i heard her gasp and her little feet dance and her instant, mama, i'm sorry!
but it was enough.
that one final breaking that broke open my tongue and i stood in the middle of flung macaroni and the shards of pottery couldn't have cut deeper than my words that spilled out.
i heard her run to her room, sobbing. my little girl who isn't quite four, and i knelt in the mess and watched elias dance in the cheese, reveling in the sensation of squishing the squishy into the carpet.
lyla placed a dishtowel in my hands.
~
and i gathered up the scattered into the blue and white linen checks...the displaced and the broken...and drew up the corners.
rinsed out the dishrag until the water ran clear and bent down again to wash the colours off the floor.
but my heart?
those colours are deep and the old nature fights hard to live and my tears are never enough to wipe it all away...
~
she isn't one to hide away for long.
i watched her, from the corner of my eye, slowly wander down the hall.
she watched me, still on my knees, tears on my face, cleaning the last of her spill.
she pressed against the wall, trying to remain hidden, as i stood up and walked to the couch.
the words i had shouted still resonating in the air-space between us...
~
and they catch in my throat, for the briefest of moments, but they do and i face a choice.
i don't really have to ever say them.
but we are broken, she and i, in these moments of silence and uncertainty.
where i am the mama and she is but the child who wonders what happens if the mama chooses to take her love away?
and i wouldn't,
not ever,
but it's there, always there, in each one of us.
what happens if i stop being worthy of love?
and i can see it there, in her big chocolate brown eyes; that question that haunts and i forget about the choice and just. jump. in.
olivia, i am so sorry. so very sorry for the words that i said. i need your forgiveness.
and because she is olivia and because she loves ferociously, i only had to tenderly say her name before she had flung herself in my arms.
~
there are fissures in every person.
ones that bleed and break and fester.
the ones that seem to have a life of their own, always gasping to know, do you love me?
and it's an insatiable beast because it goes looking in all the wrong places.
for there is only One Place, One Person, Who can clamp those jaws down.
and His Name is Jesus.
the fissures may remain, the broken pieces may collect in a heap; but He loves the brokenhearted, the ones who aren't quite whole.
He loves the lonely and the hurting, the questioning and the longing.
He even loves the broken mama who breaks small hearts with pointed words.
but His love isn't passive, it's active and strong.
and it strengthens and changes,
it fills a mouth that spewed ugly, with words that bind and heal.
He will never give up, never stop transforming a heart bent before Him until every breath that catches is caught in praise for Him...
~
and i am sure of this, that He Who began a good work in you
will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.
philippians 1:6 esv
