Friendship

Layers of thick skin –
You’ve stripped me down one by one:
Now there is nothing left but my soul,
and even that I will gladly hand over to you.
The fibre between me and you feeble, thin –
Each layer like a shield you removed gracefully, peacefully,
careful not to hurt me,
not to rob me of too much that I hang on.
When you got to the rough parts,
you peeled me down and chewed me up
until I made myself bare,
but even when I thought you must be
too exhausted from loving me
you did not stop halfway there.
You bit my edges (sometimes biting into the wrong parts) until you found the nucleus:
When you got to my core we both cried.
You knew exactly what to do.
You peeled me with such a patience that
I had no other chance but to love you too.

© Elena Natroshvili

IG: 16minutepoetry