The Saddest Thing

by Julia Fehrenbacher

I am certain the saddest thing
is stuffing the stuff that makes you most you,
squelching the sorrow until sorrow
makes you sick,

celebrating someone else's shine
while snuffing your own.

Never beginning.
Stopping mid-stride.
Caging the truth.

The saddest thing is holding in the holy
rather than letting it breathe, catch fire—
burn burn burn, a candle in the window
on the darkest dark night.

Imagine if the sun shushed her shine?
If lotus was too afraid to unfold?
If the songbird swallowed his song?

The saddest thing is leaving,
leaving the mud, the soil, the seeds, the sea
of what's here—leaving your own
skin, your own certainty—

leaving yourself out
when you count what is holy.

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Reprinted with permission. Visit Julia Fehrenbacher’s website here.