A Flowering Cactus

Untangling the knots of my heart

Can I wrangle these thoughts?

All the shoulds and oughts

Can I soften the bumps?

Smooth out all the places I stumble

Again and again and again

When will I remember that these voices

Are not my choices

They are the echo of the outside world

Old hurts and wounds

Reverberating in my cracks and caverns

Hiding my treasures

Weighing down my feathers

It’s so easy to forget

And harder to remember

The truth of the Love that I am

That we all are

A whole sky full of shining stars

Remembering is a practice

A flowering cactus

Healing the hurt

This is the work

-Melissa Renzi

July 3, 2021

Amherst, MA