Axiom: you arrived and every unit of time re-sized.
Given: two hands, a kettle, a room of weather.
To prove: love—solved for the exponents of my heart. Q.E.D.

Open to Page One: Discovery, ink bloom, coffee ring, smudge of jam.
Footnote: the morning was rain-shaped; the window wore stars from your stickers.
Your fist, a conker, I write: specimen of thunder held in velvet.
Habitat: my chest. Range: all hours.
Control notes: when you breathe in, the kettle agrees; when you laugh, the clock forgets itself.
I measure your world in silly units, seven ladybirds from wrist to window,
two sparrow-hops from bedside to brave.
[plucked fiddle echo]
On graph paper, I draw a proof,
the curve goes skyward wherever your name lands.
You yawn; I annotate: soft weather event, localised; probability of wonder = 1.
I copy the sound of your socks on the kitchen lino, shh-ssk, shh-ssk,
and the way your hair argues kindly with the wind.
Margin note: hold gently, not tight; we are custodians, not cages.

What’s fragile isn’t weak,
it’s simply telling us how to touch it.

Hold lightly, keep warm; never hard, never harm.
Hands like pockets of calm in a storm.
Write it down so the heart remembers,
feathers, freckles, rainy Decembers.
If love is a bird, then open your palm,
let it sing, let it land, let it go, stay calm.
This is my field guide to holding,
letters, maps, a lantern unfolding.

Identification: hair the colour of wet oak, eyes—bluebells after rain.
Call: a three-note “Dad?” ascending like a kettle nearly there.
Diet: toast soldiers, crumbs of moonlight, stories with the crusts left on.
Favourite words: nearly, anyway, hello again.

Distribution: windowsills, bus stops, my left shoulder at dusk.
Behaviour: picks wild names for ordinary streets;
renames fear into a pet we can train, “sit, wait, okay, off you pop.”
Control sketch: little boots on a canal path;
I notate the rhythm, tap tap rest, tap tap rest,
and underline the secret: you walk like you’re listening.
I test a theorem: if grief is rain, then love is the coat that doesn’t mind getting soaked.
The numbers behave; the page fogs slightly; a teardrop becomes a lens.
Conclusion: you make even the hard bits gentle by naming them true.

Hold lightly, keep warm; never hard, never harm.
Hands like pockets of calm in a storm.
Write it down so the heart remembers,
feathers, freckles, rainy Decembers.
If love is a bird, then open your palm,
let it sing, let it land, let it go, stay calm.
This is my field guide to holding,
letters, maps, a lantern unfolding.

When it’s small: hold near the heartbeat; count to four.
When it’s loud: make tea; open a door.
When it’s fragile: two hands, wide breath.
When it’s heavy: ask the floor for help—sit, rest.
When it’s leaving: don’t clutch; stay near.
When it’s storming: sing its true name, not its fear.
When it’s silence: place a chair beside it.
When it’s joy: step back, don’t hide it.


Advanced Section: absent phenomena; care protocols for the not-here.
I log the shape you leave, oval of air on the pillow,
steam ghost on the mug, faint moon of a thumbprint on the pane.
I practice holding without keeping:
wrap the memory in breath, not tape;
warm it with song, don’t laminate.
I chart the routes where I still find you—
in hedgerow grammar, in puddles rehearsing the sky,
in the way the village exhales when the bus doors hiss open.
Footnote: when I say your name, the rain stands up straighter.
Lemma: love outlives its evidence.
Therefore (by mornings): the proof re-proves itself,
my heart, exponentiated, still resolves to you.

The rule holds: we never own,
we hold, we learn, we’re loaned.

Hold lightly, keep warm; never hard, never harm.
Hands like pockets of calm in a storm.
Write it down so the heart remembers,
feathers, freckles, rainy Decembers.
If love is a bird, then open your palm,
let it sing, let it land, let it go, stay calm.
This is my field guide to holding,
and i’m still learning.

field guide to holding on

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field guide to holding on

Dancing salamanders