black and white

How do I paint the sky for you 

In words of black and white

How do I describe my dad to you

Or the way the trees play with the light

I trace your hands along my scar

But you don’t know how it feels

You don’t feel the leather seats in my car

Or my burnt skin after the sun when it peels

Do you hear the supper bell clang

Do you know the woods where we roam 

Do you remember how the crickets sang

Or the sound of the gravel coming home

I try to do my best to paint

These pictures in black and white

You smile and nod but it ain’t

The same–it’s all just black and white

you touch me

You touch me

    –What?
You lay your hands on my body
    –No.

My body is vulnerable
Weak, open
Too open

My body is sexual
And I can't

Stop it

My body is an object
To be used
By the hands laid on it

It is not safe

    –But you are safe.

Your hands, my God

    –They are safe.

Your hands are gentle

Healing

Not intrusive

Your hands,

They hold me

They are only good intentions

You know me. My body. Its scars. Its openness, vulnerability, beauty, sexuality, physicality, spirituality, trauma, insecurity, its comforts and discomforts. You know the darkness, the brokenness, bruises beneath the surface. 

    –Ow, it's still sore there. 

You know. You know the dirt beneath my nails.

    –Is it dirt? I don't remember.

You know the lies that have shaded my eyes, sealed my lips shut.

You know this body. You formed this body of death. You loved this body of death, this house to a soul. You died to redeem it. You laid your hands on me in the grave. I am not clean. I am dirty and it's ugly here and I don't know how to talk about it. You came to me in the dark when I was weak, defensive. I did not know who you were. 

I only knew gentle hands that didn't rip me open, did not tear me down. You do not ask where it hurts. You know all my bruises.

You wore my death in your own body on a tree in your flesh. It rose up in your throat from your lungs, stealing your breath, suffocating you. Yes– you know my shame. You drank it whole. You stole it away from me.

My body is flesh and bones and dust and divine touch

And you lay your hands on this dirt

And make me come alive in your arms

You take me into your house of healing and you touch everywhere it hurts

And I am not afraid

You take the hurt over and over 

I did not know you were taking it 

yourself in through your fingertips 

on my skin

You trade me 

Life for death

Life for death

Life for death

Until it's all that's left

In this body of death

to be seen

He holds me in His strong arms
He wipes my dirty face with His dirty hands,
Rough scarred and gentle

He looks at me
And I am terrified of being seen

He looks at me
And I cannot understand
How absolutely satisfied He is with me

He loves my mind,
The way my hair falls when I wake up
The way I tap my foot when I’m alone

He takes joy and pride in his work in me
That I am who I am, formed in his own mind and heart,
Utterly His own, in His own likeness

He delights Himself in me
In me?
In me

If He is perfect and
He is content with me
He is overjoyed that I am His daughter
He is excited that I am coming home
He is attentive to me and my cries and anger and lostness and joys and laughter and all that makes my aching heart beat faster

If I am His love
And He is mine

Then I can be at rest
In His arms–
In the darkness and the light

I am on my way home
I am coming home to You