blurt it out

the fear you have been holding like a sword
across your chest
which has been shimmering and shaking in your hands
since last saturday

“I fear I will be broken”
you text

but the truth has already spoken itself from your lips
the blade has been removed from the scabbard
that keeps you from me, me from you, you from your own liberation

you don’t know it
but I cried last night
treasuring the stories you poured straight into my heart

… the ways you both love and hate them
… the ways you have walked into the fires of lust and compassion
… the ways you were careening toward grace even from the pit of the well

“A day without going backward is a day going forward”
you say

You
You whom the world rejects
You who invites the poor to stay with you for a year or so

while you take the couch

You know something; you are someone
I need

every day
spin me into the dance of the
barefoot, abandoned, unshaven
who know what it is to be damaged
and who want to be whole

it is there I find some peace