Fortress

When I was a child, I liked secret places.
The Pantry under the basement stairs,
As high as I could get in the cherry tree.
I even hung fabric around my bed.
I liked places where I could be alone to explore me.
I wanted to have places where no one else went.
Where I was safe and invulnerable.
Some might say it was a freudian desire to return to the womb.
I think not.
I was simply overly sensitive, and needed a place to not be tense.
Somewhere where my unfolding self would never be judged or ridiculed.
Now, I try to be that place for other people.
It isn't easy, and I fail a lot.
But I want to let other people be safe around me.
I never want to wound the the tenderness of newly revealed self.
For that is the greatest crime of all.