Caverns

To love anyone is
to be at onceinvincible and
more vulnerable
than you ever
will be.

it is a change of state
from which you cannot
recover;
one that does not end.

In fact, it gets worse.

To love -- once -- is
to open yourself up
to all possibilities
of love –

a constant slow,
subtle prying of your ribcage
so your heart has room to grow.

You begin to notice things
that pry at the recesses
of your soul.

The little golden retriever who

toddles over and whose overeager
licks leave you sopping,
giggling a high pitched noise you didn’t know
you could make.

That elderly neighbor

with a twinkle in her eye
and a creak in her voice that carries
you through
a lifetime of stories.

A child in the park

you pass by who
runs with reckless abandonment;
the world nearly in his pudgy grasp.

You discover too late that you were a Grinch,

whose heart was three sizes too small.

And what they never tell you –
where the tale never finishes,
is how much
more room
this new heart has.

how the Grinch cries now
that he can feel;
there are days where
this new heart is
an empty cavern,
not yet filled with anything
strong enough to stay –

That at the end of the day,
you are still the Grinch
at the top of Whoville,
so far
from the twinkling
village below.

But now
your three-sizes bigger heart,
pressing against your ribs
can feel every
inch
and mile
between you
and
another beating
heart.

you’ve never felt more alive
and so terribly alone.