A sea of voices murmuring
At the ballpark in the afternoon.
Shouts of "Hot dogs! Foot-long hot dogs!"
And chanted hometown cheers
Fill the sweltering summer air.
Men with wooden sticks and leather gloves
Play a nation's beloved pastime.
And I watch enraptured by the rhythm,
Sounds and smells of this place.
Sometimes you just need a slowdown of life,
A weekend dedicated to the melding
Of past, present, and future,
A getaway into the wonderful world of
*BASEBALL.

When you get a chance to apologize,
Don't say:

I'm sorry, but....

Just be the adult you say you are,
Then what you say will be enough:

*I'm sorry.

Today my eyes are sunken;
They feel like they sit deeply in my skull.
My muscles protest much movement,
And my bones aren't much better than jello.
My scalp radiates pain across the back
Of my head, where a loose ponytail acts
As my one semblance of being "put together."
My breathing is shallow and my lungs tight.
My fingers and toes bloated and sausage-like.
To answer a question takes 35.3 seconds longer
Because my brain and my tongue aren't in sync.
I can't think.
I can't focus.
I can't do anything today.
Yet here I am
Faking my way through work,
Pretending my smile is genuine,
Imagining my interest is sincere,
Acting like I've got enough of it together
To be a part of normal society
Instead of locked up in the ****** bin
Where I'd be more at home
With all the other crazies
Raving about this or that or nothing at all,
Because don't you know I'm one thin thread
Away from completely losing my mind...
But I still want to be part of your world:

Up where you walk on your legs
With your head high in the sky,
No vestige of doubt that you belong
In a happy carefree life.

Up where you sing tunes in major chords
With voices loud and proud,
No hesitation of depression stilting
The vibrato of your bravado.

Up where everyone is put together.
Up where everyone is whole.
Up where everyone smiles and means it.

I want to mean it too
One day...

On Monday I took a bus to Chinatown,
Wandered the streets like a tourist.

On Tuesday I sat in the Park all day
Watching squirrels dashing to and fro.

On Wednesday I slept in late
Because well...it was Wednesday.

On Thursday I bought a MUNI pass
And rode from North Beach to Daly City.

On Friday I ran Ocean Beach
Not for the exercise but to chase sea gulls.

On Saturday I meandered the empty halls
Of the old academic institution I attended.

And on Sunday, when I had done all the
Things I used to love doing in this place...

*On Sunday, I laid you to rest.

My phone drops from my hands,
All my body's strength ebbs away.
I have to lie down so I don't fall down
Because my legs can't support my body weight.
And then I'm staring
At the whitewashed walls and ceiling
Of my furniture-filled bedroom
And suddenly the panic sets in.
Everything is too tight, too close, too much.
I need to get out of here.
I need to breathe
But I can't because all I can think about
Is you.
Your words.
Your life.
Your choices.
And as I lay there sweating cold bullets of fear,
I wonder why I'm panicking.
It was just another email.
A general update to no one in particular.
One of the ones you always send out
To everyone because you still think we care.
You didn't say a single word about anyone else.
Four whole pages of you.
And I guess that's why I'm struggling to breathe.
It's like I never existed to you.
It's like you never cared about me.
And suddenly the need to see you
To talk to you
To hold you
To laugh, to cry, to just simply be
With you
Overwhelms me.
Not the you who wrote that email.
Not the you who you think you are now.
The you who doesn't even acknowledge her own offspring.
No, I'm desperate to touch the you
Who I know is locked away in a part
So deeply hidden in your soul
That you've forgotten about her.
The you who still knows a mother's love
For her daughter.
I want to see the unclouded eyes,
Hear the unselfish voice,
Touch the compassionate soul
Of the amazing woman who birthed me.
But I'm so afraid that you've finally done it.
That you've finally killed off
The last vestiges of her soul
With the darkness of your own.
I panic with the truth that faces me:
I'll really never be able to see her again.

"But one day her eyes are opened
To see the truth from a different view."

And that's what you and I need.
That moment of looking at our own lives
From a different point of view.
On the one hand, it's *our life;
We're allowed to get caught up
In the chaos of it,
Be selfish over it,
But at the very same time,
Our lives touch and are touched by
So many others' lives.
The reasons so clear to us
For why we live, act and do things
The way that we do
Aren't so clear to others.
And that person we're endeavoring to be
Isn't always the person others interpret us to be.
That discrepancy is what causes friction
That will endure and break us down,
Unless we open up an honest conversation.
To understand our selves is one thing.
To understand how others see us is another.
But most of us are too timid,
Too scared to learn the other side of us.
So we distance ourselves,
Cutting off those who "just don't get me."
But if we communicated,
If we listened to how others perceive us,
Maybe we have a shot at salvaging
These relationships that make our heart
Beat
Soar
Sing
Full
Whole.
This isn't conforming to be
Something others want us to be.
This is understanding we are not merely
The person we make ourselves to be,
But also the person others see us to be,
And finding the person in between.