27/02/2026
As I dive deeper into exploring my shadow, the parts of myself that learned to stay hidden and the little boy within who longs to be seen, I’m reminded that this work is not meant to be done alone.
With consent, I’m sharing a poem written by a brother from a men’s group I’m part of.
It speaks to something many of us carry quietly.
“Bring the boy home,” they said.
“But you don’t understand,” I said.
“I can’t. I won’t. It’s not safe.
He’s stuck in the woods, his wounds too great.
He must remain hidden, lost and unseen.
It’s too dark, too frightening,
too late for him to be redeemed.”
“Bring the boy home,” they said.
And they welcomed me to join them,
to sit, to enter that mystical thin space,
that other world
where deep healing, mystery,
and alchemy take place.
“Bring the boy home,” they said.
These men, men of men,
offered me a place.
Time in that sacred space
so my boy’s journey could begin,
could initiate,
could unfold,
held by their hearts
with a majestic, brotherly grace.
“Bring the boy home,” they said.
“I will,” I said.
Slowly, I lured him in
from the blackness,
from the frozen cold,
that godforsaken place of no abode.
Gently, I brought him
into new light,
into a clearing,
into a fold,
a place for healing deep old wounds,
from darkness to light,
from pain to joy,
from disgrace to grace.
Given time, the boy came home.
He sits with me now,
right here, right now.
Men, there is a way.
There is a how.
For the wounded boy in all of us
to be led back home.
No longer do I, or he, stand alone.
We are on new ground.
We have found a new home.
We sit upon our rightful throne.
And all because the men said to me,
“Bring the boy home.”
🔥
