Exposed I stand.. Soul bared.
You have seen the darkness within.
You have taken my hand and walked through it with me.

Your smile now flickers through this darkness as I relapse again into the chasms. The earnestness in your eyes an anchor for my wandering mind. The sound of your voice, a steady guide to finding relief.

I find myself trusting, clinging to that which I do not understand. My boundaries respected, time granted, my being is freed to finally feel...

To feel the lightness that seems overwhelming. To float, not knowing where it will take me.
To feel your arms around me and your heartbeat against my cheek.
To feel the security of constancy.
To feel known beyond all else,
And despite the knowledges you discovered,
to Love and to feel beloved.

Exposed, the darkness pulls at me, threatens me just to wait for the conceived inevitable, warns me that it will consume you, and that you will soon want to be set free from it. That it will join forces with the darkness within you to hurt and estrange.

Exposed, I will draw from the glimmers in your eyes, the reassurance in your voice, and the strength from your embrace, the steel to forge the weapons necessary to protect you and I from the darkness. To fight and to keep fighting.

My soul bared, I smile at the darkness, because beyond the chasms, lie the moments of light with you. Knowing that hand in hand, I face neither alone.
© "Ny"