Beloved,
Forgive me. I came to you angry.
Not the polite kind of angry, either. Not the kind that tidies itself into a sigh. I came to you with the kind of fury I had been folding up and putting away for years, the kind that wakes you at three in the morning with your jaw clenched and your heart pounding at the ceiling.
I did not know where else to bring it. Everyone I knew wanted me calmer. Softer. Easier to be around. And then I found you, lion-headed, golden, the burning Eye of the sun, and you did not ask me to be calmer. You looked at my rage and said, I know this one.
I love the story of the red beer, beloved. Seven thousand jars poured over the fields. You drank it down, thinking it was blood, and slept, and woke up gentle. I used to think that story was about tricking you. Now I think it is about mercy. About how even the fiercest heat needs somewhere to rest. About how the fire that protects is the same fire that heals, once it has been allowed to burn honestly.
You taught me that a boundary is a kind of love. That I can stand at the edge of my own life and roar, and then lie down in a warm patch of sunlight like a lioness after the hunt. Watchful. Unafraid. At ease in my own body.
So tonight I will pour a small glass of pomegranate juice, deep red, and sit by the window where the light is still warm. I will tell you what made me angry. I will breathe until my shoulders drop. And then, beloved, I will drink to you, and come home.