POZZUM LOVE

At first you see the midnight eyes,
The little hands, the teeth, the tail—
A shadow moving by the fence,
A stranger on a hidden trail.
But stay awhile and look again,
Let wonder overcome your fear—
A face you never thought you’d love
Can suddenly become so dear.

I gave you shelter from the cold,
You gave me somewhere to belong.
I held you safely in my hands,
You held my heart your whole life long.

Pozzum love goes both ways—
What you give comes back transformed.
You keep a little creature safe;
She keeps your sleeping spirit warm.
Pozzum love, wild and true,
Crossing every line we drew.
I opened up my arms to you—
You opened up the whole world too.

Sara, with your winding tail,
Your quiet purr beneath my chin,
I thought that I had brought you home—
You showed me home was found within.
I fed you from a tiny bottle,
Kept you warm and watched you grow.
But every kindness that I gave you
Came back deeper than I’d known.

I gave you shelter from the cold,
You gave me somewhere to belong.
I held you safely in my hands,
You held my heart your whole life long.

Pozzum love goes both ways—
What you give comes back transformed.
You keep a little creature safe;
She keeps your sleeping spirit warm.
Pozzum love, wild and true,
Crossing every line we drew.
I opened up my arms to you—
You opened up the whole world too.

For every mother on the rooftop,
Every baby on her back,
Every wanderer in the garden,
Every traveler on the tracks;
For the ones we call unlovely,
For the lives we push away—
May we meet them with compassion.
May we learn another way.

Love the fur and love the feather,
Love the many-legged and small.
Love the rooted, love the wingèd,
Love the lives we name and call.
Love the minds we understand
And those unlike us from the start—
Life may wear a thousand bodies.
Love needs only an open heart.

Pozzum love goes both ways—
From the human to the wild,
From the ancient midnight mother
To the lost and frightened child.
Pozzum love, strange and new,
Makes the world come shining through.
I opened up my arms to you—
You opened up my whole heart too.

Maybe love is older than us,
Older than the words we speak.
Maybe love belongs as fully
To the mighty and the meek.
Maybe nothing born beneath us,
Nothing made to stand above.
Maybe every kind of being
Is another way to love.

So leave a doorway in your heart
For what you do not recognize.
The shape of love may startle you.
Look once more with kinder eyes.

Pozzum love goes both ways—
Every gift returns somehow.
What I learned from little Sara
Lives in every creature now.
Pozzum love, let it run
Through every stranger, everyone.
No matter what we’re made of—
There is always more to love.

More to love.
New ways to love.
A wider world—
With more to love.

Pozzum love goes both ways.

And love belongs to all.