I haven’t made any art in far too long.
I’ve been trying to understand and fathom how to avoid my identity as a victim.
Meanwhile, the ocean tries to fold itself over the innumerable faults we live atop –
and I haven’t opened a letter in months.

But isn’t that the problem – trying to make the bed while the sheets still tumble?
I’m thinking so.
And that’s why, when I made my bed today, I took the time to appreciate their lineage of violet
expanding with the grandeur of midday –
lying across the mattress like the virgin bride atop her cake.
I cinched the corners beneath the mattress as I’d seen my grandmother do
when I still had faith in her backyard to occupy my longings for Charleston.
But Grandma’s elephant ears weren’t exotic and I wouldn’t get a worthy thrill
till I skipped school with my boyfriend in high school.
What’s the ocean to an anxiety disorder and what’s an accomplishment against depression?
I washed my sheets today, then I wrote about Renoir – and I won’t sleep again ….

The ocean will drift from California across Hawaii
and reach India by morning –
but I’ll still have so much to do.