When We Were Little Girls (5.01.05)
by Ruth Cunningham
by Ruth Cunningham
A Mother's Musing About
The Meaning of Women's Shoes:
The Meaning of Women's Shoes:
W
hen we were little girlswe ran
everywhere,
without shoes,
truly naked
free
children,
we were our own
points
and souls
before heeled history
tamed us
named us
maimed us
gave us god
and selfless goals.
When we were little girls
We understood
Everything,
we were Knowledge -
the thrill of new self-knowing
streaming out from us
flying in sparked wake
unbound,
slipping away
as if escaped,
unfettered
we found ourselves
un-tethered
freed from that fatal flaw
force
aware we had arrived
unshaped by mistake
or false guilt,
or the choice of
shame or
repentant remorse,
as though we
were life's remedy
and rightful recourse.
When we were little girls
We believed in Life
and knew too much
about Nothing,
pretending to be unaware
of our future,
breathless with abandon
we raced ahead of care
as yet untouched
by womanhood's despair.
we knew we were
unfair unwitting privilege,
propelled into the bright blue
of summers spent
upon our own
un-dreamt shores.
We were unscathed innocence
uncoupled from error,
unafraid of our own unknowing
unprepared for our own growing,
spared the illusion of truth's daring
we daily dreamed ourselves up
like every original sunrise,
certain of the sight of our own eyes,
un-surprised by the magic of breath,
(and had we known, we would have been
stunned by the notion of death)
We flew like kites in front of time
the harbingers of unmanned flight
little girls without shoes
holy child of mine
love's imperfect pattern
carved out of time
learned lessons
pressed
into perfect
self-design.