the best that i can do

before, this was the best, this was the best i could do, read it, the best i could do.

and here? now? now it is the best that i can do. the best that i can do. 

what do you say to the morning that keeps the dark, the morning with not enough minutes to compose what lives in your head? saturday, i applied to graduate school. yesterday, i told my professor/advisor that i had needed to find out what it meant to me, i needed to see that it wasn't a matter of reacting to the space around me anymore. i'm going into this next phase of my academic career expecting there to be a list of disagreements, a list of problems, a list of ways in which i am not doing what i am supposed to be doing. the retail ghosts haunt me, bony fingers around my neck, waiting to curse me for needing a place to relieve myself from baby milk, waiting to write me up for staying home to take care of a sick kid. with the way last semester went and the number of times i found myself on the couch at 2am thinking "shit…," praying to the gods of fevers and the barking cry, i could not survive. even last night tested me, with the restless sleep and the lost count of trips into her room. she groans and barks in the night, and i wonder sometimes if it drove me to a point of exasperation, anger. when she doesn't sleep, i hate the world. i curse the universe for sticking me with this creature who can't comfort herself, who does not hear me speak, i become a monster myself.

nonetheless, i applied to graduate school this weekend, took a deep breath, and those bones shriveled up. no longer are they fiddling with my hair; my skin is soft and smooth. my voice is hoarse from little sleep and coffee feels good and warm. i have a shawl around my neck, a shawl that i made with my own hands. i am finding comfort within my own means, within my own shell, and i will carry this into the next few months, and the next year as i carve a space for myself and then occupy it, understanding what it is that makes me indispensable. this is a tactic of survival.

how many days, or weeks, have i been tracking thoughts and hoping for a silent hour? we bought iphones. ironically, i hope to use mine to escape.

what were we doing here? truth: five things. truth: i was told once that you shouldn't be putting more into something than what you are getting out of it. i regress, digress, whatever.

what is marrow, anyway? "a soft fatty substance in the cavities of bones, in which blood cells are produced (often taken as typifying strength and vitality)." here is something i am comfortable talking about. substance. what lives within the parts that build the frame. you ask yourself what you've done, whether you misjudged months ago or whether you slowly pulled yourself out of the pool, inches at a time. you ask yourself whether it's a matter of poor communication or poor living. you ask yourself why you cut your hair, girl, why did you cut it and why did you buy things, why did you go to church why did you stop going to church why did you memorize the shape of his mouth why did you choose fragments and expect them to somehow morph into a whole, a different whole, why? i tried to write letters, but when i open up the book i've got nothing to say but borrowed words. have we been trying to make a story without first learning the groundwork, the blueprint? marrow: the movement, the humming, pulsing, vibrant, resonant matter that you'll find if you crack the skeleton. i can't give you anything more.