When the night is darkest, you will
follow me home and I will
extract the shadows from your skin
and carefully patch up the holes.
They will ache for a while, but
you will lie in the sun and forget
that the forest ever swallowed you;
you’ll forget that the path was too dark and
how it almost consumed you;
When the night is darkest, you will
carry a small light inside you
I will nurse it into a blaze;
If you falter, I will cradle your body
I will carry you home;
we are not strangers meeting, but rather odd friends
mending old wounds that
we never inflicted
promising stories never yet told,
dusting off smiles and keepsakes
in the corners that no one could reach,
in the places no one controlled.