writing group. death & birth.

she remembers the blue sky. remembers the pull of current on her legs. the thought that her friends were moving far away, and quickly. remembers the feeling of hope. the strong sense of possibility. when they called her name, she smiled. gave the thumbs up. then sailed off the edge of the next hidden waterfall.

flew. face-first into the cliff wall. thought: oh. there are my teeth. flew. back into boulder. hip crash into stone. over head over heels. thought: breathe. calm. calm. the eternity of the fall. the absolute clarity of every leaf. every cloud. every breath. i am here. this is happening. breathe. the idea of lungs. breathe. breathe. this is it. this is how it happens. mouth full of blood. broken body. flew two hundred feet into the base pool. and then there were the men standing over her. thought: i am glad i have forgotten my english. this is how to be born in this country.

they told her she had been blue, floating cold face-down. that they had watched her flight, knew she had died by the way she had surrendered to the sky.

no. no. she remembered everything, she told them. she remembered everything and had decided mid-flight that, living or dying, she would trust her body to take care of her. so she let it happen. allowed her death. allowed her rebirth.

***

she (different she) tells me of her flying dreams. she takes her deep breath and then lets go. she tells me she hopes to one day know that surrender. when her plane landed in a tropical storm last week, she thought of mortality. thought of regrets. her biggest regret: living so much within her shame.

my biggest regret would be the times i've allowed myself to be small.