Forgiving

This deep deep truth
a rooted knowing
that to pray for you
would free me

to pray for you
would stop opening this old wound
again and again
would take the sting from my memories
would break chains
and allow me to really breathe again

because in my spiritual life
I am holding my breath
unable to really move forward
choking on the pain and the hurt
and the loss and the anger

all vines, wound too tight
around my heart
a constant string around my finger
a reminder to forgive you
to let you go from this cage
where I have locked you up
for hurting me
and paced in front of it
for what feels like decades

nothing good
comes from holding you there
because sadly
it holds ME there
so I end up dwelling in a place I never wanted
lurking in a past that keeps me hurting...wallowing

like trying to hold a crow
that keeps pecking your hand
why would you let it make wounds
when you could release it?

Oh wretched heart
that doesn't know what to do
that doesn't know how to let go

God knows how
and He is urging me now
to start with one prayer
and then say another
and then one day
I'll be freed from being held under
a curse I allowed
while I held onto hate
an emotion to me so foreign
so binding
and so crippling

to let go
to move past
to allow it to wash over me
and then settle at my feet
so I can step aside from it
and walk on down the beach

Those prayers keep washing
one layer at a time
exposing layer after layer
and reclaiming
all
that once
was mine.

~C