“you are a peace and a flame, you steady me and stir me all at once”

– butterflies rising

“you are a peace and a flame, you steady me and stir me all at once”

– butterflies rising

“woman to woman,
may we allow each other
the freedom to explore
all of the depths and variations
of our own femininity
and not judge or condemn each other
for the layers and directions
of womanhood
we each choose to pass by or take on.
we will not all find and define ourselves
in the same way,
but as we find and define ourselves,
let us not stand in each other’s way.”
– butterflies rising

“woman to woman,
may we allow each other
the freedom to explore
all of the depths and variations
of our own femininity
and not judge or condemn each other
for the layers and directions
of womanhood
we each choose to pass by or take on.
we will not all find and define ourselves
in the same way,
but as we find and define ourselves,
let us not stand in each other’s way.”
– butterflies rising

“you are the sweetest feeling i know”

you’re out there
and i’m here wishing i could
reach for you as easy
as a star could cross a sky…
just fall across your chest
and feel it all again.
your way of settling my madness with
that soft… slow… “baby” late at night,
and how you feel like everything beautiful
i can’t make sense of.
it’s a dangerously pretty edge
when you’re here,
but there’s a wild ache when you’re not,
and my axis pulls and pulls to
wherever you are.
i still feel you, and i miss you
and i miss you…
you are the sweetest feeling i know.

“you are the sweetest feeling i know”

you’re out there
and i’m here wishing i could
reach for you as easy
as a star could cross a sky…
just fall across your chest
and feel it all again.
your way of settling my madness with
that soft… slow… “baby” late at night,
and how you feel like everything beautiful
i can’t make sense of.
it’s a dangerously pretty edge
when you’re here,
but there’s a wild ache when you’re not,
and my axis pulls and pulls to
wherever you are.
i still feel you, and i miss you
and i miss you…
you are the sweetest feeling i know.

“when i love, it’s the littlest things about someone that can make a complete mess of me… details, i love madly in details.”
– butterflies rising

“when i love, it’s the littlest things about someone that can make a complete mess of me… details, i love madly in details.”
– butterflies rising

“that place
on the back of his neck
where my fingers fall
when my arms are wrapped around him
…that place.

details,
i love madly in
details”

– butterflies rising

“that place
on the back of his neck
where my fingers fall
when my arms are wrapped around him
…that place.

details,
i love madly in
details”

– butterflies rising

soul-tangled
with you.
you were an imprint here
before we touched wild skin.
you were a feeling. a sense.
and now
you’re an instinct. a gravity.
with. you.
my heart has no defense.
i feel chemicals with you.
my skin remembers you.
and when our bodies have to
untangle and let this life turn over
you’ll be just a feeling
and just a sense…
but only until
we’re skin to skin again.

– butterflies rising

soul-tangled
with you.
you were an imprint here
before we touched wild skin.
you were a feeling. a sense.
and now
you’re an instinct. a gravity.
with. you.
my heart has no defense.
i feel chemicals with you.
my skin remembers you.
and when our bodies have to
untangle and let this life turn over
you’ll be just a feeling
and just a sense…
but only until
we’re skin to skin again.

– butterflies rising

…skin to skin and soul-tangled

– butterflies rising

…skin to skin and soul-tangled

– butterflies rising

beautiful stardust…

when you love wildly,
your heart can break so. intensely.
and passionate pain is brutal pain…
but it’s powerful pain too.

it stirs us in our soul places. and even when it
feels like it burns right through us and tears us apart,
it can be a catalyst if we let it.
we can pour it into things like music and art
and poetry… or turn it into growth and change
and inspiration and all these other beautiful things
that we can become and can spill
out into the world.

so keep loving deep…
and keep your heart wilder than wild…
and breathe it all out as beautiful stardust.

– butterflies rising

“earth, fire, water, sky… wild, soft, free… and full of flowers. she makes everything beautiful, everything about her is made of soul.”
– butterflies rising

“earth, fire, water, sky… wild, soft, free… and full of flowers. she makes everything beautiful, everything about her is made of soul.”
– butterflies rising

could you
love her, still…
when she’s not only
soft in your arms
but when she’s wild
with the moon and restless…
and maybe just a little out of reach
from your fingertips.
could you love her, still,
when she’s not only sweet and
resting easy on your chest,
but when she’s wild blossomed in the night
and searching for more inside of herself
than who you may think she is.
could you love her
not just when she’s flowers
but when she’s fire.
she has to know… if she lets you close…
when she blooms wild and burns bright…
could you love her, still.

– butterflies rising

go where you can
stretch out and reach
wide and high
and bloom wild and untamed
and be unapologetic in your essence
and reckless in your fire
and golden in your skin
and so. easy. in your breathing…
just. go.

go where you breathe free.

– butterflies rising

that little
voice inside of you…
it’s saying, “go.” so just go.
go where you can
stretch out and reach
wide and high
and bloom wild and untamed
and be unapologetic in your essence
and reckless in your fire
and golden in your skin
and so. easy. in your breathing…
just. go.
to wherever the brutal voices quiet
and the aching doubt settles
and all those heavy fears you’re holding
on to can start to loosen from your grip
and find little ways to fall away…
because that little voice… it’s trying to
save your soul. so just go.
whatever it takes.
whatever you need to put down.
whatever you have to leave behind.
untangle from it all…
and go where you breathe free.

go where you breathe free.

– butterflies rising

i stood there
in front of you
and i thought of everything
that had ever broken me,
i thought of everything
that had ever shattered my heart,
and in that moment when i looked at you
i thought of how maybe
i’ll tell you someday.
but for now, i just exhaled.
and i spoke nothing of any of it…

because all
of it made sense now,
and none of it
mattered anymore.

you said,
tell me where you’ve been, love

and i thought of all the lost roads,
and dark corners,
and heavy work, and heartbreak,
and of all the healing

and i just said…
on my way here

– butterflies rising

you said,
tell me where you’ve been, love

and i thought of all the lost roads,
and dark corners,
and heavy work, and heartbreak,
and of all the healing

and i just said…
on my way here

– butterflies rising

“and if you
took me for granted…
you must know that
that was another life.
and i have found my way
to a new life.
and you are just not welcome here.

because i can no longer
wear that shade of unworthiness,
or hold that self-unkindness,
that let me live a life
where the people i let close to me
ever treated me as anything less than
a blessing in theirs.”
– butterflies rising

“and if you
took me for granted…
you must know that
that was another life.
and i have found my way
to a new life.
and you are just not welcome here.

because i can no longer
wear that shade of unworthiness,
or hold that self-unkindness,
that let me live a life
where the people i let close to me
ever treated me as anything less than
a blessing in theirs.”
– butterflies rising