I am a creature you can hold in the palms of both hands: soft, vibrating, and so warm. I have whiskers that twitch and I purr. You can’t crush me because I hide in small places, malleable like clay. Plus I’m so quiet that you won’t find me.

I won’t be your drinking buddy or sit on the couch and watch football. I watch the phases of the moon and go for long bicycle rides without a helmet. I bleed and yes, I have children so you’ll never be first. I’ll join a monastery when they grow up, after I buy a Cadillac. I am colorful and my hair is wild, oily and tangled by the wind. I am restless but sometimes I sleep deep in your arms and rise early with the birds. I drink my coffee alone.

I am into your energy as soon as I touch you. My tendrils wrap around all your memories, through scar tissue to extract information. I feel into where you are stuck and can’t let go. I see where you won’t breathe and sometimes the spirits show up. Ghosts are my trusty companions. The jolts of electricity wake you up. Then minutes later you soften into a trance between worlds where you see swirls of color behind your eyelids. You travel back to the lake where you saw your sister for the last time, as she drowned. We cry together, it’s safe here. The unknowable is my terrain.

I spend much of the day in the near dark, in this room with you, with the door shut and flickering light. I don’t intellectualize the work anymore. The inner voice tells me which acupuncture points to use. I learned how to trust even with substantial repercussions. You’ll attribute too much or too little to the needles I use. Plus it’s happening anyway. You are healing, you are dying, and it’s all the same. I am your witness, not your judge. We are going home.