In the past month,
through a series
of small burrs
that grew into bruises
and of small acts that
spurred obligatory responses,
I permitted my
boundaries to blur
my endurance to waver
and my defenses to falter.
Pressed flat, crushed
beneath the mighty rollers
ground down under
the millstone of life,
I let external noise and chaos
bleed into the peripheries
of my shaggy bran and
pierce my exposed kernel.
I went from whole grain
to unenriched dust
in the span of six weeks.
And I allowed it
through my politeness
and wish for peace
and hope for calm.
While I have been
rendered unrecognizable
through the machinery
of the times,
left in a heap, discarded,
I still have value,
a second act in hand.
Onward, forward, airborne:
I will fly free as silken flour
cloaking with newly found
surface area
flourishing in baked goods
making sauces velveteen
smoothing out the landing
for those around me
undergoing their own duels
with the rolling pins of existence.
