To walk again.
To watch tendons strain under weak skin.
To buy expensive, sour-smelling supplements even though they are a blatant scam.
To ignore the sky.
To eat boiled eggs without removing their yellow sun yolks first.
To hide under a pair of hands.
To schedule a daily scream on a virtual calendar.
To reach down unconsciously every few minutes towards the ground.
To list to the right side.
To walk like a toddler with mud-streaked bare feet on clean tile.
To watch decades of muscle disappear.
To buy into empty aphorisms, to repeat “time heals all wounds” and “this, too, shall pass”.
To ignore dental hygiene and the ever-present beating of a jittery heart.
To eat ice cubes that taste only of aluminum and plastic, to eat them like they are a full meal.
To schedule time to watch trash reality TV at night but then continue to watch fake love bloom until the sun comes up.
To reach toward someone else but fall short.
To list groceries for someone else to carry.
To walk once spring has urged the magnolia petals onto the grass.
To watch pity burn and ebb in tightened lips and brows.
To buy pink pain relief.
To ignore people that matter.
To eat eggs for every meal.
To hide from the light like some creature in the deep ocean.
To schedule a dentist appointment after flossing bleeding gums.
To reach an agreement with uncomfortable silence.
To list places that can be discovered only while walking.