A Space for Me

This world offered me no spaces, just for me 

So I set out to build a space that was all my own 

Once it was devised and developed 

I filled it with my treasures and my trinkets

I filled it with my art and my brilliance 

I sat in the middle of the room that I’d created and sang until I wept 

And finally not knowing better, than the best that I could know, 

I began to fill it with my doubts and my anxieties 

I fed it with my fears and my worst case scenarios 

I painted the walls with my hunger and the need to always know; 

Am I good enough to be here doing this? 

Overwhelmed by the ghosts I had invited in, 

I found myself unable to move

And so here too this space of mine 

Began to resemble the world I had run from 

The spaces I had hoped to leave behind 

In a dream my teacher came to me 

I asked her what I was doing wrong…

She told me that my question held the answer 

“You are already healed,” she reminded me, 

“Your Ancestors wonder, ‘Why does this lady keep acting like [her spirit is] sick?’”

The next morning I felt the wind change…

A few weeks later I wrote a letter to God

And in the act of doing so I heard my true name 

It occurred to me 

That if I am to build a space that is all my own

Capable of holding my treasures and my trinkets 

Capable of housing my art and my brilliance

Then I must leave my doubts and insecurities on the outside looking in 

This world is so full of spaces in which they can belong… 

There are so many spaces where my worth can be questioned, debated, and cast to the side

Spaces where my uneasiness can be held in high esteem and reassured 

Until it feels justified in its need to cling, and distrust, and withhold

The space that I’ve built, can be no place for such things 

The space that I’ve built must be sacred in its clarity,

that I belong here

The best of me belongs here

Gently holding to the knowledge that creating such a space

Does something to the fabric of worlds long gone and worlds still yet to come 

Gently holding to the hope that creating such a space

Does something to the world outside