“I don’t know if anyone could ever love me,” you say.

“Don’t you see how I worship you?” I scream with my thoughts, but you can’t hear me anyway. I debate, asking you, whispering in your ear.

Instead, I am silent, unsure of how to comfort you. I don’t want to tell you that I love you, not yet.

So I close my eyes and trace my fingers along the lines of your jaw, cheeks, nose, and eyebrows.

I touch you like one would handle a porcelain teacup. You could break if I don’t think about keeping my fingers light as I follow the fine craftsmanship all across your back.

I don’t tell you the words of praise and admiration I trace into your back as you crane into my touch. The body absorbs what the mind cannot fathom.

I place kisses on your belly, the back of your leg, and the places that are never loved. When I love, I want to love all of you truly.

“No one has ever touched me like this, so softly,” you say, and right then I want to burst into tears. How dare they! How dare they not treat you like artisan bread, like a mural in an alleyway, like freshly molded pottery before it enters the kiln.

What a crime it is that you have never known what it is like to be held for the sake of holding, to know touch that has no fine print and no malice.

You quiver and shake when I touch you like the novelty of this feeling is too much. I make a joke about how sensitive you are, so maybe for a moment, the reality of why is just a joke instead of reality. And for a moment, you can cope.

You don’t like being looked at in these intimate moments, so I think about how I would describe your eyes in a poem instead. I’ve had ample opportunities for this, and I have come up with the following:

The sky with just the right amount of clouds, the kind of day with a light breeze that makes you want to pick blueberries.

The first drop of rain. It always seems to land on your face, like a kiss from Mother Nature.

The newest flower on an orchid plant, only a bud the day before. It is the same color you want at our wedding. It feels like such a far-off thing to me, a vague concept, but to you, it feels like the Save the Dates have just been sent in the mail.

The rest are a bit much.

—

I remember to massage your toes, the ball of your foot, the arch, the heel. You don't like feet, including your own foot, but I am here to love the parts of yourself that you can't love.

I pray to you in my thoughts that you can feel my love through my thumbs rubbing healing circles into your tense shoulders. That somehow, my actions will help you remember what a divine being you are, a god with amnesia.

What are you the god of? I think, maybe, that you are the god of moments. Humorous glances from across an aisle, Dutch ovens, singing too loud on night car rides, vicious tickle fights that end in sweet kisses, interrupting each other at work, finishing each other's thoughts and sentences, taking my glasses off when I fall asleep with them on, tiny routines that are barely considered routines but are done almost without thinking all the same.

I, for the first time, feel seen by a deity. There is no higher power, no sin. There is no wrong. There is only the reverence I give to you, that is expelled by every cell in my body, that consumes every waking thought.

There is you, and there is me. There is us. And that is enough.

Don't you know I worship you?

they wove me of delicate thread
now years-frayed and blood-stained
and even though my hands are torn
they still pull the needle, pull me back together

The sunshine melts in from the dark.
The summer sunflowers start their  morning yellow glow.
From the dark of nights despair and suffering.
The light of questioning wakes up,
I begin to ask why the pain?

Did I, or do I have the capacity to be optimistic of my will? Over matters of the past?

Shame, denial, self- soothing, trying to escape emotional pain through all varieties of addictive responses to life.

Understanding this new target for my heart, mind, and body gives me optimism of the will while
knowing
there will always be suffering.

I ask myself, what is my capacity? As the light rises in the morning I feel more air to breathe in.
Aware of the air inside of me whether in dark or light, carries some vessel of hope
to help ward off the strength of suffering.

I am not the wave. I am the ocean. The womb. Conceptualize
the possibilities in this morning dry landscape,
before abandonment. Conceptualize having what you need. Ease and compassion enters. Possibilities move through with ease and healing is within reach.

The capacity to heal needs warmth like the morning globe of light.

When you are Loved,
and so deeply cared for;

There is nowhere to run..
  Nowhere to hide

The only thing you can do
(under the warmth of that beautiful Hold)

     Is to slowly unwind..
     Until  you  Become.

It is already in you, Love..
buried behind the horrible Residual.
Remember..?

Within the soon to crumble Wall..

within the Corruptible,
that was so unfairly and horribly
     corrupted

Is the  absolutely Beautiful  in you
that has been  (and always will be)
     Incorruptible
.. preciously-Hidden, behind the wall


"It is Incorruptible..
It cannot undergo Decay"

You are in there, sweet-one
   buried underneath
every horrible part of it all.

      As the wall comes down..
      Love will find you.


   When allowed,
   it always, always does.

Something has been eating me alive
and it's coming from within
when did it truly begin
when did it start eating away
what's the cause of this decay
my insides are in disarray
out of place
some things missing
slowly filling with the void
an empty replacement
fulling with darkness
it won't stop spreading
is it truly from within
or did you infect me
pierce me with your toxin
to slowly eat away
making me useless
so I can't fight your words
your toxic hate
breaking me down
piece by piece
destroying who I was
and what I could be
but your gone
I have begun to heal
but it's hard to replace what you've taken
what you destroyed
sometimes I can still taste your poison
I know ill never forget
what you did
the pain I felt
but I can be better
I WILL be better
I can make it out alive
I can heal
no matter how hard you tried
I'm still alive

Heartstrings frayed and  
weathered.

Scarred, and afraid
to weather the storms.

But to heal,  
you know you’ve got to swim
to better days ahead.

All you can do
is all you can,

A push comes to
shove,  

and within time,
the feeling of
love

saves you from  
being buried within.

I used to see
the world in  
black and white

Always thinking of  
the best or the worst,
falling apart.

But here I am, surviving  
and I'm hoping to save myself
first.

Always followed
by my footsteps,

I’m haunted by a
never-ending dream
that puts reality to the test.

Haunted by the ghost of a
past state  

I hope to never
become again.

I’ve hit my lowest  
of lows, and all I  

Need is some reassurance,
that everything will be  
more than fine

Because I don’t  
want to fall apart
anymore.

I used to see
the world in
black and white.

Always thinking of  
the best or worst,

But lately, it feels
I was handed a lifeline

and my world suddenly
opened

When I met you.

I used to see
the world
in black and white

But together,
we'll color the world,
one hopeful brush at a time.

it's a bittersweet
moment, to leave a
page in the making

a hopeful, beautiful
story

filled with
confessions
and life's lessons.

haunted by a
tragic story
from the beginning,
to the midsummer's
end.

you caught me
right at the moment
when i felt
a little less than.

there's weight in
these lines,
and sometimes
it's hard
to take in.

the words,
just out of focus,
but clear in my
head.

it's a bittersweet
moment,
to leave a page
in the making.

i can't wait
to see you
again.