Breath That Can’t Be Held
It’s not easy to wake up
thinking: something better than sleep
hovers in the dim air
beyond the bedroom door.
:That the breaths that slowly
thaw--
begrudgingly--
the frosty will
(like the the light from the hallway
half illuminates the door-cracked bathroom
and thaws the icy eye-scales)
will give blood something better to do
than regulate temperature.
It’s not easy: to stare down the shells
of words to be spoken,
seemingly arranging themselves--
without your consent--
in a pile by the front door, insisting
to be placed in your bag on the way out,
and see anything
more meaningful than the pictures
that danced like quarks last night.
Not easy: for Christ to pray
in the garden
while the flowers filled the night air
with final oxygen and
he filled the night air
with doubt and resignation.
:to lay up there and feel
his lungs on fire and believe
his was the breath that can’t be held
and that the sword being forged
in that fire to rip through Hell
would take the shape of a coughed-up “It is finished.”
“Do not hold on to me.”
“Receive the Holy Spirit.”
Awake.
Breathe.
Speak.
