I want the universe to know I can write about small things.
And by small, I don't mean brain-clot-small, I don't mean prison-cell-small, I don't mean urn-of-ashes-small,
I mean, door-hinge-small.
I could write about door hinges.
I could find a story there. I see beauty there.
One time, a contractor told me that most door hinges don't usually break, they just stop being able to do their job. They warp, they rattle, and - though the hinge mechanism holds- their job is not so simple as that, and so they are retired, dumped in the trash.
If that's feeling like a metaphor for something, I promise you it's not.
It's just a small tale about door hinges. Something I could write about if I were not always distracted by big things.
I would maybe write about how the pieces of a hinge are called things like leaves, and pins, and knuckles. Words that bring to mind a once-broken-always-broken hand, holding a tiny flap of autumn, thinking about how a snapped bone or branch is often part of the plan, part of the let go, part of the try again. Sometimes hinges have a steeple top, too. It's not always so, but sometimes a simple thought like that is a kind of prayer, after all.
A lovely thing about prayers is that they do not need a roof, or shelter, or secret knock.
Prayers are, themselves, a sort of butterfly hinge. The mechanism that swings clear of trims and trapping, and lays you flat open in front of the universe- an autopsy of the past, an accounting of soul.
When I set my heart down on the great scales, I promise:
I can write about small things. Door-hinge small. I could write a hinge so tiny, my whole life could prayer inside of it. I could cocoon my life down to that size without problem, without question. I could butterfly with a wingspan so small I am barely seen, with footsteps so light I leave no mark.If I am given these very large stories only because I can write about them, if I have been typecast from my prior work, please know, please look closely at the inside of my heart and know...
I could write about door hinges, too.
