Based off of Nikki Giovanni's "My Tower" from her poetry book, "My House" circa 1972. This is a rough draft of poem I chose to write in class with my students today.

My Tower

I have built my tower on the tears of an abused scared woman from Chicago.
Spinning nightmares while needling peace in my little girl fantasies of Wonder Woman.

I have built my drems on the love of a man, holding my fragile hand through tough days back in 1997.

I have built my castle by the shore
remembering good time with my old friends, thinking I was not a queen
but when a tiny grain crept inside
my bruised heart, it reminded me of my
untouched beauty.
I spit around and around
and spun a new serene universe inside
embracing the woman of integrity
I am now.
But back then I used to hide beneath
under all my blue insecurities.

I have borne a nation
on my heart
and my strength shall not be my
undoing.
Cause this castle never crumbles.
And losing my peace for that mometn in time helped me to gain an inner spirit
that is powerful.
Now I'm full and complete and like the white dove soaring above Chicago Rainbow's Beach, I whisper to the world that I travel through.
I know like that dove, I am an divine being created by the creator and an instrument used by the master
for his final musical mastery.
Like a new mother emptying her womb for the very first time, I give to the world a new being, fresh, wet and new to be molded again.
And while my blue sea ebbs and flows to the melodies that God plays,
I flow gently, all around the earth.
I sigh in relief.
I am now home.