i love the sky

most of the time i do.

when everything is too full and it seems we will not be able to do

what it is we are here to do

that victory is impossible

that cruelty and greed and dominance will slowly tear us apart with ravenous teeth and swallow us

broken and whole

when everyone and everything is more than i can handle or hold

and i need no one to need any more of me, when there’s only a sliver left

that is pulsing, and still longing

then, if i can remember

i look up.

and this sky full of wonders and terrors

keeps humbling me.

every heart in my lineage lived and died under this sky

it has always been impossible

but they lived the small lives that led to mine.

and if it is impossible for me, for my people, for my species, to go on

i know this sky will watch us come apart

will watch the earth rest over us

will watch, someday,

our bones come to light, to startle some future stranger

like dinosaur bones

perhaps we will feed that future industry until the sun goes cold

and perhaps that will feel like justice

or liberation.

or this sky will welcome us

to go beyond atmosphere and ideology

survival and constant war

and the accumulation of belongings

that never add up to enough

to take only what we can lift beyond the reach of gravity

to take only the truth

and use it to seed a new home.

or perhaps

this sky

will watch us become small and smaller

slower, to fall into her rhythm and sustenance

to submit to this heaven,

to be satisfied with knowing so little

and feeling so much.

these big thoughts

make me feel small enough to breathe again

to laugh and argue and plan and look forward

these big thoughts

somedays

are the only peace I know