NON INIUSSA CANO —ECLOGA VI:IX [1]
The breeze told me
that our names serve as prophecy. And
if a request could have floated from my preformed lips up to my mother’s hopes:
amanda
I would say
amanda
I cry
As for my mom, she thought princess
And I can’t complain.
There are perks to being a princess—born with natural talents, set to inherit the realms sitting on those shelves that line my room.
I can paint, harmonize, dance, braid hair, dream, and I have a well-tamed temper that furrows my eyebrows in an endearing way—or so they say.
I became my name.
People tell me there is no use for my classics major.
But I tell them amanda means she who must be loved.
There is something different about just being loved.
It’s a fact. A necessity.
The weight of princess is the gildedness of the
gold. Lovable in nature, lovable for Reasons:
for the work created,
for the music made,
for the image painted,
for the role fulfilled.
As diamonds tug at the ear and gemmed bracelets cage both wrists
I say back to the breeze
o esse amanda. [2]
FOOTNOTES
1: Latin for “Not uncommanded do I sing.”
2: Latin for “O to be amanda.”
Sarah Ling ’24 loves God and admires His creativity. She is on the continual pursuit of Beauty and hopes that she can mimic even the smallest amount of this in her own life—starting with the Telos journal and graphic designs around the campus and Williams Christian Fellowship.