Life Lessons

Kindness is a Gentle Teacher

When a person’s kindness can teach us better than a person’s reprimand

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my own worst critic — 
failure again,
beating myself on each specific,
don’t know how to begin to win,

pummeled —
that’s how I leave myself,
broken, battered,
greedily buying every degradation my mind sells,

I can’t stand —
the weight of my own reproach,
let alone another’s reprimand,
don’t share, don’t encroach,

I’m fragile —
don’t confirm the worst of me I see,
give me time to wage and win the battle,
I’m fragile, let me be,

when he comes and sits —
no mentoring words,
no guidance from my pits,
just sits with no concerns,

he leaves space — 
lets me grow comfortable,
allows me to laugh, live, love with no trace,
of insecurity that kept me vulnerable,