I’m Getting to Know Her by Kinyatta Gray
What you see here may not be who you were, but it may recognize who you are becoming. 🦋
I’m Getting to Know Her
by Kinyatta Gray
I stood in the mirror
and didn’t recognize the woman looking back at me.
Not because she was unfamiliar,
but because she was honest.
Her hair was shorter now.
Not styled for approval.
Not softened for comfort.
Cut to match the clarity she carries.
Cut to match the weight she no longer holds.
I wondered if I had shed too much.
If I had released too many versions of myself.
Too many people.
Too many explanations.
Grief has a way of making you audit your life.
Every relationship.
Every silence you once tolerated.
Every place you made yourself smaller so love would not leave.
Some people from my past do not get to meet this version of me.
Not out of bitterness,
but because access requires alignment,
and I finally understand the difference.
This woman has learned things
no book could teach her.
She has witnessed absence.
She has absorbed loss.
She has released illusions.
She knows now that survival changes
the architecture of the soul.
I second-guessed her at first.
That is what we do with what is new.
We mistake unfamiliar peace for regret.
We question growth when it does not resemble
who we used to be.
But standing there,
face bare and spirit steadier,
I realized this is not a mistake.
This is becoming.
I am getting to know her.
I am learning her boundaries.
Her softness.
Her quiet strength.
I embrace her.
I accept her.
And I know, deeply and without question,
she is not alone.
She carries love that never left.
She walks with guidance that did not disappear.
She is becoming,
and somehow,
she is exactly where she is supposed to be.
I am getting to know her.
And for the first time,
I am not rushing the introduction.
© 2025 Kinyatta Gray. All rights reserved.
This poem and accompanying image are original works and may not be copied, reproduced, distributed, or adapted without written permission from the author.
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