on the flood

Something strange happens when you really cry for the first time in years. You can feel the ghosts of all the stupid boy-crazed, skinned knee, dead rabbit, friend-fight tears stuck to your cheeks like a pair of wet jeans. Those tears felt real enough at the time, but were only cracks in the dam that holds the lake behind  your eyes. When the dam breaks, the lake spills so fast and strong that it misses your face completely, dropping straight to the valley of your chest and into the basin of your belly button. The pressure from the dam shakes your entire body and the only stillness lies in the milliseconds between rapid heartbeats. When you don't really cry for years, the lake grows, and the spill can make you wish you had built an arc. But when the water stops flowing, there is a sense of cleanliness, like the dust the accumulated on the backs of your eyes has been washed away. It will take time to adjust to the clean lens, and you might not see a rainbow with every salty blink, but it's a start.