You look my way, but don’t see me.
Looking through me, past me,
I am not present in your eyes.
I am not seen, I am not heard.
Yet God says to me, “I love you, my child.
You are my daughter, lovingly created in my image.”
My gifts are yet-to-be-mined diamonds, still buried within.
They burn within my spirit, searing my soul,
Diamonds ablaze with desire to be quarried, cut, and polished, to shine for God’s glory.
The possibility of their existence does not occur to you.
Did God intend for me to be passed over, ignored,
Condemned to perpetual “time-out,”
Punished like a misbehaving child for being female?
Open the eyes of my oppressors, O Lord.
Help them to see through your eyes,
To see me and my sisters as fully gifted reflections of you.
Open blind eyes to the pain in our souls, the potential in our spirits.
The church does not hear our voices,
Yet …
We exist. We are here. We are called.
We are valuable in your sight.
