You say I don't have to worry.
When we were laughing, happy,
And I said, "I'm trusting you."
I meant in all things.
When I sealed it with a kiss,
I meant
I am trusting you.
Trusting you the way I have only ever trusted
One other person.
One other,
Who dragged me through hell and repented,
Whose every ugliness and cruelty I saw and accepted,
Who I know better than I know myself.
It took that to trust her,
It took seeing every corner of her for me to give her
What I am handing you right now.
You are still shrouded in secrets, in uncertainty.
I've not seen your darkness, only heard that maybe it exists.
In so many ways
I don't know you.
But looking into your eyes
I trusted you
And I trust you
And here,
Here you go:
Here is every night I lay awake, my stomach twisting in knots,
Fearing that you'll forget me.
Here is every morning I wake up
And try not to bother you too soon into the day,
Fighting the irrational panic that if I don't hear that you exist
You'll have been only a dream.
Here is every midnight I will spend wandering in the cold
Looking for ghosts of us together in the dark
Wondering what you are doing halfway around the world under the same moon that paints the snow silver here.
Here is every doubt I have.
I trust you.
Here is my faith.
It is never given lightly.
But I love you.
And since I do,
I have the choices:
Trust you
Or don't.
I will love you either way.
I will fear you either way,
And what this trust means is that
I have found a new kind of courage.
When I am sad, or scared,
When my day has raked me over the coals,
When I am forced to my knees, and have to get up all alone,
I will allow the thought of you
To comfort me.
I will let you in
In my darkest hours
And let the light that fills up every inch of me when you touch me
Return without you
And warm me.
You may never know what this means from me-
You've not seen me guard myself like a fortress for eighteen years.
You've not seen me refuse to let anything comfort me
In fear that if I rely upon it
I will lose it and be unable to survive.
You've not seen me suffer silently, grimly, stubbornly
For months
Just so I will have done all the getting-up
Myself.
This trust, this faith,
This is the most precious thing I have.
And I gave it to you,
Laughing.