The Door That Saved Me

There is a door that broke me when it closed,
A path I would have followed to my end,
I begged the lock, I bargained, I opposed,
Then knelt to grief the way one greets a friend.
I did not know that closing was a hand,
A quiet mercy dressed as my defeat,
That love unspoken had already planned
A safer road for these unsteady feet.
The house I built with hope was built on sand,
Its rooms were named for what I could not keep,
I decorated absence, took my stand,
And guarded rubble in my restless sleep.
The child in me still knocks on rooms long gone,
Still asks the vacant hallway to reply,
Still lifts a candle when the wick is drawn,
And calls it faith to watch the flame go by.
I studied why the heart insists on stone,
Why longing wears the face of what we lack,
Why we mistake the ache of being alone
For proof the missing thing is coming back.
But some refusals are a kindness worn
In armor we are not yet strong to see,
And some rejections are the way we’re born
Into the life we were designed to be.
What felt like exile was a quieter shore,
What felt like silence was the room to grow,
What felt like nothing shutting was a door
That kept me from the sorrow I don’t know.
I do not preach. I only speak from ash,
From chapels built on could-have-been and rain,
From every promise ended with a crash,
From every prayer that outlived its refrain.
If you are standing where a door has sealed,
And every hinge is heavier than stone,
Consider that your wound may be a shield,
And what walked off was never yours to own.
The thunder passes. Fog forgets its hold.
The garden grows for those who tend the ground.
And one day you will thank the door that closed
For all the softer thresholds you have found.

…

DCG

What if the door that broke your heart was actually the door that saved you? Sometimes life closes a path you really wanted because it sees something you can’t. What feels like rejection may actually be protection. Maybe that loss was never meant to hurt you — it was meant to keep you safe.

— attribution anonymous