Art by Jae / post #1

surrender (release)

I am a warrior / doused in black armour /
I am the wind / that whips

I lay my arms at the edge of the farm,
its borders swarming with men & women defending its crops and a lot of them
smile to themselves, still--
and turn themselves up to the sun as
the clouds part

I tried in mind to put aside that there was blood on the ground,
made it to the edge of the woods on tippie-toes without looking down
no breath
no sound
there is no room between words here, no way around

and so even long after the battle I perched in panic mode
while soldiers fell around me in the dark,

drowned
their stories left untold.

....Later on,
there was dawn

bodies decomposed on the lawn
while butterflies perched upon the noses of soldiers, birds took song

and I watched the surviving emerge from where they were hiding
as shyly as the sun rose out from the horizon.

What can you do to know when the fight is truly won, I wondered.
And then what can you do to move with feet of lead? I floundered. 

Gazing up I saw shining faces,
stepped back a few paces
tripped on tree trunks like boot laces & for a moment
on my back
the cold grass
was circumspect too--
the kiss of dawn's dew upon my cheek
was too new,
felt too true,

but then the breeze blew the leaves and the canopy moved,
and the trees let my eyes through and the sun came into view

and I knew then,
in the moments the sun rushed over my skin,

that the world breathed in,

exhaled with me

and we lived to breathe again

evolve by Jae