After the darkness, we rise

Gentle, my soul.

Light kisses the earth

and again,

we are here,

pulsing

breathing

chasing

dreaming

hoping

bleeding

feeling forward one soft step at a time.

Each step smooths the masks away,

softens faces shaped by fear.

In the empty spaces rise comfort and restitution

with the hopeful echoes of lifetimes

spent rising and falling with the tide.

When the light sinks out of view,

the darkness becomes fertile.

The wet warm earth of all that buries us

cracks our shells in two.

We are left soft and bare,

exposed to the microbiome of metamorphosis

and the light reaches down to find us

to let us know

there is another way through.