The butterfly

I wonder how things are with you, between you, amongst you all.

I shouldn't wonder.

And me? The fizzing euphoria of the past few days has flattened. I felt it drain from my spine and my fingertips as I sobbed into the bath water last night. No more the pixilated pavements rushing beneath my feet, no more the sky blazing and spinning above my head and no more the fire that was searing my belly and my heart.

Something else instead: a butterfly trapped inside the rib-cage. Soft iridescent wings beating tirelessly against the frets. It feels cruel to cage that nymph, but that's the way it is - has to be. Smothering out of  judgement and necessity. 

What it is to be human. No other creature has the resolve to deny life and joy as such. Not knowingly so and at such expense of self. 

To be honest, yesterday even the windfall didn't make me happy - in the true sense. Oh I stood in the shop a little delirious and sought out something extravagant to buy. Champagne? Chocolate? A new coat? I bought broccoli and potatoes and stuff for supper and left with change from a fiver. I may be a staunch realist but I know that money is no substitute for love. 

Am I in love? I trust my instinct far better these days but I'm still wise enough to know that time will tell. 

And that kiss? Did everything turn on that kiss? What stirring can of pupae would we have left unturned had it not been for that kiss?

I am a realist and I am an advice worker. I've numbered the options and I've considered the rights and responsibilities apropos each. As usual, there are three: the dutiful/compromise (moral, realistic, dull even), the hedonistic (exciting, dangerous, deceitful) and the true (fantastic, destructive, liberating, improbable).  While we both have rights, 98% of the responsibility is in your hands. I wish I could shoulder some of that, but I can't (my shoulder is a little buggered just now). There is nothing I can do and little I can offer bar cliché and distraction. I shall keep schtum. 

I will never forget the summer house and the bench, the night sky& the light from the kitchen door. The memory is saturated with something I can't or won't name. 

Oh for an hour in your arms. For the butterfly to rest its bruised wings and sit softly on the shoulder. 

I am sending you love - just gentle waves - to bolster your strength and your wits.

love K. X