Poem: Becoming Free

Freedom didn’t arrive like a trumpet blast
or a door kicked open in the night—
it came quieter than that,
like a window unlatched
when no one was looking.

At first, I didn’t trust it.
The air felt too wide,
too unscripted,
like a question without a mark at the end.
I stood there, holding old habits
like coats in summer,
unsure where to set them down.

But the wind insisted—
soft, steady, unreasonable.
It slipped through my fingers,
untied the knots I forgot I’d made,
whispered, you can leave now,
as if I had always been allowed.

So I stepped—
not boldly, not bravely,
but enough.
Enough to feel the ground
not claim me, but carry me.

And somewhere between
the fear of falling
and the surprise of not,
I noticed—
nothing was chasing me anymore.

The sky didn’t ask for permission.
The road didn’t demand a name.
Even my breath felt borrowed
from something endless.

Freedom, it turns out,
is not a single moment—
it is a slow remembering:
that the cage was never locked,
that the key was never needed,
that the hands trembling at the threshold
were always my own.

And now, I walk—
not toward something,
but within it—
this vast, unfolding yes
that feels like finally
becoming mine.