The story of this heart is that it was born beating in shadow. Eventually the shadow resolved in darkness. This heart was a bleeding wound I learned to wall to keep the daggers out. Bricks, mud, plaster. I keep the walls clean. Fear sterilizes hope. It's easier to wall off the door than to install additional locks, to know, even though I swallowed them all, there are keys.

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This heart is forever trying to escape. Even now it tries to shake the walls down and pulse through my thumb into freedom. Hush, tender heart. There is pain waiting on the other side of your bricked up passages.Stay still. Stay quiet.

But there is you, and my heart won't stop reaching. Quiet, I say. No, I tell myself. But there is you and I am reaching and you are pulling away and the walls are crumbling the way this heart grates at them trying to shake free. I want you. To be wanted by you. For our hearts to touch, see if yours relights my glow.

This heart is a fool. Noisy, belligerent, scarred. It longs to be uncaged. It seeks no permission. I spend my days spackling the cracks, reinforcing the barriers between me and your mercy. I know you aren't ready. Neither am I.

Then there was you

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