Chicken Littleitis, Severe

Have you heard?
The sky is falling.
Unpack the suitcase
said the little bird
parked in the nest
behind my eyes,
and she was chirping like mad.
The voice,
so like my mother’s
when she wanted to tell me something
was going to be too hard
or I was too small.
Don’t leave she would say.
Today the voice said
you are not to take
that trip to the high road,
you’re too small,
too tall,
too young,
too old,
too thin,
too fat —
whatever it is,
you are it
or have it.
Stay here, so you
and I can have tea for two.
I did what you’re doing, she chirped.
I left when I was your age
and my life has never
been the same.
Was it all bad
I asked?
It couldn’t be I said,
because here I am and look
at our house
and your fur coat
and all those hats with veils.
Pay attention to your dreams
I heard that voice whisper.
Was it crying?
Don’t stay inside the lines
like I did, the voice, went on.
Find open skies.
Buy big kites and fly.
Follow the gypsy path,
the river, deep and wide,
like that that Huckleberry Finn boy.
Stay on the roads less traveled,
talk to the people who make you cry
and laugh,
learn a bit of this and that,
and see if you can find
that which makes your heart
beat faster and your smile bigger.
Don’t go where people tell you to go
unless you feel that heartbeat rise
and your breath flows easily,
like when you sleep. A perfect fit.
There’s always time for a “this” – a hat-
or a “that”- a fur coat.
Or there isn’t.
Go where dreams take you.
What you will miss
may be there, or not,
whether you are or not.
Leap. Fly. Fall. Dance.
You will always find
bandages.
Make peace with loss;
accept either/or;
take “and” and hold it up to a mirror
next to “maybe”.
Stay connected
to your heart.
Always find the sky.
Check to see if it’s falling,
or whether that problem
is in someone else’s yard.
Fly kites so you keep looking up.
Laugh, if only to and with yourself.
If someone looks at you,
like you’re strange,
just smile and say:
Thank you.