Binding Skin
My skin, the cover of my soul’s pages, is soft
leather binding, knitted together
by the Expert Craftsman,
protecting secrets from
salty tear streaks
and perspiration,
aggressive sunbeams
and biting winds,
prodding noses
and heartbreak
only I have flipped through these pages,
except him,
the one my soul opened for,
letting him examine the rawness
of emotion inside me,
deciphering the smudged script
written by my shaky left hand
his revisions were subtle, at first
just the change of a verb or two,
until he found the heart of
my story, tucked deep within
the meaty pages of my flesh,
and with the flip of a page,
the plot twisted, as he unexpectedly
ripped pages from my spine,
erasers burned and lead poisoned
as he edited me out of my own story,
penciling in his version of me
I slammed shut,
preventing his destructive hands
from tearing more holes in
my story,
and now
I’m alone,
in the painful process
of revising myself,
pen in hand as I dip into
the blood of the wounds he left me,
writing over the scars, a tear in my heart,
desperately trying to make
what once was beautiful,
beautiful again
my soul may never open
for another, but I will find comfort
in this skin that binds me,
the cover strengthening with time,
until when I’m old,
and gravity pleats this leather casing me,
ink fading with my memory as
the binding gives way,
letting loose all my secrets to
mending hands comforting my
mangled body on crisp white sheets,
as my last page is filled,
my final sentence written,
only to be followed by
a heavenly epilogue,
written by the Author of Life,
in a celestial script of liquid gold,
on crisp white pages,
in a new skin that forever
binds me to Him.