While on retreat, I celebrated the Sacrament of Reconciliation, confessing sins from my youth and talking about the shame I have been carrying for many years.
The priest assured me of God’s forgiveness and mercy and suggested that I find a scripture passage, song or poem that would express God’s acceptance of me.
I love poetry, and I keep copies of some of my favorite poems in my Bible and prayer books, including e. c. cummings’ poem, “i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart).”
After the Sacrament of Reconciliation, I pulled out my copy of the poem and reread it. The poem speaks to me of an incredible closeness, a sense of unity.
Then I read it as if God was saying it to me, that God was the one carrying my heart in God’s heart. I listened to God say to me:
i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart) i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
i fear
no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you
here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)
Accepted, loved, forgiven, reconciled.
Madeline Bialecki 