What is Sown in Light?

Sown in Light is more than the title of my poetry book or the name of a budding brand. It’s a revelation.

When I first started writing poetry for this collection, I didn’t have a title in mind. In fact, the title was the last thing I submitted. How do you name something sacred as it’s unfolding? How do you title a work that pulls you out of the abyss and brings you to the edge of your own awareness? I didn’t know either.

But as the stories and poems started coming together, I felt it—a quiet, undeniable pull toward a kind of bravery I hadn’t tapped into before. There was both fear and freedom in it. A lightness, and a trembling.

All I knew was this: if I wasn’t going to be honest—really honest—then I had no business writing.

So I made myself a quiet promise: to lay my story bare, even in its seeming simplicity, even in the parts that felt uncomfortable to tell.

I wasn’t looking for something polished or pretty.
I wanted something real.
I was after depth. After healing. After light.

So I kept going. Digging beneath the surface. Pulling up roots, untangling weeds, turning over what had been buried. Writing started to feel like tending a garden, messy, miraculous, and full of meaning.

Writing was one way I started digging. But I wasn’t doing the work alone.

While I was writing, I was also listening—filling myself with self-help, spiritual teachings, and words that spoke to where I was.

One podcast in particular, In the Light, felt like an external conversation echoing my inner dialogue.

Dr. Anita Phillips, the host, first entered my life through a YouTube sermon. She was talking about a tree, and somehow connected the image of a seed to the brain stem. It was poetic and scientific and spiritual all at once... and it unlocked something in me. 

After that first sermon, I was hooked. I became a full-on stan. I searched for every message I could find, soaking up her words because she did something I had never been given permission to do: she acknowledged and respected feelings.

She spoke openly about the mind, and the deep connection between spiritual, emotional, and mental health. In each one, she peeled back the layers of emotional complexity I had carried since I was a child, feelings I didn’t know how to name, or wasn’t allowed to name, or was too ashamed to name.

So when she launched her podcast, In the Light, I was already in.

And the more she named emotions—calling out anxiety, depression, fear, worry, stress—the more my own feelings began to surface. The more I heard her speak truth, the more I started speaking my own. Not just out loud, but inwardly.

Not just to others, but to myself.

That shift in honesty started to show up in my writing—especially in my first poem, Namesake, where I wrote about burying my gifts deep, hoping no one would find them.

Sown in Light is not just a book title. It’s a reminder.

A calling. Forward.

A soft, sacred tug that says, “I see you. You were planted with purpose. You were always meant to bloom.”

It’s not to say “don’t be afraid,” but it’s to say: acknowledge it. Make peace with it. And do it anyway.

Sown in Light is a reminder to myself and a love note to you.

This message is for the women who have been whispering their stories, waiting for the right moment to say them out loud. It’s for the ones who’ve been playing small, staying quiet, hiding their brilliance out of fear or shame or habit. I know what that feels like. I’ve lived there too.

But I also know what it feels like to step out—nervous, unsteady, unsure—and still speak.

To stand in the sun with shaky legs, sweaty palms, a trembling voice, and say:

“Hi. My name is Tekira. And here’s what I know…”

We grow in the light.
We bend and wave and stretch in the light.
We are made new in the light.

And so, every poem, every piece of this work, this offering, is a love note to the girl who needs to hear, “You’re not alone.” It’s a warm embrace. An acknowledgment. A holy permission slip to feel everything, name everything, and still rise.

You were sown in light.

Don’t forget that.