Button-minded

I've gradually, and then suddenly, grown apart from being such a tiny thing. I'm still quiet, still little button-minded, blossoming right out of an open palm. But maybe I'm a touch louder, a touch more upfront, a little heavier too- with open things, with possible things and hopeful things, a shock of mess but a smile to go with it. I think about holding hands a lot of the time, rubbing shoulders, and I help elderly ladies carry their bags onto their buses, chat to them about their grandchildren, and I don't feel lonely when they smile back at me. I think too about dancing, about how I'd like to try it again in the New Year with my girl friend. I've become fresh water running down skin and wettened eyelashes. I don't know if I'll ever be comfortable in my own skin because I haven't felt connected to this body since I stopped feeding it for the first time, and then forgot how to feed it completely. I'm really making it up as I go along, but I do feel some connection to something else- something that isn't my physical self but something like threads, stretching and contracting with every movement I make. And I think of interconnectedness. I think it so strange that now I'm more aware of my little button-self but somehow not so terrified. Somehow established and sinking into a bottle of warm, brightly coloured sand.
I think Ella would be proud of where I am. I miss her more than I can possibly say. I never believed in an afterlife really, but I hope there is one, just so that eventually I can get there and see her again.