Raw mornings

 mornings come raw

full of emotions

unable to stop

pouring from every orifice

unstemmed, steamy, infantile,

all woman—

tears and laughter

of pain and passion

sweeping as a hurricane

across my heart

and then—spent.

there’s no filter at dawn.

the truth of me

spills before I remember

to be polite,

before I tuck myself in

to someone else’s comfort.

the wildness,

the holy ache of feeling too much,

is mine.

has always been.

i wake carrying ghosts—

lovers, regrets,

soft traces of old joys

like perfume on a scarf

left too long in a drawer.

i am stitched from moments

that cracked me open

and from the light that poured in after.

some days,

i want to be held.

others,

i only want the sky

to witness me:

bare-faced, puffy-eyed,

gutted and glorious.

a woman

who survives her own storms

and still sings

in the aftermath.