Hello, friends. It’s nice to come back to this space again. I’ve been taking a break from this blog while I’ve been working on another project. Now that that is finished, I am going to try and return to my weekly posts as best I can.
As I’ve mentioned, I’ve just wrapped up a truly seismic collaboration with a Houston-based artist, Lanecia Rouse Tinsley (check out her work here), commissioned by my church Southeast Raleigh Table, for the forty day season of Lent. I was able to follow the weekly scripture readings, write a poem, and then hand-off those words to Lanecia for her to give them flesh and bones.
It not only was a dream come true for me to see a visual representation of how my words made someone feel, but it gave me the courage to name myself.
It was the first time I’ve ever called myself a poet and believed it. And the first time I allowed someone to call me a poet and believed it. That is no small feat for me. It takes quite a bit of effort for me to tell my self-doubt to sit the hell down and allow myself to accept words like this.
Rumi said, “You were born with wings, why do you prefer to crawl through life?”
Calling myself a poet, and allowing others to do the same, is the equivalent of leaving behind my hands and knees and accepting my wings.
I have always feared the possibility that someone will tell me, or worse–think and not tell me, that I do not deserve these wings. And there will always be those that think you are not good enough to fly. I am still afraid of those people. And yet, the words still come and something has to be done with them.
I recently had some dear friends speak words to me, about me, over me and a theme emerged. A theme that was, at once, exhilarating and intimidating.
Create. Creator. Cultivate.
Words are powerful things when believed. They can create sacred spaces and just as easily, they can destroy those spaces. Too often I have played the role of destroyer in my own life. I must forgive myself for that. And that forgiveness will have to be an active choice. Every day.
So, here is how I find forgiveness:
to live into these words spoken over me;
to speak those words over myself;
to believe those words;
and to create sacred spaces for myself and others.
Pretty simple, right?
As always, I am thankful you stopped by.
Alexandra