Unshackled

If there is a God, they will find me in the forest, in the storm, in the fire.

Anywhere but on my knees.

I will not bow to expectation. Nor shrink beneath the gaze of those who measure faith in obedience.

Let the wind howl through the trees, let the sky roar in thunder, let the flames dance untamed that is where I’ll be found.

Not in pews carved by shaking hands. Not beneath the heavy silence of sanctuaries built on guilt.

I do not reject the divine I simply refuse to believe it speaks through borrowed tongues.

Men who stand on gilded pulpits, weaving fear into doctrine, demanding devotion through downcast eyes. They speak of love but wield blades. They call themselves shepherds, but I have seen the teeth beneath their smiles.

They do not own the infinite. And they were fools to ever think it could be kept.

If the heavens have a voice, it is not whispered in trembling dogma it roars in rivers, in mountains, in the wild, untamed wilderness of being.

And if I am damned for thinking, then I will walk into the fire smiling.

Let the flames lick at my heels. Let embers singe my skin. I will not tremble.

It wasn’t hell that burned me it was the holiness of those who needed me damned.

They call it heresy to question. Blasphemy to think. Sin to seek truth beyond their walls.

But damnation is just a word. And I will not be caged by it.

I do not need scripture to know I am worthy. My existence is not an apology waiting to be spoken. I was not born in debt to a god who demands I kneel to be seen.

I am carved from the same chaos that births stars. The same fire that fuels the sun.

My worth is not dictated by ink-stained verses or the fearful decrees of trembling men.

It is in my breath. My heartbeat. My defiance.

I will not worship at an altar built from shame.

They tried to carve my sins into stone, to weigh me down with regret. But I refuse an inheritance of guilt.

Holiness is not in stained glass. Not in whispered amens. It lives in the freedom to exist, without permission.

It lives in the unshackled soul. In unrepentant laughter. In hearts that burn with the audacity to live.

I have walked through hell and the only devil I met was fear.

Fear that bound my hands. That told me to shrink, to obey, to silence the thunder in my chest.

But I faced the abyss and did not flinch.

I’ve learned the greatest sin is not defiance but surrender. Surrendering the self to hollow voices that demand it.

So let them call me lost. Let them say I am forsaken.

I will not beg for their heaven. I will not fear their hell.

If there is a god, they will find me unbowed, untamed, alive.