Release Me – Poetry by Xianna Michaels

“Release Me” is a sonnet written during an unaccustomed period when I could not seem to carve out time to write.

It is unnerving for me to read it today, because about two years after I wrote it I suffered a literal, catastrophic fall and broke my jaw and my ribs. It tells me we ignore our inner promptings at our peril.
Release Me
I prayed for light, dear G-d, so I could see;
I’d groped around in darkness far too long.
So You lit up my sacred path for me
With painful shocks whenever I went wrong.
And so I learned, but still my courage fails me.
But why? What power holds me in such thrall?
I beg You, G-d, please heal whatever ails me,
But I cannot take another major fall.
And while it’s true I know my path by now,
Yet others’ wishes still take precedence.
Does fear of censure override my vow
To You, or do I doubt my inner sense?
  Whatever phantom captor stills my pen,
  Release me, G-d, that I may write again.

It is unnerving for me to read it today, because about two years after I wrote it I suffered a literal, catastrophic fall and broke my jaw and my ribs. It tells me we ignore our inner promptings at our peril.
Release Me
I prayed for light, dear G-d, so I could see;
I’d groped around in darkness far too long.
So You lit up my sacred path for me
With painful shocks whenever I went wrong.
And so I learned, but still my courage fails me.
But why? What power holds me in such thrall?
I beg You, G-d, please heal whatever ails me,
But I cannot take another major fall.
And while it’s true I know my path by now,
Yet others’ wishes still take precedence.
Does fear of censure override my vow
To You, or do I doubt my inner sense?
  Whatever phantom captor stills my pen,
  Release me, G-d, that I may write again.