Freedom

And when I close my eyes I could feel it 

It felt like the relief a drop of sweat sighs on my forehead on a hot sunny day

Like wafts of love’s breath dancing on my lips. 

Like the dance of my fingers tracing across fields of passion 

Like I was home.

I was home. Grasping pieces of a broken me in clenched fists.

Fists I had used in the battle with my consciousness 

Battle because when I close my eyes I could see it and it scared me

It looked like a cloak of confidence sheltering naivety 

Like rows of dead apologies 

Like a path paved with nodding coincidences 

It looked like home.

I was home. Wrapped in verses of failure that I held close to my skin for years.

Skin that sung stories of minds in chains and the girl that never belonged.

Even though I tried because when I close my eyes I could hear it.

It sounded like a thousand souls liberated by a birth that most called death.

Like a captured voice returned

Like breaking chains

Like feet, greeting the ground slowly at first 

Then rushing towards the first meeting with what they had known all their lives.

Home.

“Freedom” by Adelle Onyango