Humbly Expressing Brilliance
How does one remain humble, yet see and express their brilliance?
The poet Rilke says to “be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart.” Love the questions. Live the answers now.
I opened an old journal tonight and found this scrawled in red:
somehow I grew
accustomed to taking
my tongue out willfully —
handing it over to the loudest
person in the room
so they could tell me
how the world tastes
I will never again
give away the pleasure
of my own sweet
sour
salty
tangy
taste of living on this earth
I used to make a habit of apologizing for myself. Deferring. Not seeing or tasting myself clearly. As if that is a humble gesture.
Once , when I was working as an usher at a college football game an attractive, dark haired man came up and started talking with me. “What’s your name?” he asked. “Who do you hang out with?” After a few short, blushing replies from me, and some small talk about football, he said, “Would you want to go out sometime?”
“No,” I said. Not because I didn’t want to, but because I thought he was playing a joke on me. I scanned the crowd looking for drunken men watching us, egging him on from afar. Even though I didn’t see any, I was sure he was only asking me out because he had been dared to. It wasn’t until he called me the next day and asked again that I realized he might actually be interested in me.
I used to hunch my back and cave my shoulders in to hide my breasts and my heart. I used to look away first when someone, usually a man, held eye contact too long. I used to lay myself down upon the bed and let him.
Now I stand tall, back straight, breasts out, eyes wide open. I don’t apologize. I don’t defer. I don’t look away. I don’t lay down for anyone except by my own desire.
Now I taste my own vision. I give my tongue and its language over to my own blaring horizon where my brilliance shines crepuscular rays on the whole damn field of my becoming.
Now I stand in the humble shadow of the sidelines beaming, and know that I am absolutely no joke.
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