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In my interview with Danielle over at Knotty Yarn, she asked me an interesting question involving a theme that she noticed in my writing. She called my blog a poem to my 17 year old self. I’d never considered what I’ve written here in that capacity. But, as a body of work, I can see how it easily and seamlessly falls right into that description. I wrote myself a letter in that interview, which has been churning around in my mind as incomplete.
I view my life in two very distinct chapters. Before my rape and after. But lately, it feels as though a third, unfamiliar chapter is beginning to take shape. It is begging for my attention. Pulling, pushing, challenging. It seems to be demanding that I graduate from this long-fought period of pain and emerge into my birthright. Below is the commencement speech to the girl I am becoming.
Go, with passion. Ever forward progressing with the fire of things which bring you joy, go. In the morning, after your blackest dreams, leave them waiting and fight them again later, with your sleeping mind. They have no place in your waking life, go.
Go, with boldness. You are a shining creature of light. Hiding it serves you no purpose and denies those around you the opportunity to soak up your glow, go. Write your words and sing your songs. Paint your world with your own perspective. Your brushstrokes are a living legacy to more than just your survival. They are a sequined walkway to your success, go.
Go, attack those things you think you cannot do with the same fearlessness you attack the things you know you can do. Your only failure is when you are too afraid to go. Go.
Go, love with the fullness of your heart and count on it to be broken. But dance, in the glory of love for whatever time it lasts. When you find it in its permanence, prepare for it not to be easy. But rather to be worth it. So know that you will carry battle scars, but you are a warrior. Go.
Go with confidence. Your past is not your future and is merely a shadow in your present. It is left to you to forgive. Forgiveness is not for the one who is wrong. It is for the peace of the one who is right. Act with mercy, go.
There are absolutes. There are grays. There is a world of absolute balance and chaos. It is not for you to fix, or even understand. It is for you to navigate with grace, with humility. With kindness. You are all of these things and more that are yet to be named, go.
