When I am asked to visualise a meadow, 

I think of the one

from Howl’s Moving Castle. 

More than any other year this was the year of starting things and not finishing them.

Buy seeds only to not plant them. Buy plants only to not water them. 

All those TV shows where the murderer was society all along. 

All those unheard songs 

only to crawl back to the familiar. 

Lately, my lessons have been learning me. 

I tell the doctor I sleep well enough and tomorrow comes regardless. 

I say I am yearning for a place I’ve never been 

and that I am learning to cope 

by learning to paint and learning to breathe.

From my belly. 

Emerged a deep purple wave. A full circle. 

On a walk, I see the street full of people enjoying spring. Remembering spring

is the season where plants shiver new seeds into soil, then await the right conditions. 

Every day, both despair and hope sit on my shoulders and 

make me dance, 

news cycle by news cycle. 

The spring rain left puddles. Puddles holding all I know

about suburbia. Her lights. Street lamps. Amber, like cat’s eyes. 

I’m sorry

I have called today and many days 

similar to today, ‘hell on earth’. 

In my defence,

it felt 

and feels 

like a terrible train ride, one where after working long hours on my feet, 

I then stood the whole way 

and had nothing

to hold onto and steady myself. On the train 

a stranger 

kept staring at me, then finally asked: Are you okay?  

To which I remember replying, I AM, and believed it.