge of every mistake,

Every possibility, and still beating

I wish you a multitude of scratches on the paint,

if it lets you ride more freely

if it teaches you to how to fall

And how to care for the fallen

I wish you First Sorrow,

So the second can be softer, or so

You can move into your life like

The greatest thing you can lose is not comfort

But yourself

Christie Flemming