prospecting

where is peace?
and the piece of me it took with it.
one hand over my eyes and one hand over my ears left me blind and deaf.
no hand to receive, no perception of depth and words sounding mumbled together.
just like drunk when any idea seems like a good idea.
convinced even that it's perfect, in a dull witted moment.
i'm hungover from my own ideas filling my head and slowing my senses.
this week is my headache. this adventure my nausea of dehydration.
all my best intentions look like thin white paint over an ugly stain.
it should've been red.

like a prospector i've gone west in search of gold and arrived in the desert.
my pan and my pick are good tools, i bought them.
but they are of no use if i am supposed to be planting.
how much more appealing to mine gold than to plant wheat?
immediate results.
and the ground here is not for wheat.

saving face is no longer an option.
failure feels like a scalple running over the scar where my pride has died before.
cut the cancer again.
it needs to die.

i awoke from my stupor sometime early yesterday.
i waited for you to pour salt on my wound and assign my penance.
"stay in your hole and wait for spring" i thought you'd say.
instead i saw your arm, not raised to strike, but to caress and comfort.

i couldn't come near, but you wait.
all this prospecting, all my good intentions merely shadows of goodness.
little regrets and huge hurdles lie strewn around me.
"go back to where you left off" you say.
so simply.

you require nothing and yet i heap responsibilty on myself.
my disheveled look and the stupid life rearranging details don't embarrass you.
whatever i could find to pass the time i filled my head with.
all the best intentions were nothing to me because i insist on doing things myself.

by some unseen grace i have found the piece of me i left behind.
hardly the way i remember it.
but the peace is here again.
what can humiliation bring but a need for something to cover myself with?
to hide the red rising behind my ears.

you cover me.
you're my hiding place.

show me how to put my feet.