On Hunger - Kelsey Lynn Sivertson

I was told I was born to be brutal

painstaking steps into fists

locked out of my home

for being too soft

too mushy

too impractical with the harvest

too messy with my chores

too loving to the things that didn't love me

See I thought if I could love something

that hated me

I could somehow grasp onto a deeper fountain

I could somehow hold in a larger well

where the water tastes different

because maybe it doesn't just satisfy

it also sparks a longing

for that unknown space under my bed

where I keep all the secrets

I'm too scared to utter

because what if no one ever tells me an answer

what if when the end comes

all I have

is the mystery in those questions

even though

I climbed every hill

I fought every battle

and I surrendered when you told me to.

What does victory mean when half

of my body is burned

past the point of recognition

what happens after the ceremony when

I go home and look in the mirror

and I don't recognize the person staring back at me

So now

I pace worn holes into the carpet

checking the clock every ten seconds

hoping

when I check again

the world will have rotated fast enough for

time

to catch up to my longing

and then

while the skin on my body burned

I could reach out

and find something holding me

that reminded me exactly how

to inhale and exhale

and then

fall

into something I never needed to understand to possess

See my God has made home in my hunger

landscape and sky and

rough uneven patches

need no work of my hands

My God in his glory

levels all in due time.

Footnote:

To He who leaves

open spaces to breathe

maintaining oxygen and love

to He who became the mountain

that overcame the mountain

you have loved me for a thousand years

more than that even,

I will find you again.