The Beginning of A Dream Planted

In 2010, beginning my junior year in college, I took one of those general education "required" courses that ended up changing my life. I don't even remember the class name, but its content was women's studies, specifically in third-world or impoverished countries, and its focus was on human and sex trafficking. At 21 years old, I had never heard about trafficking and was appalled and the reality that was uncovered. Not only did I learn that human sex trafficking existed, but that my city- my hometown, Toledo, Ohio- was ranked as the #4 city per capita in the US for the sex trafficking industry. The University of Toledo held an annual conference to educate and mobilize people about anti-trafficking efforts. As a part of my course, I was invited to attend. I remember meeting speakers of different non-profit organizations, hearing testimonies from rescued victims, and learning from scholars' research about this multi-billion dollar industry... a multi-billion dollar industry of selling women and children's bodies for profit. I was heartbroken. My heart seemed to be breaking at an increased rate for the country of Cambodia, it's 80% status of orphaned children, and its high rank as a country of origin from where sex trafficked victims come. 

That college course and conference was only the first seed planted of my calling to work and fight against this phenomenally horrific crisis in our world today. This poem articulates an overview of my journey unraveling and specifying of that calling.

A Dream Planted

Seven years ago

a dream was planted in my heart.

It needed time to grow

and cross-cultures to be nurtured.

I traveled over the Atlantic to share my dream

and met the nations of China and Korea in France.

I explored European loveliness,

learned new language,

and returned home.

The dream stirred

and the Wind blew me across the Pacific

to the happiest children in Cambodia.

I learned a new language,

soaked up happiness,

and returned home.

The dream felt crushed, then re-directed;

I waited for that Wind

but my travels lay stagnant.

So I absorbed a new language, new culture

in place

and waited, and prayed, and waited,

and waited.

           

A new adventure was birthed within my dream,

the destination seemed a detour to me,

until there came that faithful Wind

with purpose and precision

sending me once more over sea

to India: the land of my dreams.

Once there I found myself in mourning and weep,

I learned no new language,

absorbed many questions,

ached in limitations to be fully me,

and returned.

The dream disappeared.

A smoldering wick, an ember remnant

was kindled again by dreamers’ intervention.

I felt again that Wind of direction

To build roots, stay planted—

that dream needs a home

here where I’m landed.

I look around and within

to see cross-cultures,

diversity displayed in the city of L.A.

the nations have come here

and here I am, I land,

the hovering Wind, ever-present, always stands

with me, forever, wherever I am.

“Certainly Your faithful protection and loving provision will pursue me where I go, always, everywhere. I will always be with the Eternal, in Your house forever.”