Forgive Me, Too

Forgive Me, Too

— Matthew D. Lyons

I have tried to be careful
with other people’s hearts.

Tried to notice the bruise
before I became the hand
that made it.

Tried to apologize
without decoration.

To say,
I was wrong,
and mean it.

To ask forgiveness
without making a performance
of my regret.

To understand
that harm is harm
even when I did not intend it.

This has mattered to me.

Not because I have always done it well.

But because I know
what carelessness can do
when it enters a room
wearing someone else’s confidence.

I know the old ache
of being dismissed,
misread,
spoken to sharply,
laughed at
before the wound
had language.

So I have tried,
in my imperfect way,
to move through the world
with my hands open.

To leave fewer marks
than were left on me.

But somewhere
in all this watchfulness,
I became careful
with everyone
except myself.

I asked forgiveness
from others
and withheld it
from the one person
who had carried me
through every consequence.

I apologized
to the room,
the friend,
the stranger,
the beloved,
the harmed,
the disappointed.

But not to the boy
who thought he was dumb.

Not to the body
I called unattractive
before anyone else
had the chance.

Not to the face
I studied like a problem.

Not to the heart
I kept improving
instead of holding.

Not to the lonely man
who acted out
because he did not know
how else to ask
to be found.

Not to the frightened one
who confused secrecy
with shelter.

Not to the hungry one
who mistook attention
for love.

Not to the ashamed one
who kept returning
to the same fire
and then blamed himself
for being burned.

I have wanted forgiveness
to be clean.

A white cloth.
A clear bell.
A door opening
after the proper confession.

But self-forgiveness
is messier than that.

It arrives barefoot.

It sits beside the evidence.

It does not deny the harm.

It does not erase the past
or soften the truth
until nothing sharp remains.

It simply says,

You are still here.

And because you are still here,
love is not finished
with you.

There are parts of me
I have treated
as if they were not worthy
of being brought home.

The ashamed part.

The arrogant part.

The addicted part.

The part that lied.

The part that hid.

The part that judged.

The part that needed beauty
to be proven.

The part that needed intelligence
to be crowned.

The part that needed desire
to become a doorway
because tenderness
felt too far away.

I have made exiles
of my own suffering
and then wondered
why I could not feel whole.

So let this be
a different kind of apology.

Not the apology
that asks the past
to become acceptable.

Not the apology
that pretends
I did not cause harm.

Not the apology
that tries to rescue me
from accountability.

But the apology
that turns toward the mirror
and says,

Forgive me
for believing
you were only lovable
after repair.

Forgive me
for calling you weak
when you were lonely.

Forgive me
for calling you ugly
when you were simply waiting
to be seen with mercy.

Forgive me
for calling you dumb
when you were learning
in a language
no one around you
knew how to hear.

Forgive me
for using shame
as a leash
and calling it discipline.

Forgive me
for making your body
the courtroom
where every old verdict
was read again.

Forgive me
for treating your desire
as proof of your brokenness
instead of listening
for the grief beneath it.

Forgive me
for leaving you alone
with the very pain
that made you reach
for what could not save you.

I am not asking
to be excused.

I am asking
to be received.

By myself.

At last.

To place one hand
on the chest
and one hand
on the belly
and stop arguing
with the life
that has been trying
to survive.

To say,
yes,
there has been harm.

And yes,
there can be repair.

Yes,
there has been shame.

And yes,
there can be tenderness.

Yes,
there were years
I disappeared
from myself.

And yes,
I am allowed
to return.

Maybe forgiveness
is not a verdict.

Maybe it is a practice
of unlocking the same door
every morning.

Maybe it is not
the end of grief,
but the end
of abandoning myself
inside it.

Maybe it is not
forgetting what happened,
but remembering
that I happened too.

That I was there.

That I was the child
inside the insult.

The teenager
inside the mirror.

The man
inside the secret.

The seeker
inside the shame.

The heart
inside all that hunger,
still pulsing,
still waiting,
still willing
to be touched
without being corrected.

I have spent so much time
asking not to cause harm.

May I also learn
not to harm myself
in the name of becoming good.

May I make amends
without making a weapon
of remorse.

May I tell the truth
without building a prison
from it.

May I bow
to those I have hurt.

May I bow
to the one in me
who was hurting.

May I forgive myself
not because everything
was okay,

but because punishment
has never taught me
how to love.

And love,
if it is love,
must eventually come home.

Even here.

Especially here.

To the one
who has been waiting
longest
at the door.