Back in high school and college I penned a lot of poetry. I loved my Creative Writing classes and excelled in the poetry portions, much to my delight. I loved reading poetry and writing it, and it was a coping device for when things weren’t going so well and I was hurting. There were breakup poems and poems about the love I’d once have. I went out on a creative limb and tried my hand at poetry once again but you’ll notice the theme is more fitting for my life in recent years…
When She Wakes Up
When she wakes up
She wonders what she can do today to be better
How she can walk lighter on the eggshells that have become the only ground on which she stands
How she can possibly choose her words any more carefully so she won’t feel the slap of them when thrown back in her face
When she wakes up
She wonders if anything she does today will be good enough
How she can work any harder, appear any smarter, dress any more pleasing
How she can betray herself any more than she does already in order to be more compliant to his demands.
When she wakes up she leaves behind her dreams
They were only real in the quiet peace of her sleep, the only place she was allowed to have them
The only place she could be beautiful and dance and speak free of ridicule
The only realm where her thoughts and feelings mattered
Then one day life changed forever
The record screeched and the path was unchartered
But what was broken and painful, God fashioned into patchwork beauty
Her heart was reformed, restored, replenished
When she wakes up she feels new peace
Her feelings are cherished, her voice is heard, her life is precious
She is safe and she is revered and her days have new purpose
When she wakes up, she is living her dreams…
Live your dreams!
