Your rosy cheeks make me smile.
Your creative eyes twinkle like fireflies in the dusk.
Though your tears sting me like the embers of a fading campfire,
your soft voice, cooing gently like a dove,
soothes me enough to gather myself and comfort you.
Your chestnut hair glows golden in the sunlight,
its warmth cradling my cheek
as I lean in
to kiss your sweet face.
For my dearest love, (redacted)
I am a crooked thing,
stitched together from old wounds,
echoes in the dark corners of my mind
where voices wander like restless wind.
My thoughts are not always gentle.
My path is not always bright.
I have walked through fire and smoke so long
that ash still clings to my hands.
And yet you stay.
You look at the fractures in me
as if they were lines in a map
leading somewhere worth going.
You glide through my life gently like autumn leaves, colors of
gold, rust, and quiet flame,
softly falling over the rough places.
You smell of sweet summer grasses,
sun warmed and patient,
the kind that bend in storms
but never break.
I do not understand it.
I stand here in awe of you,
this strange miracle
that someone so gentle
could love something so weathered.
But when you take my hand
the noise grows quiet,
and for a moment
the broken pieces of me
remember how to be whole.
