I started two different blogs earlier.  First, I have a lot to say about Sarah Palin.  As a woman, as a voter, as an American, an intellectual… there is just a lot to say.  I will try to have that done by the end of the weekend, but for now I just have so much more on my mind.

So I started another one, about being burned, losing a friend (no one any of you know, an old friend, I’ll explain later).  But I didn’t want to post another rant.

So I got to thinking, about how in the very near future I’m going to be pretty vulnerable and I’m going to need to learn how to protect myself from the people who will prey on that.  A certain poem started running through my mind while talking to a man tonight.  Not just any poem… since about 1998, if you asked me what my favorite poem of all time is, I would give you this one answer.  I need to repeat it again and again to myself in the upcoming months.  I hope it might be helpful to some of you as well:

Never Offer Your Heart to Someone Who Eats Hearts

by Alice Walker 

Never offer your heart 
to someone who eats hearts 
who finds heartmeat 
delicious 
but not rare 
who sucks the juices 
drop by drop 
and bloody-chinned 
grins 
like a God. 

Never offer your heart 
to a heart gravy lover. 
Your stewed, overseasoned 
heart consumed 
he will sop up your grief 
with bread 
and send it shuttling 
from side to side 
in his mouth 
like bubblegum. 

If you find yourself 
in love 
with a person 
who eats hearts 
these things 
you must do. 

Freeze your heart 
immediately. 
Let him—next time 
he examines your chest— 
find your heart cold 
flinty and unappetizing. 

Refrain from kissing 
lest he in revenge 
dampen the spark 
in your soul. 

Now, 
sail away to Africa 
where holy women 
await you 
on the shore— 
long having practiced the art 
of replacing hearts 
with God and Song.