acceptance isn't a room into which you can walk, acceptance is something you build.


the gymnasium is full of white light. it streams through the small squared panes and bleaches the raw interior; the concrete floors, the iron beams, the leftover pipes, the high walls that arch into one another in the center, and the staircase that winds up, up, up. this is your cathedral. a benediction built by heat that grows in the body and radiates out into the cool and hushed room. know this. know this one thing

when the dirt washes away and the root stays
soft and white and tender
when the knuckles scrape and the center twists
and youre going nowhere under high pressure


let down slow. pull the weight off the legs, loosen the feet. pull everything into the arms, then lower. step out of the air, step into your bicycle and ride the sunset home. pant up the stairs and into the kitchen, peel the sweater from your skin and turn on the flame under the kettle while lights glitter on across the berkeley hills out the window.

why oakland, he asks. it's been three weeks, i cannot remember. something about home. a good place to start building. what creux you can drive into the heart of a place, the shape your body hollows out of the potholed streets, the crowded buses, the rattle of the bart on the overpasses, the pattern left after your feet skip through the detritus towards home. the cigarettes in dirty water on the porch, the light through the magnolia...

from greece, she writes. she says she is happy, she send pictures of blue skies, blue seas, white beaches. she's in love, she's in a power struggle: i have trouble being completely happy for her successes, she says. it's always vacation somewhere. rachel calls in tears from toronto. a woman fell after the symphony and died on the sidewalk, while the help balked and shuffled awkwardly.