Held in a Tender Split
Writer’s Note:
I drafted this piece early last week, when I felt more hopeful about what might emerge in the hollow. But life, as it does, pressed so much harder on my shell before I could glimpse any new growth. Now the crack feels irrevocable, and I’m lying soil-level, not sure what—if anything—is rising. Perhaps something has already sprouted, reaching out toward light—though all I can perceive are the shell’s remnants scattered in the dirt. Yet the hollow still holds space for both anticipation and lament. Right now, the lament sits more prominently—and that’s okay. Maybe naming it proves that something is stirring beneath—and perhaps has already penetrated the surface.
There is a moment—quiet, hidden—
when a seed is still buried in the hollow.
Not gone. Not lost. But kept—in love.
Just waiting.
In the moment before what’s next,
there’s a breath of resting in the now—
making space for what’s to come.
Sometimes, in the inhale before the exhale.
Other times, in the exhale before the inhale.
In that place, the light doesn’t shout.
It flickers.
It glows.
It waits.
And all the while, the next breath awaits—still held in love.
In the hush, warmth seeps through the soil—
a gentle stirring presses the hidden seed
upward toward the light
that gently touches it.
A subtle crack begins to form,
unseen yet profound.
A tender split in the boundary
between dormancy and awakening.
Not the end.
But the beginning.
Of becoming.
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May this hollow not only hold you,
but open something in you.
A flicker. A whisper. A beginning. A knowing you’re kept in love—even here, even now.
Jesus tells us that “unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed; but if it dies, it produces many seeds” (John 12:24, NIV).
What have you released, or are ready to release, so new life can emerge?