Letting go

Holding on means you’ll make it, So, hold on. Some days that’s all you can do And some times those days string together, The holding all that feels safe.

But time still flows, That staff— was it a staff?— you were holding Begins to rot, falls apart And still the holding is all you know.

So you grab the pieces and hold tight Until they break again and again And again. By then you’re holding Fistfuls of ash.

You can’t imagine letting go. What danger awaits, Where you might drift. It’s been so long since you let anything in. There’s no way in without open hands.

In that space there is, finally, possibility And in that possibility, assuredly, pain Though maybe something else too. A staff— was it a staff?— you could hold. Them’s the breaks. The unknown or A pile of ash.