When I am Hopeful by Jo Dingle (Theme: When I am Hopeful)

When I am hopeful

I am smooth to the touch words

like the word love spelt in pebbles

on a beach in any weather.

I am that figure

positioning a tide worn part,

a harmony of salt and body

and space between letters

When I am hopeful

I am lifted by the sounds of the sea

carried in song out over the dunes

into the forest of life

I find myself attached

to some ancient umbilical chord

never cut, endlessly entangled

with the world

When I am hopeful I am,

everyone I’ve ever met

every innocent dream

I am tree and rock and river

I believe this serotonin horizon

can rest and lean

into an oxytocin sky

that promises to hold me.