You have to lock the strongest hearts
behind bars sometimes.
Though it isn’t fair—
though it may not be right—
The darkness needs to keep them there,
not because it’s mean,
but because it’s scared
of the buried power and the love-tipped prayers,
the glaring light that might leak wide
on the bleak-eyed shadows
if it let them loose.
But the goodness, too, and the champions
and the angel armies all agree
that it’s best not to break in
and set them free,
not because they’re uncaring,
but because they know
that strong hearts need iron
to help them grow.
They can take the metal,
though it bruises their souls—
they can make it out,
though not alone.
Their fingers, too thin,
will toughen to pry
the ceiling open into sky.
Strong hearts sometimes cry—
but they still come out stronger,
and when pain multiplies,
they just hold out longer.
Sometimes justice turns its head
as they lock an innocent heart away
because mercy remembers
the powerless prisoners,
the weak and the wobbly,
sick and unsteady
who’ve forgotten to fight
every guard that’s in sight,
who need a strong heart’s hand to hold,
need to hear a strong song
blast notes of hope
through the underground empty
and the frozen below.
Great men need prison
and all its compassion,
for strong hearts recall,
and they always come back
to rescue the next heart trapped
in that same old cage,
saying, “I know the way out.
And I will keep you safe.”
Heroes aren’t born;
they grow from the ground.
They’re buried in holes,
and they break their way out.
Backyard Apricots 