12.15.14

I.

How fearful I became the first time walking through its doors

Learning for a fact that I wasn’t a United States citizen

How the tears flowed fearful of deportation

Seeing a country I haven’t seen in almost two decades

Hearing a language that is no longer at the forefront of my mind

Lost in prayer, pleading with my Maker

Please don’t allow them to strip me of my identity

How fearful I became a second time

When I felt like a criminal when they placed my hand on the glass

Pressing down each finger separately until it was displayed on the screen above

How fearful I became a third time

When the same action had to be done again

Feeling more shameful than criminal because I was told incorrectly

How fearful I became a fourth time walking through its doors

Knowing I didn’t want to live the life planned

Out in Plan B

II.

Seven hundred and sixty days, seven hundred and sixty days

SEVEN HUNDRED AND SIXTY DAYS later

I walk through its doors again

More fearful than any other point in time

III.

Chatter is all around and friendly faces greet me

Waiting in line to make sure every little detail is correct

Signing an oath with my given name my correct name

Allowing these chains that have bound me

To loosen up just a bit

IV.

It seems like a lifetime before family and friends enter the room

The replaying of the here from there starts

And it doesn’t stop until every fiber of my being

Is feeling some sort of emotion because it’s in the replaying of moments

I know this was never my job nor my fight

To become someone's daughter

I was chosen, disowned, left behind to get lost within a government system

All I have ever wanted, all I have ever needed

Was for someone to love me

I am tired of being lost I just want to be found and found for good

And have the comfort of safety surround me

V.

It begins the ceremony that will  completely set me free

He starts to speak of all the countries represented in this room

But he forgets Russa

And that feeling of being lost resurfaces, but it’s quickly corrected

Then a another gentleman speaks

And it becomes white noise because I know my responsibilities

I’ve been here long enough

Just give me the paper that makes it all legal

In which all my rights are intact

I just want it to be over, I just need it to be over

And with a little more chatter and some song singing

I raise my hand and declare my allegiance to the United States of America

And with so help me God

After seven hundred and sixty days

SEVEN HUNDRED AND SIXTY DAYS TOO LONG

I felt the long awaited calm

VI.

What a feeling it is to know

My greatest Goliath is no more

Hallelujah, hallelujah AMEN!

07.09.15