Flames rise and fall within

and many cannot see.

We feel innately; we know without knowing,

but it’s so hard to resist the fear,

to let ourselves become what we can be.

A fragmented fragility, like skin wrapped too tight and thin,

was caught in

whirlpool ravagings and battered sharp on

jutting, giant, granite faces-

and we sometimes wanted to let go,

so tired of life breaking our hearts,

so sick of holding against a looming and terrible emptiness.

But there was no letting go.

In fact, nothing could have ever swept us away.

Now a door sits,

beckoning from a distance too vast to contain,

Seems too small to squeeze our massive beings through.

What of ourselves will be lost when we go?

We think we must cut off some parts less vital or

reduce what we are, shrink so that we can fit…

Or, the door looms too large and

we couldn’t possibly fill the black space left in its absence

once it opens-

like we didn’t already swell so large the world could hardly contain us

like we hadn’t been looking for a door our whole lives

like we hadn’t kept dreaming even while awake

like we hadn’t already healed from innumerable heartbreaks

like we forgot that all we believe is all there is, all there can be

like there wasn’t someone waiting for us on the other side

like we were alone our whole lives…

and we have been.

We’ve felt the massive chasm of space that lies between us and every other person

the lack of ourselves reflected back at us.

But chance throws us.

We couldn’t even see it coming.

Life laughed and hurled us into one another-

fate or time or God knew it was too hard to go alone,

and so we didn’t let go of the rock

we didn’t get rushed beneath the torrents of fury, like flames flowing cold,

we weren’t trapped in a dark space aeons ago, outside of everything,

we looked up, saw an escape, were freed, were not alone-

And so the door is waiting.

terrifying.

And everywhere else, the world will go on, so easy to let things stay.

But eternity is beckoning beyond that door

and we are not too small, we are not too big, we cannot go astray

because we are led.