I don’t have the usual things
A husband or wife
Kids
A regular job or some kind of inheritance
A drive for security.
I have fear
But it won’t drive me to keep doing
Something I hate
Or to stay at a job that dries my soul.
In those places, there’s only the steel fences of boundaries that devour delicate gray green shoots and whitish veins.
My life was never about that
I’ve not understood
What
My life has been about
But I know this—I won’t stand in line
To find out
I’ll go soaring and skipping
Across geeen fields
In bare feet
And when the hall monitor tells my 16 year old self to put my shoes on
I’ll run away and shout over my shoulder
“I will, when I get to class”
And she will shake her head and threaten detention after school for three days
But my feet won’t be contained
By the ordinary shoes
Of normal people
– Uma Bode