Next to Cleanliness

P.C. Scheponik

You tell me your brokenness, and I’ll tell you mine. It doesn’t matter who you were with yourself or others. It doesn’t matter how many times.

Damages, being what they are, are never really done. We have a will for “shalt nots,” and a penchant for guilt. Put them together, and you have enough milk spilt to drown in. Be all things as they may, it’s never too late to find your way back to the fields that are always open.

There are wildflowers and goldfinches waiting for you, and don’t forget the groves of trees with their leafy, low-hanging branches and the sun-kissed streams that babble below them, ever ready to sing you their song. Remember the sky, blue and wide enough for every dream you’ve ever had, still open and waiting to gather your thoughts in cloud-filled arms.

The world is always with you, willing to take all the dark things you’ve ever done and wrap them in green, turning your sorrows into a pond of love, letting you bathe in its waters until you are clean.