My heart is open and getting softer to
This unruly, textured, tender, layered existence

This isn’t new though

It’s always been a giant beating thing.

It beat for acceptance and praise and approval
As if those things were Love
As if those things sustained anything besides veneers

When my heart beat for anybody but myself
Kids, partners, parents, friends, strangers
It beat so loudly that it drowned out
The sounds of its own losses

This time and space forced me to be so
Unraveled
So broken open
That the only beating my heart did at first felt traitorous

Slowly, slowly when I had no reason to protect myself
No reason to deny my small self anything
Because there was nothing left to grasp for...
My heart turned to itself