Why Tangled Wings
It all began with a poem...a poem about a woman tangled in the flight of her becoming. I am that woman.
If These Walls Could Talk
Maybe they'd spill all my secrets,
unmercifully sharing all the things
I try so hard to hide, to keep quiet,
everything I think I bury but is
actually written all over my face.
Maybe they'd tell you about a woman
who uses the thunder to drown the
sound of her own sobs, a woman
who is someone different in the dark
than in the day, a woman with longings
and hungers that seep from her skin
and rise into the night but never find
their complete satisfaction. Maybe they'd
tell you stories about someone who
can't decide if she wants to let go,
someone who carries guilt and shame
like freckles on her back, someone who
has said she wants to step into her life
so many times she's forgotten what that means.
Maybe they would vividly describe the life
of a woman who knows her best self lays
just below the surface, a woman who meets
herself every morning with determination
and hope, begging God to help her learn
to touch what she knows is within her reach.
Maybe they would tell you about the times
they've seen this woman fall to her knees,
broken and frustrated by life, or the
times she been caught dancing by herself,
scared of being seen but secretly wishing she
wasn't dancing alone. Maybe they'd break
down and whisper about moments they've
seen blackness drive the emptiness and
sense of lack to find their voice in fantasies
whose only substance is the hunger of a
woman who never feels full. Maybe they'd
tell you that they know her beauty and her
goodness because they witness it everyday
of their lives, they creak with longing. wishing to tell
her she sells herself short, that in fact she is
a burning piece of God. But they don't.
Instead they hold my secrets and my stories
in their dark hollow places choosing not to
offer judgment or harsh shame. They
stand silently observing, allowing me
to be exactly what I am: a woman who's
wings are tangled in the flight of her becoming.
