…from the denim fade at morning’s rise, the screech owl’s serrated cry severs the horizon.

Dawn charges.

Her ritual rise, reigniting embers from the depths of Hell, illuminating the sky in gilded light.

I sit within the aura of Gaia, silent in my physical, silent in my breath, my mind imploding with thought.

…I have a student who gets bullied daily, 3:30pm yesterday, he came to me and leveled me with the words, “I want to die. I’m ready to kill myself.” The maternal took up with a rage, the empath crushed by the weight of his hopelessness, the nurturer set forth to aid.

I get told daily, never bring work home, but a child isn’t work, an inanimate thing, nor their pain easily dropped and forgotten.

The morning flares, as my thoughts cycle, the unhealthy cycle, the opalescent light guiding my hands, into prayer, into meditation…I think upon the lotus, the heron, and sight…I silence my mind, I fuel my fight…

E.A. O'Connell. November 2018