Seeking Grace

That longago night of charged darkness when I said to you I want to touch you touching me and your darting tongue retreated into a slumped body with no hands and your eyes became opaque and wet, it was the god in you I wanted to touch the god in me.

It was your faith I needed to borrow that night that longago electric blend of body, mind and soul. I needed your fingers mixing earth and spit rubbing clumps of clay into blindspots, there was so much heated truth dark and warm and light that evening and other days, so many unedited miracles had already taken place or so I thought.

Was I asking for too much, for more than your hands could hold? Was the reach across that table beyond your grasp? Perhaps, I should have silently touched the hem of your pants when your back was turned taken your virtue by surprise and walked away filled with the spirit.

But that is now hindsight I have withdrawn and you ask why. I have detached, not withdrawn, to shed the skin that scared your touch away that startled you and me a skin that remembers the sound and taste of love in hiding the scent and touch of panicked tremors. I have detached to renew a skin that knows the awesome sight of sacred touching.

That longago electric night when body, mind and soul seemed so certain of your grace your healing hands, it was the god in you I needed to touch the god in me.

And so be it!