So subtly is the fume of life designed,
To clarify the pulse and cloud the mind,
And leave me once again undone, possessed.

From, “I, Being born a Woman and Distressed (Sonnet XLI)” by Edna St. Vincent Millay

I am often possessed. Possessed of emotion. Possessed of senses. Possessed of fire. Possessed of extremes. I embrace my possession as part of who I am and who I am not yet. I celebrate my possession as part of my connection to myself and the world. I understand my possession as part of falling apart and coming back together, the ebb and flow. My tide. I understand my possession as a passion that is the very fuel of life. I shift my possession from something I judge and try to shed — something that isolates me from others — to something that allows me to fully love. My possession, in that sense, becomes an anchor in a rough sea, a guide star in a night sky, a butterfly in a cocoon. It is bigger than age, gender, sexuality, or even ability.

I want to say a few words about the importance of coming undone. Feeling things fully and completely. Crying from the tips of your toes, the place that feels ground. Screaming from your finger nails, the place that can throw fire. Breathing from deep in your belly, the place that knows truth and light. Those places must be lived and explored, if we are to make sense of beauty and pain. Those places must be protected and remain safe. It is in coming undone that we come together. It is in our brokenness that we become whole.

I want to say a few things about being undone and possessed right now, at this point in my life, during these times. Right now, uncertainty is certain and impermanence is permanent. Right now, the ground moves between quicksand and earth. In a wobbly world we seek find peace. We seek to see right and hear truth. We seek to love and be loved. Being undone and possessed are consequences of being in the arena. A consequence of being awake and alive. It all feels normal. (If I believed in normal.) Losing ourselves to something. Anything.