Coming Slowly to Love
Met, but not fully felt, for the fear in the body
is much greater than the space in the heart
to let His love in too much, risking what I most fear.
Worried, as I had learned from earliest
memories of loss, that saying ‘yes’
would conjure disappearance once again.
Thinking now of all the ways my fear,
(yours too perhaps) of love and loss has
held my hardness fast, my face immobile.
Father-love, brother-love, son-love
all tenuous since tied to their own fears,
misunderstood yet claimed as my own.
Husband-love with hidden needs, desires
unmet, a matched set in union, yet divergent
in truths and lies, doomed to silence ever.
Proof everywhere of weakness in mind and eye
to read nuances—a glance, a posture, a breath—
even words from throats and lips cannot be true.
For so long my heart, anxious and afraid, has closed.
For too long thoughts have been my chosen Queen.
For how long can this aged heart wait to fill, at last?
Looking to the horizon of my life now beckoning
seeing at last my ever-fallible ego might yet win.
There is nothing left to lose, and tides of time are upon me.
‘Welcome travail, terror, longing and love’ says the heart.
This began late in 2022, during a 5 day retreat with two close men friends. Exploring together intimacy, shared meditation with journaling, then sharing poetry, and psilocybin plant medicine together, a hidden voice opened. I completed it (for now) on 2.14.2023. This site, new to me, came my way at end of day and seemed exactly where I should share it...so publicly it frightens me. © Judy L. Todd 2023
