Even our cocoons must be Kevlar.
No spindly feelers breech the bud,no filmy wings, slick and paper thin
greet this dawn.
We emerge fully present to our
enduring capacity to remain unbroken.
Our wings are boned in titanium
framed with panes of
shatterproof stained glass.
No wild summer breeze
nor gale force hurricane
will set us to flit and flutter.
Us with wings of leaden gold,
Us with wings like eternity
improbably heavy,
must create our own currents,
raise ourselves sturdy and skyward
to take flight by surprise.
We must fall in love
with our own industrial beauty,
never expect to be recognized
for the glorious celestial beings we are,
learn to swat daggers with every wing flap,
learn to embrace wholeness
the way Vampires learn to love
the curse of immortality.
Those cuts will never kill us,
might sting, might bleed,
but we will remain unbroken.
Understand the gift of our
impenetrable vulnerability.
We must learn to be held
and to hold others,
but know it is only
in the cradle of our own arms
that freedom is really free,
only in the understanding and sweet embrace
of our own souls
that love is fully expressed.
It is up to us to be:
Be the butterfly,
Be you, be me.
Be the night sky,
Be the stars,
Be the Universe,
Be the traveler unafraid of new adventures
Be the road that wraps back around on itself,
Be the song sung by a child when no one is awake to hear her,
Be the humming wings of quick moving birds,
Be the steady pulse of the mountain,
Be the river arching out to ride the wind across the desert sands,
Be the rain that makes love to each grain of rice in the fields,
Be whatever and whoever we dare to be,
Be the fulfillment of a universal promise,
Be the butterfly,
Be the little black girl, arms and smile outstretched with no fear of
poison daggers,
Be the little black girl with nothing to lose and the whole world on a
yo-yo string already in her back pocket,
Be the Kevlar butterfly, bulletproof and daggerproof and wordproof and
poisonproof.
Be the proof that black girls can fly.
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