Sometimes
my soul hangs off me
in strips.
It makes me think of the bark
that peels from fat-trunked trees;
old layers tearing off in shards—
like maybe
the tree
might be crying.
So that’s what a sad soul looks like?
When I walk in nature
I wonder if it’s true.
Maybe a tree wears its soul
on the inside…
and the outside.
And maybe trees
need
to be hugged.
Just like we do.
I’m not really okay, today.
And yesterday—
I wasn’t really okay then, either.
Yesterday, there were tears.
Feelings.
And yesterday I couldn’t see the sky, anymore.
Maybe it’s hormones.
Or the rain.
Or maybe it’s just my broken bits screeching
Reminding me
That I am only human.
Or something like it, anyway.
So.
For a day. Or two. Or three
I’ll probably still be this.
A little bit lost.
A little bit bamboozled.
A little bit wondering…
‘When will this tenderness seep back into my bones?’
Yesterday I searched for a place to hide.
A place to feel safe.
But today, I’m just here
Feeling the ache and letting it…be.
Because what else is there to do?
This is life, after all.
And life is exactly what I’ve come here to do.
I am.
And I love.
And everyday
I choose
To be
Me.
Again.
Let this heart I wear
on my sleeve
draw all of its letters in the sand…
not just the ones I think
you
will like me for.
And in that sand, let there be
scribbles of the past, the present,
and the future;
a million perfect letters
tumbling all about my day
teaching me,
quite slowly,
just who it is I am meant to be.
I am no longer searching
for anything, or anyone.
Somehow
I just know.
I’ve found the thing
I never knew I needed to find.
A tiny home at the edge of my sleeve.
The rose began to wither, in
her heart of woven gold,
the ocean melted in her eyes
for stories never told.
The window shone the morning bright,
not once did she look there,
the darkness had become her and
the rose, at last, was bare.
The bluebirds flew about the day,
the air cut like a knife,
and all the while a single rose
lay weeping bloody life.
For no one knew the rose had died
and left a heart of black,
except the girl with ocean eyes;
a train run off the track.
The gardens coloured in the world
so full of joyous spring,
and daisies spread along the path
as death came wandering.
The children danced in rosie rings
while men laughed at the sky,
yet, there she lay upon the bed,
a light about to die.
And as the days became the years
her rose grew back once more,
a rose of black and white, this time;
a life unlike before.
-Brooke Cutler, 2018
Come with me to the land of darling.
A place where night-lights watch over sleeping babes.
A place where laughter skips ’round the edge of the world, looking for a new soul to leap into when the time is right.
The land of darling.
You just never know what magic we’ll find there.
You’d have been there before, I’m sure.
The last time you laughed.
The last time you cried.
The last time you tripped over a boot in the hall…
The very boot you couldn’t find last week.
Darling, hey?
Darling can be so many different things.
Which is why I’m sad to see this day come.
A sweet kiss goodbye to the darling that’s flooded 31 of my days.
It’s been hard. I’m not going to lie.
But I look at all the darling that’s come from it and…
Well.
There aren’t really any words to describe that kind of wonderful.
And so, we come to the final curtain.
The bit where we all hug and giggle, and I say:
It’s been super nice to meet you. Super nice to share the darling of my days.
I wish you a million more darling days of your own.
Because darling happens all the time to those who open their hearts wide enough.
And now you know what darling looks like, how it feels…
I dare you to catch it and fly.
You know you want to.
Lots of love,
xx Brooke
She sits upon the river bank,
Picks daisies one by one,
She peers into the dawning day,
Sighs ‘welcome’ to the sun.
The windy reeds sway in the morn,
Sweet blackbirds hop and play,
A simple hour of darling joy,
One darling day in May.
She sees a shadow on a hill,
The grey of faded light,
But even if the cold creeps near,
She knows she’ll be alright.
She whispers to the universe,
‘Protect my heart, this day,
And I’ll sing you a rainbow sky,
To wash your grey away.’
What if
The darling moon
Fell in love
With the Sun?
Would two lights shine from the black?
Or
Would day-time drift
the lovers into the open
blue
Where they would shine
A single ray
on a hill by the sea.
Never too bright, never
a smudge of char on the
cracked stone.
And
What if
The darling Sun
Fell in love
With
The
Moon?
Last week I was car-less.
Imagine.
A young Mum with things to do. Places to go.
Objects to move from one place to another.
Small children to move from one place…
To another.
What a bother.
And then it struck me.
These legs of mine, these feet—
What marvellous things they are.
This body: flushed with life; me and the pram
Powering up hills, and down. Getting places
No engine necessary.
What a gift.
Finding my feet again gifted me other things, too.
Like time.
Time to feel the papery trunks of nature’s watchmen,
Time to see—spindly leaves, dancing about in the open blue. Time to be
Me.
Free.
What a gift.
But the very best of life on two legs was this:
Extra time with my babies— one and four years old.
Not three minutes together, like the car ride to kinder.
But twenty. Precious. Minutes.
Every day for a week.
All of us wide-eyed, as natures sweetest creations passed us by.
What a gift.
The gift of bother.
brooke-cutler.com 