You are tall windows that let in all the light.

When nobody is looking, you are music.

You dance along the fault lines of your life.

This is courage.

Look at you, how it spills from your front door!

Down the path it goes, and out into the world.

Every small moment you can find, you hold holy, in your hands.

And then, you set it free.

It knows your name.

It will find its way back to you.

And when it does, I hope it settles in the curve of your neck—a handful of wonder.

I hope that you let it, that you turn your cheek to feel its softness, feel it choosing you.

You only have one long breath in which to live.

Call yourself brave. Call yourself beautiful.

Use your own voice for this.

It might take a little while to recognise but do it.

Be faithful about this.

You are a wild thing, a free thing, a soft thing with skin that needs touch, that needs love.

It might be easier to look away, to live hungry.

It isn’t.

And what is more, if you are ever tempted to plant a lawn—grass in tidy rows, may every kind of weed find you.

May they nod their yellow heads at all of your plans.

May you see that there are some things that one can do nothing about.

Still, there is beauty.

I hope that tall trees grow all over your life.

And lilacs, brassy and bold.

May their sweetness climb purple all over your walls.

Some people don’t like them, find them cloying—are left breathless by their too muchness.

Imagine that.

Still.

They grow.

They bloom like nobody’s watching.

Imagine that.

May bees come, and caterpillars, and other tiny things that have prophecy in their names.

May they make their home within every failure you will ever own.

And in the evening when you sit alone with all your darkness and all your light, may you be kind to your life, all of it—each sharp corner, every hidden door, may you know it as your own.

As you.

Yours.

And if you ever feel like giving up, I hope a blackbird finds you waiting, settles in your hair.

I hope he sings behind your eyes.

I hope that you believe each note of his song.

I bless you with this.

© Liezel Graham 2021.

Image by Vagelis Lnz on Unsplash.