Thursdays were my favorite days
Since I was in middle school I claimed them
The start of the end of the week
But also, I liked the shape of the word
The weight of it
I’m running after work
And my audiobook reads “effortlessly”
I snap to attention mid-stride and smile, as I always do
My favorite word for a decade now
It takes me back to a line in a scene in an unfinished story
I used the word “pretty” in a poem in high school
The teacher challenged me to pick something more descriptive
But I liked its simplicity, its subjectivity
The pretty hopes that stitched me together
Every time I ripped myself apart
All my cells have been replaced
And all my skin has grown anew
Yet I am still the girl who tears her cuticles
And gets stuck in the quiet places
— dawdling in the shower
Or stretched out on the carpet
Instead of stretching
I guess I think it’s a minor miracle
In these years after I burned down the house
And remade and will remake myself
That these little things are fireproof
A day of the week
A couple of words
But the truth is the deeper I dig
The more that I find
Like golden eggs hidden in the ashes
And I wonder if I burned down the house at all
When my home was always in the foundation
In the goddamn roots
With Love,
Natalie