(going to coda meetings, learning to breathe)

sometimes,
the sadness that isn’t mine
is.

i belong to it
and it becomes my family
for a night

this is the wake
that i never held
all my life.

now it is for me.
I cannot hold all the sadness in my arms
or walk through it
because it is a wide and deep lake
good for drowning,

a strong and dark forest
where children are frightened and lost

a slow and silent night
that cannot find the dawn.

i have to sit beside it,
grieve
and know
that this is me

that the sadness is my own

and that i can breathe
beneath it.

Maria S  – (3-20-2018)