White Rose - An Adoptee's Reflection

Recently, the very first poem I ever wrote has been coming to my mind. I have recited it for a few people, and I would like to share it here for you.  I wrote it when I was about seven years old. I remember it well. 

I was waiting in the dentist’s office, sitting on the floor at a small table for children. My mom had given me a very thin, light-brown notebook filled with lined paper, completely blank – not a single word written upon it. I loved the feeling of those empty pages. Their infinite possibility inspired me to turn that little notebook into a book of my very own poetry.   I decided to begin right then and there, and this was the first to emerge from my heart:

White Rose

All the tulips in the garden are growing high above,

While the little rose stands all alone, as pretty as a dove.

The white rose is the soldier of the garden,

She guards it day and night.

She’s always there when day is through,

And in the morning light.

 

I have recalled this poem many times throughout my life, but recently, for the first time, it gives me pause. I suddenly sense the seven year old me, whispering through time, trying to tell me something I had not been listening to in previous reads and recitations. Perhaps it’s due to writing my adoption memoir last year, or all of the activities with the adoption community that followed, or all of the beautiful conversations with many fellow adoptee’s that ensued, but I can really hear my little adopted self speaking through White Rose.

She’s different than the tulips, that little rose. She knows very well she is not one of them. She stands alone. She feels the vast, mysterious yet beautiful nature of her aloneness in the garden.

White in color, she senses her own purity.  Though she doesn’t even realize it, she feels close to her soul.  Her soul is right there with her in the garden, peaceful and delicate, like a small dove.  She is alone, but whole.   

Strong, with a fierce mind to protect, she is no ordinary flower, this rose… she is a soldier!  She must protect the tulips, to compensate for her lack of belonging. She must safeguard all the flowers, for that’s how she creates her value. She must look after the garden carefully, for it is the fragile inner landscape of her pure heart.

Day or night, she never lets her guard down. This soldier takes pride in her immense responsibility to defend the innocent life of the garden. She is a white rose – a soldier of purity and truth. Defending the true nature of this world is all she wants, and all that makes sense to her. 

She is unwavering and loyal. Brave. She stands tall in the darkness, trusting the light of the morning will always come again. For the Light, she waits.

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Struck by the strong symbolism, I was eager to share my reflections.  Perhaps you, too, have a little adopted self inside, who resonates.  If so, I welcome you to share in the comments. May all the beautiful flowers of our hearts connect, heal and blossom.