my undoing...(p.41)
“Even the most difficult things lead us where we need to go. It just isn’t always where we thought we were headed.”
-Nancy Ann Healy, Falling Through Shooting Stars
my spoken words…
my undoing and my guide
When I first began to talk as a child, no one could understand me.
My words ran into the other…
syllables became a duel that my sword could not master.
They say I improved over time.
What I remember is feeling different.
That look on someone’s face who couldn’t understand me...
I shrank before I even grew.
Over time, my words became stronger, but my spirit drifted.
To be singled out in front of others was my greatest fear.
In school, I prayed not to be called on.
“Please, please, please…don’t look my way.”
“Don’t say my name”.
When the teacher called on me,
my body numbed.
My face filled with heat.
My mind drained of thoughts.
I could not recall what was just asked.
I only wished it was a dream.
But there was no stirring to free me.
I sat, awake, wishing I could disappear.
When words found their way out
They fled in every direction and not in any understandable way.
If one were patient, they could piece together my lost words,
but I could never dance with conversation.
I am forever the beginner repeating,
“step, one, two, three… step, one, two, three.”
It was no surprise that I began to write at an early age.
I journaled, I wrote poems, and I loved to take pictures.
My body craved to speak.
Words seemed to flow onto the page.
Photographs filled the blank spaces.
This became my voice.
I marvel at those who speak eloquently…
knowledgabely…
witty…
engagingly.
But that is not to be.
I found my gifts in a quiet room.
I may have missed them if I had chattered.
They say to write as you speak…that I cannot.
I write the words I hear in stillness.
Somehow, they aren’t lost like the spoken ones.
They know where to go.
My weaknesses and my fears
seem to be as crucial as my dreams.
They are the rails that keep me close to my path.
Without them, I may have strayed.
So I write.
My voice never travels far.
But my pen knows no limit.
My undoing became my guide.
Sometimes, what appears isn’t quite as it seems.
Often, hard things have a different role.
Without them,
I may have wandered too far off to find my way back.❤️
