And Yet

There’s a canyon under the road I travel
Always waiting, unseen
I, unaware as the bridge swayed to break 
And under me lured a truth
Something there, I felt
But its steep cliffs fall question
Once slipped, curiosity turned commitment

I saw it once
The glow of something so pure and relatable
It was there when I wiped the dust from my eyes
And I let myself approach it at the bottom of the canyon
As if I could cup it in my hand and call it mine.

Only a few inches away a stream trickled
Harmless
I tried to step over it
I tried to bypass the clear water
Clear water I am still straining to see through in its muck
With branches and debris I became in part of crashing surge
And I was hit with them 

Until sight was snapped away from the simplicity of shimmering truth 
My mind drowned in it
Weighed down by dripping bricks
Made of the same uncertainty I started to listen to
Is there even a real truth and was that one mine?

It drowned the last pure oxygen 
I was looking up when it covered the sky

And there was a lake
At the bottom of a cliff with 
Me nowhere to be seen

Not that there was anyone to see
Impossible, it seemed, to ever reach back up to be a standing past above the canyon
And just walk away
And yet, no matter how deep I searched 

Or how many handfuls of sand I kept grasping to look through, hoping that truth was there
None of them felt quite right 
I saw acceptance reaching down into sun rays that glinted hopefully off of my tears
But I didn’t know what to illuminate in them

I do not see the me that people assume
Just lost in doubt 
Of the seconds seem to pass
Waiting to find a definition
A purpose
I feel me maybe
Never am I truly me
 
There’s secrets I’ve concealed from others 
And now my realities have even backed away from my own ears

What I hear 
Is an empty canyon echoing 
I can still walk on with my path and hear it
There
But I don't need to know the words yet
As long as I know there's that canyon that needs to be added to my map 
Part of me