“Speak boldly and with intellect. Never hush your voice for someone else’s comfort. Speak your mind, make people uncomfortable.” ~ Unknown

I am choking on all of the words I know I shouldn’t say out loud.

I feel as if I am ill. My throat burns and my heart aches with the suffocation of not speaking what is written across my body in shaky manuscript, soaking in tears and the disillusionment of artificial ties to what is no longer serving me.

Suddenly I realize that I can’t find the words to speak what needs to be said. It is a momentary truth. Whether or not these words withstand the test of time, they need to be expressed—not so anyone else might hear them, but so I can breathe a sigh of relief knowing they are released into the world.

I feel as if my identity is spun at the hands of those who misunderstand me.

Regardless of how authentically I present myself or my thoughts, others can only understand me according to their own level of self-awareness and comprehension.

My truth is mine regardless of how it is interpreted. I am not asking others to agree, but I am hoping my words will make others stop and think, if only for a moment.

Sometimes I feel as if I know nothing at all, that these words are simply dreams that grew wings and then launched themselves into space without any predetermined destination. Maybe that is the only way to speak the sentiments of our heart, when it thinks no one else is listening.

I’m just a woman, sometimes simple yet often times more complex than I can imagine. I don’t intend to be the way I am. It comes as naturally as the seasons do, sometimes blooming pale pink in lovely adoration, and at others barren and cold, waiting to come alive once again.

No one is one specific persona, as long as we allow ourselves to ebb and flow as the tides along the rocky shore.

I’m independent and strong yet know that I have a tender weakness I try to protect with the scandalous armor of sexiness and a brash honesty.

All I can do is bleed these crimson soaked words, smelling of warm vanilla and aged pages from a journal that no one wishes to read anymore.

I’m brave, but oh so scared—every single day.

Fear sometimes wraps itself around my bruised heart until one day it can reach the sun and bloom.

But it’s not a fear I run from, which may sound like a contradiction. Rather I’ve made friends with my fear. We sit over steaming mugs of black mango tea steeped in honey and laugh about all of the times I thought I had things figured out, only to realize the moral never came.

At one time my journey was painful because I was scared to talk to God—I had trepidation in acknowledging that such a being existed. After experiencing great pain; babies that bled from my womb, bruises that appeared on my skin and children whose cries still echo in my mind, I wondered how such a God could exist.

So it became easier to pray to the universe, until I realized one day that I wasn’t scared of God anymore, we had made peace.

I may never identify with one particular religion, but not feeling embarrassed or scared by my belief in the divine feels like a piece of my heart is fitting back together, gifting me the strength that I’d abandoned in the bitter trails of indifference.

I never lose sleep because deep down I have unfathomable faith.

And I realize that it’s not late night whiskey moons, or breathing in pot smoke as thick as a summer night that makes me a wild woman, but it’s my vulnerability. It’s giving myself the courage to say what’s on my mind and in my heart.

My need to share my words scare me as I sit and let the harsh first light of day wash over them. Yet silencing myself is a battle that I have no desire to wage again.

Sometimes it’s hard to keep writing—to keep letting it flow and not worry about what may come of the prose that sometimes seems to be too good to be true. My memories and wishes mix like the rivers into the vast ocean. Regardless of the contradictions, or seemingly twisting backroads, it’s all a part of who I am.

I’m content, yet I want.

I want a love whose old fashioned sweetness is matched by its unparalleled freedom.

I enjoy gender specific roles which provide comfort, yet crave the freedom that lets us both fly away when we need to. Tender hands and a soft heart of a leader—a love who can sit quietly with an arm around my shoulders as I’m reminded I’m not alone in this life or with an erotic hair pull and a slap of my *ss can let me know who’s really in charge.

Because as the moon grows full under the lingering summer sky, I am reminded that who I am is not determined by the rules I played by yesterday.

Maybe I’ll seem shy or perhaps radiate a confidence so bright it’s blinding. There might be an innocent look to a dirty thought, and I may seem so strong that I couldn’t possibly need anyone.

Yet, I do.

I need and want and crave and satisfy, again and again until morning comes and the new day determines a new me—and with it whatever lessons or blessings that life might bring my way.

And maybe it’s crazy to speak my crazy fears and desires, my innermost thoughts.

But on the other hand, it feels crazier not to.

~

Author: Kate Rose

Editor: Ashleigh Hitchcock

Photo: flickr/Martinak15