A Broken Vessel

Sometimes this feeling comes in violent crushing waves---  I love you, don't leave me --- and I press my forehead to that place on your back between your shoulder blades. 

And as I'm collapsed there, immobile, I find a freckle here or there, or I would, I realize with broken vessel horror, if I had not forgotten where to expect a freckle a mole that I once knew exactly.  And I'm by fireside, fireplace too hot, bonfire too cold.  And I am biking on forest paths, rain starts, trail jagged.  A dance floor of awkward strangers.  A familiar face I cannot meet the eyes of, for what does "like" mean anyway?  And I am feeling pavement beneath foot -- closer, closer still, to forest entrance -- a glance behind shows no one knows I've slipped away.

And I am sinking against door, sob breaking.

And I am pulling at hand to sit with me on bench.  

And masks.

And candles.

And I let go.

And I press into friend's arms.  And he holds me.  And vessels heal.  And heart stills.  And I breathe in trees and grass and peace.

And you're always just right there over my shoulder, aren't you?

Against Odds

The purpose of the (H)owl is to combine thought and reason with the animal nature and instinct at such odds within me.  I know the rational thought.  I know the instinct.  I just don't know how to make them hear one another and come to a conclusion.  I have watched with grief as those around me gave up on their animal nature in favor of surviving with some semblance of happiness.  What is happiness anyway?  Each their own, yes?  And mine is the howl.  Mine is the animal within that just wants to dance and move and run and scream and love with all of the passion built up within me.
Rational thought only wants held now and then.  To know it is wanted.
But I, I am a wolf.  I am passion and animal and instinct intuition and energy so violent, so chaotic, so tense in its calm, that I shake from it. 

It has not escaped my notice that these hunters see a wolf, admire a beauty they see in it, and invite it inside for a while.  Eventually, they recognize with rational mind that they have invited a wolf inside, and they apologize to it and ask it to leave.  When the wolf goes outside and heads for the forest line and beyond (where it belongs!), the hunter begs the wolf to return, perhaps as a dog, and lay at the foot of their bed so that the hunter might pet it now and then.  The wolf is tempted to agree, if only for some warmth.  After all, their more domesticated kind seems so happy in this sort of being.

But the wolf.  I can't help but howl for the wolf.