Some poems, despite being really old, still seem current to me. I’m in a different place, my readers are in a different place, but yet the poems remain popular and even gain a new audience. The meaning and depth behind the words seems to change. “Tomorrow, She Walks With Grace” is one of those types of poems.
I wrote this one over twenty years ago. I was in a place where I saw that the things that had happened to me had made me someone who sabotaged every good thing I tried to bring into my life. Self-sabotage is something we do when we don’t feel we deserve happiness or love. I wanted to wake up and be a different woman, one that could put it all behind me and just be the “me” that God created. Just be creative and silly and introverted and geeky. I wanted to be the girl I was meant to be, whatever that meant. At the time I wrote this poem, I didn’t know what it meant. I don’t think I even know it now, but I have a better idea.
I mentioned this poem a while back as I was creating a painting, and I do find that the words from this one find their way into my art. This poem was also published in my first poetry book, The Difference Now.
Tomorrow, She Walks With Grace
Tomorrow…
I will be a new woman.
I will smile like a girl with thin thighs.
I will close my eyes and breathe deeply
exhaling bad thoughts from all the days before.
I will remain silent
listening to God
greeting Him with a welcoming mind.
Tomorrow…
I will get up early.
I will be thankful for my ability to rise again.
Like a warrior.
Facing a new day.
Strong.
Ready.
Tomorrow…
I will laugh like a child
and wonder why adults don’t play more.
Tomorrow…
I will move my muscles.
Drink cleansing water.
Eat good food.
Not drive so fast.
Not be so angry.
Tomorrow…
I will not think about the mistakes
I made on any day before.
I will walk with wisdom
and know I have earned it.
Tomorrow…
I will not hear the snickering,
the laugher of those who claim to be friends.
I will move further down that road of understanding,
climbing to the highest perch,
so I can look out on all God offers.
Tomorrow…
A new woman will emerge
from this tired cocoon.
She will no longer wish that same desire.
She will understand her fate.
Solitary in nature,
with angels for companions.
Tomorrow…
She will be the woman
that walks with grace.
