I’ve been naive,
I’ve let you pretend to leave.

your footprints on my back,
your hands around my neck.
insidious, nagging, affection-less,
touch-craving little me.

I’ve been worn down,
pierced in private longings,
secret places,
there inside my deepest heart,
my deepest holding,
my most sacred cradling places.

how many times?
two times two,
time tables,
turning around back to you
will I begin to see?
will I be able
to reconcile with me?
to ward off lonely lagging leeches
like you,
like feathers drifting by
in a dusty, sticky sky.

naivety was my gravity,
not knowing,
-my sanity.

now I ask,
in full sunlight,
blue sky as my witness,
which is a graver danger?
you no longer hold
the dagger.

and still I walk trembling in my feet
one step:
steadying in defiant dignity,
two steps:
an angel’s voice to heal me.

I can hold up the glass,
see foreground,
see the past,
all’s perspective,
all is what I decide now,
what I ask,
what I intend and what I allow.

~Lana Maree Haas