All or nothing.
Take it or leave.
Of course, only
all and take it
earn me keys.

It’s clear-cut,
cut and dried,
cutting, cutting crosswise
across my nature.
Close your eyes,
swallow ideology
wholesale.

Conform
and consume
and follow the lead.
Choke back questions.
Ignore contradictions.
Come as you are
if you’re like us.

Such slow exhaustion
living perpetually outside the fold.
Or in it,
but outside myself.

I once was trying,
but now I see

I would never be shaped
into that vessel
or any vessel
at all.
I am not clay,
it turns out.

I am wind
and sunlight

And leaves
budding
unfurling
changing
falling,
nourishing new roots.

I am space for unknowing
and uncertainty.

I am choosing nothing
and leaving
and astonishment at
what blooms.

I am myself and
my questions and
seeing all the contradictions.

I am other possibilities
beyond either/or.