It´s not what I thought it would be
This leaving my heart on foreign soil.
I expected to have my heart change and I embrace that.
But this Immigrant Child of mine
Has a foreign stamp on her I hardly recognize
She´s him and me and…
…and something else.
Something vaguely familiar
(Because I have lived in many places, too.)
But it left a different impression on her
A mysteriously ethnic mark on her soul…
It´s beyond her “native speaker” ability in the language
That is way too obvious, simplistic
It´s ways of thought, values-based decisions (on values different from mine)
Relational patterns, things held dear, things subconscious
Something colorful & mystical to me.
Sometimes she feels completely other-worldly
She doesn´t fight my causes, defend the same things I hold dear,
Get motivated by the things I do,
Or cheer for the same teams as I.
And though I thought I wasn´t nationalistic about my home country
When she attacked it
I defended it!
I didn´t anticipate that.
She is her own world, her own person
And she´s making her own life with her God.
So I lay things at the altar I didn´t expect;
There are many of them.
And when I lay down the right to understand her as her mother
It is a holy moment.
It is a holy moment of sacred surrender,
And of a tender trust in the One who loved her first.
In the One who completely understands her.
Her destiny is still unclear.
But as I release my right to understand her
Tears begin to fall…
And I decide, I make a choice
To open-handedly and open-heartedly celebrate
My Immigrant Girl.
© 2012 Women of the Harvest.