Have the Courage to Reveal Yourself
Sarah Dravec
I wish I could tell you that I am a weeping willow
growing from a river no an ocean no an explosion. I
know what it is like to be an explosion to be a person
all exploded and disappointing in my ruin. What I
know more is how lovely my branches will be when
they are really open and pouring my sadness away
from me and down toward my roots all at once. Oh
this sunset and its unexpected colors and the
nightscape this day will become when we are less easy
to see. When we are so happy looking dark and being
dark. When you reveal yourself you cannot stay dark.
When you stand in the light you will inflate. Not
because it is too hard to resist the light at the mouth of
the cave. I am in the cave all the time and I know what
it is like to be made of bad rock while you are dying to
be soft and bright. I wish I could tell you I became this
tree and I am the most powerful tree. Instead I
became the skin on a woman’s lip. Instead I became a
woman’s eyelash. Instead I became a woman’s
reflection saying here I am with the smallest cells.
Sarah Dravec is a recent graduate of the NEOMFA. She is a poetry editor for Barn Owl Review. In 2015, she was awarded a University and College Poetry Prize from the Academy of American Poets. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Bone Bouquet, jubilat, Phantom Limb, Pinwheel, and others.