• Because
    The world tried to imprison you in your own soul,
    You were unfinished hands of solitaire, afraid to find out
    Whether or not you'd ever be good enough to make it to the end,
    To fit neatly into one of those four conclusions and maybe you never knew
    Where in the game you stood, because cards were left unturned
    And on days when the sun forgot to rise, you were forced to build your own
    Or construct elaborate chemical illusions of the light,
    The infrastructure to consciousness that told you "Look the sky didn't fall,
    It just tripped over its own feet and I was here to keep it from crashing down"
    And maybe that was all you ever wanted for yourself--
    To stop playing solitaire, toss the cards to the wind and write your own ending for the day,
    Maybe this was just what you were waiting for but you couldn't hear your own voice
    Over the choruses of names they sang out to you, like cruelty would banish your demons back to Hell
    And not just deepen the wounds to let them fester, further infection from their words
    Until you were trying to anticipate what would come next just so that you could stand your ground
    When everyone in the whole damn world seemed to want to bury you beneath it,

    Because
    Your life learned to grow inward and no amount of medicine or therapy could break the seal
    And the pain eventually began to break through. Screaming spells, scarred wrists, bloody noses,
    Like there was some way to make the effect tangible, the tidal waves of anger might recede...
    Like uncontrollably you would burn from the inside, starting another fire from the outside might be your best bet
    To kill the growth of the blaze and escape.

    Because
    You never saw what I saw when I looked at you,
    You were too busy listening to the voices telling you that you were damaged
    To hear me telling you that you were beautiful, even with the scars marching up and down your forearms
    To me those were stories of what you had survived, and a testament to your strength,
    And if anything they should hope to someday deserve the right to wear such badges of honor,
    A diploma from the graduating class of "Against All Odds" they would never be able to boast of

    Because
    You etched your life into your skin and now that you are changing, the rest of the world
    Is so far behind you that they don't even realize THEY ARE WRONG and they always were,
    Because you have walked eons--you have stepped over the gaping mouth of the Atlantic,
    You were shackled to a salt pillar in the motherland that wanted to sacrifice you to "psychosis NOS"
    And you fought so hard to break those chains because you knew there was so much more to see
    You bathed in the Pacific when times were young, you transcend time and season
    The purifying burn, the pain with the power to transform
    You had returned home before they realized the world was even turning
    And you had seen it all.

    Because
    You could sew their cruelty into your veins but never believe me
    When I told you there was something so worth fighting for in you.
    You are looking at yourself through a cracked lens of the past and you never saw
    It was distorted from the beginning, because they built a point of view for you
    That you grew far beyond. The frames begin to crack when you see yourself beyond
    The medical diagnosis that is two part pills, three parts misunderstanding
    And realize that you aren't playing solitaire at the lunch table trying so hard not to hear
    Or pretending to be a statue of frost in midwinter--your heartbeat betrayed this facade long ago.

    Because
    I wanted to collect your rattling nerves in the palm of my hand and bridge the gaps in your soul
    That you fear to cross lest you fall into one, because I heard a melody played on out-of-tune heartstrings
    As different and something to celebrate, a thing of beauty rather than the afterbirth of a damaged being.

    Because
    I can still describe to you in detail the way the sky warps just before it's about to crack open
    And the darkness on the far side of the clouded bowl of the heavens engulfs me.

    Because
    You wanted to kiss the wounded parts of my soul
    And make it all better
    But were afraid

    Because
    Lying beneath the bridge it felt as though it was something you had built just for me
    To protect me from the falling pieces of the past as it rains down fire and brimstone

    Because
    I wanted to keep you there forever
    Where no pain could touch you

    Because
    I wanted to protect you

    Because
    I wanted to save you from whatever it is that sneaks poison into your roots
    And tells you that you aren't worth it

    Because
    The tightrope act we entertained daily--
    Hatred flaming up on one side and tears like an ocean
    Wishing to drown us on the other--
    We survived,
    And can look back on it now as a memory
    That had less to do with the agony of our burning souls
    And more to do with the beauty
    Waiting when we reached each other.

    Because
    I believe in you even when you don't believe in yourself.

    Because
    I wanted you to see the same thing in the mirror
    That I saw in your eyes, breathing across
    The distance to your soul.