A few too many mixed metaphors, but it’s nice to be writing again…

We’d thought at the beginning
that running a thread of grace
through the stories we wear as our life
meant it could only ever turn out beautiful

but it’s nothing like the pattern made us hope.

it’s become
somehow
an unholy mess
from beginning to end

we tried unravelling
to start it all over

we searched with clumsy fingers
in the knots and tangles
to find an end

but there is none
no beginning
and no neat and tidy finish

and instead
with all our attempts to make it
neat and perfect
the thread of grace
only became more tangled,
inextricably
knotted to the stories
we never dreamt that it should touch

reluctantly
we let go the idea that somehow it was ever
going to be perfect –
or even wearable in public.
the mess is still a mess.
but it’s a tangle held together
forever
by a thread of grace
that won’t let it come undone.