This is for my tender hearted girls.
The ones who are told they feel too deeply, cry too much, love too easily.
The ones who are called naive or foolish. The ones who get spat upon for swooning over a sunset or chided for burying a dead bird they found and placing a smooth stone over its grave.
The world is harsh for you, my babies, I know it. A tundra wind blows through every decision you make and the frost gnaws at your ankles, so delicately unprotected in thin cotton socks that don’t suit the weather.
My open hearted ones, don’t let the world fool you. Their locked doors are not a sign that your key should be unbreakable. Yours is the softness so many have neglected to nourish.
Though you walk through a chorus of disharmonious tongues clacking, carry on as you were. Write your poetry in leather bound journals. Press little flowers into their pages and forget about them. One day your children will lift the broken petals from the books and smile at the memory of all you stood for.
Go on then, be our refuge. Be the wing that holds us close to your breast until the storm passes.
Be the downy softness that gives us the only reason we have ever needed to keep going.
Be the one who reminds us that just because things are the way they are, doesn’t mean it’s the way they should be.