Each salty drop

In your cringe

and bite

following another’s ignorant words,

pain.

Not the pain of a current slash of the knife

but of a gash inflicted long before self and other

stepped far enough apart to decide, even,

if they wanted to dance.

Knowing requires time, 

recognition of habit a road winding into distant hills-

the shape your tears will mimic.

May strength and a giggle well up

along with each salty drop.

In warm dark

Older even than yesterday,

not by loss or separation but

through integration.

Finding one’s bones calls together pieces

held apart

by the paralysis of stories requesting endings.

When settled back into bones,

whole now,

a new story begins.

Fire and Wind,

Light and Shadow,

Earth and Water,

the pairs learn

where to weave their edges-

fingers finding each other in warm dark.

This is full movement,

empowerment,

the invitation of Being.

For that,

there are no words.

You call my name

You call my name

when I go to that place I don’t understand,

the one where the word for terror was unknown.

Your firm, tender voice reaches in,

helps pull me out

of history that feels like a drowning.

Reclamation becomes devotion.

New birds continue to perch on the tree,

a proof the threatening waters

did not claim me.

When you call, I return 

from somewhere losing its strength

to possess.

Difficult to say,

but I couldn’t do this alone.

I hear you call,

Thank you.