Does my sassiness upset you?

Why do you imagine golden birds? 

Cut the ties you have to failure and shame.

I know I am solid and sound,

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear

Flying in a green light,

The journey might take you a few hours, a day, a year, a few years, a hundred, a thousand or even more.

I exist as I am, that is enough,

But I know, too,

Did you want to see me broken?

Don’t worry.

I know I am deathless,

Do not hold regrets.

I rise.

Whitman "Song of Myself" Section 20

Angelou "Still I Rise"

Stevens "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird"

Harjo "For Calling the Spirit Back from Wandering the Earth in Its Human Feet"