THIS LIFE

sunday service: a poem, a prayer, an offering | "in this life i hold someone else’s baby in the night and tell him i’ll blow his nightmares away"

in another life 

i craved meaningless sex

i read poems on rooftops 

i flirted with strangers on the internet 

a friend tattooed 

a freeway bridge 

a leaf 

a mountain 

on my arm

after, we shared 

cigarettes and spicy noodles

and talked about god 

in this life 

i hold someone else’s baby 

in the night and tell him 

i’ll blow his nightmares away 


in another life 

i ordered a week's worth of groceries 

from a target in nevada 

5 days in advance 

for a solo trip in the desert 

i flew Spirit with one backpack 

i slept in my car and in a hammock 

i hiked every day

drove early every morning 

i watched the sun rise and set

in this life i pause in the bathroom mirror 

to examine the dark circles under my eyes 


in another life i went to hongkong 

to process a visa

i stayed in a hostel and 

drank milk tea on a beach 

and spoke in broken mandarin 

with new friends who showed me 

around the city they loved 


in this life i jump over the lava 

and get excited about buses 

and dramatically belt the chorus to Let It Go 

just to see someone else’s  “not a baby 

anymore” “little bit big” 3-year-old 

—my foster son, smile 


i throw late night dance parties at 8PM, 

because he begs just one more before bed 


the nightmares have been bad this week 

we’ve barely slept more than 4hrs 

each night punctuated by the same things 

thrashes and screams and glasses of water 

and stories and lights on and lights off and 

moving to  couch and big bed and back and 


inevitably my voice sharp 

cutting the night 

demanding something 

beyond either of our control 


in another life i didn’t understand 

how many things could all be true 


in this life everything is more

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to those of you who have been here for awhile and have been very patient with my extended hiatus—thank you. to those of you who stumbled onto this page one way or another during that long exhale, welcome! i’m so excited to experiment and play with different ways to share/connect/build community on here in the new year.

xoxo

billie

also: my car was egged in -8 weather yesterday so if anyone has experience or advice on what to do about that i’m all ears