Secrets

="Secrets"=

by Savannah Massingill
I can't always find the light that everyone else seems to grasp in their hands.

I can't always swim with the sea of happy floating faces.

Sometimes there's a glimmer of light, of someone pulling me

from the depths. But they let go, I sink again and the lights fade.

Everyone else seems to run through fields of irises and chrysanthemums.

I tread through the treacherous thorns of the dog rose.

I create a crown of laburnums and verbena that pins itself to my head.

Still I smile, Pan-Am. I joke and pretend.

I try to be like them. I tie balloons to myself to float. I gently hold the fireflies in my palms.

But still the light does not stay. The balloons burst. I fall.

I want to stop trying to find my light, and let it find me.