Counting Steps

Sometimes,
My steps grow weary,
Run ragged of step taken,
Mis-taken steps.

Circling back,
Like a spiraling staircase,
Winding.
A cyclical pattern,
My mind replays.

It's a tape always playing,
On repeat.
Like that once favorite song,
Its rhythm now stale and dry.

Its notes toned sharp and cutting
To fine-tuned ears.
The same pattern,
The same nagging
Thoughts.
Around and around.

It's that repetitive noise,
In your head,
Like a monotonously dull,
Sometimes sharp tone,
Always cutting like a knife,
Piercing,
Prickling around the edges of clarity,
Murking the waters.

The grooves in my brain run deep,
Like the valleys,
Cutting through mountains,
Always cutting my mountain
Of strength
Down.

They cut and tear,
And shred.
Tainting beauty
With the grays and blacks,
Of its darkness.

Like pieces stripped,
They tear and claw
Persistently,
Patiently,
Tirelessly.

This is my inner darkness,
My subconscious thoughts,
Of insidious nature.
The thoughts I've hidden
From daylight.

For they shake,
In the wake,
Of light.
My light.

But, they keep surfacing.
Brought out in the light,
Of truth,
Bubbling over,
Rushing through
Layers of shame,
Protection.

Shame has hidden,
My light.
But, not today.
I keep shining,
Through walls of doubt,
Shame,
Guilt,
Anger,
Fear.

One light,
One step,
One turn,
But never back.

My steps are counting,
Counting steps,
Always counting.
Sometimes short,
Sometimes too much.

Today,
I step out
Into the light.

One step forward,
One giant leap...
Forward.

Like a Tree

Like a tree, I stand
Rooted and
Solid.
In the now,
Writing and
Weaving
My web
Of creation.

Roots ground me,
Like feet planted on the earth.
Two seeds grown into one.
These roots my own.

Tainted thoughts may shake
Leaves from my branches,
Bare.
But my roots sink,
Deeper each time.

I rise above,
The darkness,
Always reaching,
To the light,
Resting on the earth.

Planted in the soil of my soul,
Though my thoughts
Fluctuate and
Pulsate
Against the rhythm
Of my heart,
The heart of a tree.

Like leaves of the tree,
They float downstream
Of moments passing by.

My tree grows barren now.
Its bark stripped of beauty,
On the surface.
Pounded tooth and nail
Into its rings.

Shaved branch,
After branch,
To seek the heart.

The solidness beneath the bark,
The depth beneath the form.
The soul beneath the mask.

The bark grows tattered,
Each day,
And passing season.

But, the fruit is ripening,
As the seasons blossom,
Darkness succumbs to light.

The thoughts are lifting today,
Swimming further downstream.
And, I can breath again,
Steady and strong.

I stand, again.
As a tree.
Battered,
But not broken.
Shaken,
But not shattered.

I am mending.
My roots are mending
My new bark.

My soul is mending
Its structure back together again.
One branch at a time.
One new leaf at a time.
One breath at a time.

Like a tree,
I stand once more.