I would like to come and sit next to your pain

and you to mine.

Let’s cradle it, here together

on this soft couch in this big house with this lady with kind eyes

She knows our grief without telling hers

sitting here, in a room full of our stories

Her short sentences telling us there is somewhere to get to from here.

Let’s whisper it, here to each other

Between sobs, choked in the center of the throat, through the blank stare of shock

So that only we and God can hear. Give Him a moment’s rest from our pleading.

And us, too.

Sit here with me, together

Let’s look at each other, stare and marvel with wide eyes

the million broken shards, some blunt some sharp some splintered

one human to the other: “What has become of you, stranger?”

Let’s paste each other back together. You do some, I do some.

It’s not going to be perfect but

It’s going to be.

Let’s sit here together next to our pain.

Let’s cradle it in the ache of a mother’s arms.

Let’s whisper it so only we and God can hear.