Sunday After Sunday (Draft)
I grew up
in the pews.
Velvet cushions worn down
by generations of knees,
mine, too, bruised
before I ever knew what guilt was.
My grandmother’s voice
carried the weight of rosaries and penance,
of saints nailed to every corner of our house,
eyes downcast,
just like mine were
in every dress
that dipped too low,
every laugh that came too loud.
There were rules,
etched deeper than scripture:
a girl should not speak too freely,
should not argue,
should never desire
what the boys and men were handed
without question.
While my friends roamed outside,
I learned modesty
meant invisibility,
and obedience
was mistaken for virtue.
I was born in a country of open roads,
raised in the hushed corridors
of an old country
that still echoed in her every gesture.
She clung to order,
the way the altar cloths must be folded,
the way girls must fold themselves.
For a long time,
I resented her iron grip on my joy.
I mistook her fear for tyranny.
But I began to see
the edges of her story
not written in gold leaf,
but in salt and defiance.
She, the girl who crossed an ocean
with a man who was not yet her husband.
She, who walked away
from the mouth of a village
that would’ve swallowed her whole
for loving too early,
too much.
She, who taught herself a language
in fragments.
She, who raised children
between two worlds
with nothing but a catechism
and a cracked spine of hope.
Maybe she made the rules so tight
because no one gave her any for this new world.
Maybe she built her fortress from the stones
thrown at her back
when she dared to leave.
Now I watch her,
older, smaller,
lighting candles with trembling hands.
And I think...
this woman who taught me
how to fear,
also taught me
how to survive.