Kaleidoscopes

Some people's lives play like broken records.
The grooves are carved into our skin like scars so they can
play and replay and
play and replay like
the grooves of scars that are carved into our skin, there are
some people whose lives play like broken records.

We've all seen this story before. 
We can read it with our fingertips like
Braille is our native language and we were born with the gift of in-sight
we need only look
to read all about it.

And, I'll admit:
there are days I only believe her because she asks me to.
She won't always do it with her words, but she asks me with her eyes
and the slump of her shoulders
and the way her son holds my hand
or wraps his arms around my neck,
or the way her husband shrugs and looks at his feet
in a gesture of resilience living as shame refusing to name itself.
They open their hearts like sunsets inside kaleidoscopes:
fractured, repeating patterns of glass
reflecting the reflection of the reflection of the reflection of
the world around them.

We are all so broken.
So human in the way we touch one another,
and in the ways we don't, and the ways we can't,
so I don't want to save the world:
I want only to read words like reflections
are my native language, but there are days
when I only believe her because she asks me to and
some people's lives play like broken records.
The grooves run track marks like glass through skin
fracturing the reflection because
we live a resilience that refuses to name itself and
no one cares to notice
there is beauty in the repetition.

And, I'll admit: my record
is scratched and broken.
She sometimes calls me "Doctor," sometimes "Hon,"
occasionally "Love,"
and I just go with it because we both know:
sometimes she has more answers than me,
and schooling doesn't always equal education,
and I know I'm supposed to like when she calls me "doctor" best,
but believe me when I say that some days, it doesn't feel like a compliment, but a scratch
that disrupts our developing melody
so I like it when she calls me "Love"
because that's all I've ever wanted to be.

When they ask me, I give them every cell that looks like belief, but
I don't know if I believe in god.
Some days, it seems that human-kind
-where kind is questionable -
might have a better track record,
so I turn up the volume on the broken records.
We play our songs loud as we spin through space,
our tears punctuating the night with stars like exclamation points
blaming or praising or trying to find the holy we all want to believe is existing
somewhere beyond our fingertips.

We are all so broken,
so kaleidoscopic
in the ways we shatter.