Once I held my breath

And waited patiently

As though that would make me a saint

I rejected beauty where it was in the form

Of gruesomeness and pain

Thinking I could pull God apart

And discover her love

Somehow separate from the rest of her body

A body that I have begun

To know better now

Like I’d know my own

Aware of the places that hurt

And the places that excite and cry out in ecstasy.

Her body is perfectly flawed

And irrevocably Holy

Her beauty encompassing

All that is “pure” and all that is “lost”

And equalizing them with a single breath

A breath I do not hold so much any more

But savoir

With no attempts of capturing it

A breath that yields to every breath

That ever danced before or after it

Bringing me home to the oneness

Of her whole body

A body that begs to understand itself

The way I trace my abdomen and hips

With my fingers hoping to fully embrace

The magic and wonder

Of my seemingly separate body

Hoping to capture the whisper

Of my “highest” potential and grace

As if it weren’t marbled into my whole essence

As if I weren’t just another piece of her

Whole perfectly flawed body