Roses
3/16/26
Months ago I lay in my own bed,
praying I’d never wake up again…
Days ago, I lay on a gurney — too scared to fall asleep —
praying that I still could…
Wondering if I’d ever share another smile with a stranger,
or laughter with a loved one.
The dichotomy of solace and depression turned to juxtaposition;
I struggled to fathom how my longing for death and fear of it
could suddenly converge.
At this impasse, longing gently bowed before fear,
and motioned toward the road ahead,
“Perhaps if you embrace yourself, you’ll find equanimity along the path.”
When I traded the Rocky Mountains for the Concrete Jungle,
turbulence overcame serenity.
Somehow in a city of millions —
with friends and family at every corner —
I felt more isolated than when I’d wander
from pasture to peak, completely alone.
Maybe that serenity I found in silence
hadn’t been tested amongst overwhelming noise.
Even though I’d grown up minutes away from that noise,
as I adjusted to living inside of it, its currents suddenly felt unfamiliar.
I lost myself — just as I thought I’d found myself —
drowning in them.
Just as my mind finally learned to match their pace,
my body shut down.
Just as the seeds I’d planted bloomed into their beauty,
their petals began to wilt.
Now I’m enamored with a lingering question,
Do blooming roses ever find themselves longing for death
amidst the uncertainty of storms,
or do they embrace the fear of death
to savor every living moment?
It seems God placed me at death’s door to remind me:
to savor every living moment,
to stop and smell the roses.
It’s been a while since I’ve posted. I can’t blame that only on the predicament I found myself in over the last few weeks, since it largely stems from the same problem I described in my last post — setting my standards too high & overthinking, ultimately crushing my desire to write.
That being said, I’ve been bouncing from near-death to near-death, grappling with the stability of my youth and the fragility of mortality amidst a barrage of medications and life-saving emergency procedures.
For the first time since I ended up with these pulmonary and subclavian embolisms, I decided to take a walk in the park and write in my notebook. I feel like a few muses had planted the poem I’ve shared above into my head after the first trip to the hospital, but something about the idea felt like it hadn’t matured enough to write down.
As I found myself back at yet another hospital over the weekend — in a far worse condition than the first time — the motifs and imagery I’d been juggling in my head finally had enough time to marinate and grow.
It’s interesting how much my meditation practice and recent triumph over depression have made it easier to deal with the circumstances I find myself in. In spite of all the chaos, I don’t think a smile has ever left my face for longer than a few seconds, even in the darkest moments.
Hundreds of people have asked me how I’m feeling, and my response remains the same each time:
“Physically, up and down, but my spirits are high.”
Now more than ever it’s clear to me that life is just an endless series of peaks and pauses.