the blood, the blood

it was in that instant that my blood ran cold and i stood there gripped and handled with the desire to run and yet i did not run. i sweated blood instead (it’s called hematidrosis) brought on by every thought hard squeezed and pressed on every side of the questions i carried in my pockets. you can’t get blood from stones (let alone turnips) and so let every grain or drop be collected when the moment arrives in its full glory adorned with blood, sweat and tears; unbowed and uncowed, crowing and prancing by the side of the road. it’s like wading through water, though thicker – like blood – and i am afraid to count the cost, afraid of blood money and the many trails it leaves, afraid of the taste it leaves in the mouth – all that bad blood. no blood, no foul you said, and you walked away thinking that wound was a gift, traces of that gift on your hands and underneath your fingernails. and that was that. i am only flesh and blood and bone and skin and words – too many things are too rich for my blood and too meager for yours, or too meager for mine and too rich for yours. how we determine who walks in privilege and who walks in the cold. It’s not enough to say that anger runs in the blood, passes down through the bloodline, generation after generation until regeneration and the new blood. let me find some new words, to heal and not to wound; to fill and not to drain. start walking.