A MESS OF LIFE

Sometimes you just make a mess of life
There's no getting around it.
Sometimes, your best efforts at easy
or letting go or believing the words
flowing no matter what the eyes see
just leave you breathless,
unable to make sense of it, so you make...
a mess.

I'm not sure how you clean up
some messes... I mean yesterday, it was as easy
as remove the sheets and throw them in the washer
and when they weren't clean through the first cycle,
rinse and repeat.

I've been on repeat wash of my heart for
some years now... messes made and made
again; and always, there's someone bearing witness
to it and claiming they never would have
made that particular mess.

Does it matter to you what "mess" it is...
whether of the heart or the soul;
the clothes or the house, or a relationship
that can't seem to find the same page
even when there's only one in the book?
Does it matter to you that even
with the residue on my hands and my
knowing how dirty it all looks, it feels...
I am committed to cleaning it up... again?

I keep making a mess of life
And when I think I've learned the lesson,
a test comes to show me again...
"clean" depends on a chance to
keep trying, to a washing machine,
to a heart open to "one more time."

May 6, 2015
©  Valerie Bridgeman