Softly

I speak to my body with soft apologies,

moving through time as I run my fingers

through my hair and down my arms,

a fossil dig to the past that somehow reveals

more about who I am now than before.

And even as I find evidence for a person I am no longer,

skin never forgets how its held and broken,

muscle memory intertwined in

the fabric of its limbs and nerves.

So I tuck myself into my body with soft hands,

ingraining a new way to hold myself

for the person I am becoming.