Drought

There’s a pit I used to fill with notes, songs and pictures of us together. Abundantly, they’d fall from my fingertips. Every time my mouth opened, blessings poured out in your name and the pit overflowed into an oasis of our own creation.

There’d be days I’d toil for words; days my arms would go slack after hours of pumping; days the heat of our anger would call out my words as sweat rather than sweet spring waters. Some days, I’d add to the pit. Some days, the pit would add to me. But my body is intimate with labor. I’ve pushed hard for you and, for a long while, I kept that bank lapping at our shores as its childish waves brushed my toes.

But I haven’t given to the pit in a while; only taken. I’d dunk my bucket into
our ocean,
our lake,
our pound, when I looked at you and felt nothing.

And when it was a puddle, I drowned my heart in our history. The pit is dried out now and I’ve used up every nice thing I’d stored away. I don’t know what to think when your hand brushes mine. Nothing will tell me how to feel. But there are clouds on the horizon, and a knot of hope in my fists, and I think I can hold out until the rains pelt the cracked earth.