Growing pains

I felt a change in the air,

Hidden in the spaces between us,

& before I could grasp what was going on,

You were already gone.

I felt a change growing in my left palm,

First a gnawing, itchy, restless kind of feeling.

The feeling only grew & began to crawl up my arm, 

Violently, it pierced me straight through my heart.

Looking for a quiet place to fall, I look down,

Extending out of my chest, a branch.

More branches grew & they grew & even more grew,

Stretching towards the sky defiantly.

As if trying to touch the heavens.

Leaves began to form, then the flowers & then the fruit. 

The birds & the bees love me during the spring, until come fall.

My branches becoming bare & not too soon after,

My new-found company also gone.

During the winter frost my trunk is a kind, warm place for critters.

Butterflies migrate every year to lay their eggs on my leaves,

Everywhere there are ants working endlessly together,

Once in a while a pass byer will sit under my shade.

While I lay here, my tears continuously flood my eyes.

Rolling down my cheeks, it waters the soil beneath me,

Where the roots have long dug their way into the earth.

My mind cannot grasp the beauty & the ugly of it all.

It swells out of my heart, all this love with nowhere to go,

I have nowhere to go.

So, I created a place within me that is both pain and love. 

Ugly & beautiful; It is a perfectly imperfect place.