I grew up in with a very religious mother, and to say I was a “Jesus girl” would be underselling it. Had I been Catholic, I would have become a nun. I read through the entire bible twice and had copious amounts memorized. I was one of those “sold out,”…

The word surrender means “to cease to resist.” That definition holds freedom and defeat in the same breath, and it is at the very core of the complexity of hope. Interestingly, in the tale of “Pandora’s Box,” after a wealth of plagues were unleashed upon the world, hope was the…

Identifying destructive patterns in dating I think I’ve been trying to find home for a long time. For most of my life, even though there were a lot of uncertainties in my upbringing, I had a home in my faith. I belonged to something bigger than me, so when I…

I went to the cabin in the woods to be alone. It seemed fitting to sit and stare at what had been left untouched, and I wanted silence. The cabin was dark. It had a cot perched in a makeshift kind of loft, so when I looked outside, I could…

The thing about it is that it colors everything. It seems impossible to live in — suffocating, grasping. And to step out of it, to try and live, feels like climbing over the bones of everything lost. It feels like betrayal — and all the worse because it’s necessary. Right…

Abuse Worlds were being created And I stood in silence absolute Watching as you spun The atmosphere with the Bloodied knuckles of your fists My home lost all gravity The words “I love you” floating, disconnected Like particles no longer Bound to any creation I recognized You shook — and…

The list of agreements we have made as a society regarding the responsibility of a woman is endless. — When I was a little girl, I was taught that this was the power of women. They were created as helpmates, literally taken from the body of man — an extension of something already formed. This woman — this body — was meant to take from a man and complete…

My father and I loved each other through poetry. Lines shared in shortened, staccato rhythms with endless meanings in-between He was beautiful in the way that wild places are in the way that conjures awe and fear at the same time A place to visit, but never to stay. I…

Tomorrow I am turning 50. It is weird because I still feel the vulnerability of 18, the drive of 30, and the wonder of a child. I’m sitting here with sunlight streaming through my window, listening to music and feeling the stirrings of something new. And, honestly, it’s fucking miraculous. …