Even though it’s cold here
It feels like summer
When you laugh.

I think sunlight must be running through my veins
I feel like honey and wine
I feel the way I used to feel
In the mountains
In the bright warmth
Air so pure it made you dizzy
And the sky like a blue blanket
Soft and inviting.
Being with you
Laughing with you
Feels like sitting on the porch during a heavy rainstorm
Watching the chaos
And breathing in the scent of damp wood and stone
Safe from the cold and the wet
Clutching a cup of hot chocolate.
Being with you feels like
Lying on a foreign beach
Under a cloudless sky
And fearlessly letting the sun kiss my skin
Mind hazy with heat and contentment
Hair made wild by the water and sand.
I haven’t felt safe much
In my life
I haven’t felt whole
But I feel it with you.
I feel like I belong here when I’m with you.
So often I am an observer, a bystander, someone who records
Beautifully
The world
But cannot be in it
And cannot be touched by it.
When you touch me I remember all the times I’ve ever felt real
All the times I’ve been truly reached by anything.
If there is a home for me anywhere on earth
It is this feeling
And it lights me up from the inside,
Rolling off me in waves
My joy to live
My joy to be
It’s back, it’s here,
And while it stays, I bask in it like healing sunlight.

I wait for you
Like a tree waiting for the rain
Like a seed beneath snow
Like the birds wait for dawn
Like the wolves wait for moonrise.

I wait for you
Like a breath held
Like an unfinished thought
Like a step almost taken
Like a dissonant chord.

I wait for you
Like sustenance
Like peace
Like salvation
Like an answered prayer.

I wait for you
Like a tree waiting for the rain.

Of course it’s work-
People say that word like it means
Pain
But
I am not suffering.
I’m building something-
It is holy work
It is the only sacred thing,
The only war
Worth fighting.
The only oath
Worth keeping.
The only sacrifice
Worth making.
I have been pure and whole
But I have not been meek.
Why pledge yourself to a god whose only promise
Is that he will never touch you?
If you’re going to take vows,
Give yourself to skin
Give yourself to joy
Give yourself
To love
And **** the rest.
If you’re going to belong to someone
Belong to them with your whole being
Every little corner.
I vow to chase this feeling until I can’t run anymore.
I vow never to be satisfied.
I vow dignity through pain.
I vow courage in the face of defeat.
I vow sweetness when spite would taste better.
I vow to do my own
Sacred work
And if I pray it won’t be on my knees
But with my lips pressed to the forehead of someone
Whose eyes I want to drown in.
I vow to keep reaching for this world
Until my hands are too scarred to feel
And if I choose to worship anything or anyone
I want that faith to leave a mark.
I want it to burn.
I want it to pierce me to the core
And leave me new.

I would probably forgive you
For anything
And I know I should be afraid of that
But instead I’m just glad.