Greetings this #ThinkingThursday, a vulnerable poem to share today

Thanks so much to #MiracleMindsetMentor Akosua Brown What’s Your Story – Author Services for her Tender Pages writing workshop last Saturday, it opened space to feel & heal some grief. I hope this touches your heart also

I feel the titration
of a world dying
slowly enough to witness,
quickly enough to ache.

And still—
people evolve,
community rethreads itself
through the cracks.

Grief moves like weather:
denial in the morning,
sadness by afternoon,
anger sparking at dusk,
bargaining in the night,
acceptance slipping in
unannounced.

These emotions so normal
they become invisible—
unnamed, unfelt,
unhealed.

In my body, an old refrain:
children are to be seen, not heard.
It rings in my chest,
a somatic bell
of shame,
of neglect.

My voice folded inward.
My heart learned silence.

I was allowed to disappear
into screens—
TV glow, endless feeds—
a sanctioned dissociation.
Eating my feelings.
Smoking cannabis.
Screens dovetailing into munchies,
numbness dressed as comfort,
survival rituals learned early
and practiced well.

And somewhere along the way
I forgot
who I am,
where my magic lives.

A not knowing.
Coping masquerading as choice.
Avoidance dressed as rest.
Distraction cascading into escape.

Grief keeps pulling
my muscle memory backward—
toward what was,
toward what felt known,
even when it hurt.

And yet—
identity is under reconstruction.
I am learning
how to live anew.

A slippery slope
I am now aware of—
parts of me stuck,
circling a familiar rut,
unsure how to emerge.

I am in a chrysalis,
uncertain of my wings—
their shape,
their strength,
whether they remember
how to fly,
how to inspire.

This is a journey
of emotional intelligence,
of authenticity
still becoming.

Beyond my skin,
the world fractures—
imperialism renamed necessity,
domination baptized as order,
murder justified,
sometimes applauded.

My peace shatters.
Safety reveals itself
as illusion,
as privilege balanced on eggshells.

It’s hard to breathe
when the air might carry tear gas.

Still, I make space.

For love.
For joy.
For acceptance.
For creativity, beauty, and play.

For dreaming—
not as escape,
but as practice.

For sustainability and regeneration.
For remembering we belong
to the elements:
earth beneath,
air within,
fire transforming,
water remembering,
metal holding,
wood growing,
ether listening.

For reverence made policy.
For protection stretched
seven generations forward
and beyond.

I am dreaming a new world.
And when I am quiet—
when I soften my grip on what was
and breathe into what’s forming—

I witness her.
I am her.
Emerging.