exercise

1.12.2025

writing about being scared doesn’t make me any less scared but that can’t stop me from wishing and even pretending that it did. even now, I’m tempted to tell myself that this exercise—to get outside, go on a walk,

keep turning my head so none of the colors or signs of life escape

from the corner of my eye, to remember that even in the driest time of year this world is abundant

with life and logically it only follows that so am I,

to start finding the parts of that life that have been missing so long I keep forgetting they might exist,

to walk

on concrete until I find the salt-and-rosemary, littered-with-bottom-white-pine-leaf terrain and listen to the crunch under my feet as I cross it and sit

and write them down so I can revive them—

is a step in the right direction, but i don’t know that it is.

Its 35 degrees and the sun has set and my fingers aren’t moving as fast as I need them to anymore and again I’m tempted

this time it’s to say ‘ill finish this later’ so I can wait a beat or a week to come back and scrutinize over these words and risk damaging the most sacred part of this poem (maybe any poem), its candor. twice in a row, I’ve resisted temptation today

declaration, decision, strength, confidence, exercise