Excavation

I have been made to dig,

fingernails pressed into skin,

searching memories for early warnings,

mistaking them for prophecy,

for markers of an early grave.

I have been made to open doors

in rooms untouched by light,

to stand in the honest truth of myself.

To climb through attics,

peel back wallpaper,

strip the house to its bare bones,

checking whether the foundation could hold me.

I have been made to walk

through something deeper and darker

while my body felt set on fire.

There was a version of me before you,

and this version—

the one that exists because of you.

And since there is no going back,

I understand now:

some people are not lessons,

they are excavations.