Love After Love by Derek Walcott

The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcome


and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you


all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf, 


the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life. 

My eyes see my heart feels
The vulnerability crippling me
Face the pain ripping through
Smashing pounding pacing
Hold self down mad thoughts
Move a side Free the chains
Slapping pushing blocking
Turn to light to free the fight
Move with vibrations of light
Purity
Wash me pure tender and true.

Selfish is word with strength.
Selfish is as selfish does.
Selfish is bad when hurtful.
Selfish is good when hurt.
Selfish breaks things apart.
Selfish lives in us all.
Selfish ego, selfish heart.