On Becoming.. in Journal

My senses are sharp. They relay to me the exquisite sensations of the world. I revel in the cold sting of chilled running water, and the warmth that blooms in my skin afterward. My eyes seem to penetrate the farthest distance, and I imagine that I can see as well and as far as the keen eyed eagle. My nose pricks the faintest trace of musk, spying the passersby of early morn; those night stalkers that can’t be seen. Even my ears bring me news of far away happenings, warning me if they should come any closer.
And yet there remains a sage indwelling wisdom to pick through and decipher these senses of mine. There is not the anxious nervousness of a bird, nor the blind curiosity of a dog following a trail wherever it may lead. No, I have something that makes me entirely different from them. And still, I don’t know exactly what it is.
It seems that I have never known who I am. Not really. I was told when I was very young that I was a girl. I was told all that was expected of me. But I didn’t feel like a girl, and I didn’t want to do the things they said I should do. I felt very much like an errant lion cub, cuffed and rebuffed, not unkindly, by the huge and powerful adult lions in my pride. All I wanted was to stretch and run, to see how far and how fast I could really go. But they told me it was not for me. They told me to stay at home and start learning to be a proper lioness, for that was what I must become.
Then, I was told that I was a young woman; that I must put even more effort into my studies, and to remain chaste and pure. But I didn’t feel like a young woman. Every night I dreamed, and I dreamed of far away places, of promiscuity, love, abandonment, torture, animalistic urges, of predatory tendencies, and prey like fear. I always carried my dreams in secret shame, for my parents remained to me as the huge and powerful adults, only now with more threat of consequence. Then, I felt more akin to the young rabbit venturing out of her warren for the first times. She was anxious, fearful of every shadow, but so enraptured with the world around her that she barely had a care for her own safety. Better to become a victim of the world, than to remain in painful ignorance of it.
After that, I left my parents and I was running, hiding, and furtively acting on my half imagined fantasies. Finally free, I was like a vixen; always hungry and never satiated. Drunk on sensation. My mind whirled and my eyes were bright with the possibilities of the world, for I had only a small taste of it, but I dearly wanted it all. Those were some dark days in my life. They were filled with fear; more fear than I ever had when I was still under the power of my parents. For the threat of their violence still clung to me. Only now I was deserving of it. And it drove me to run faster and hide deeper.
Now. As I am, still unsure of who or what I am. Was I ever a girl? Or a young woman? Am I a woman now? I know only that I am not what I once was. I am a shape-shifter; a changling. I think that I will continue to shift and to change. I know that I am now more calm and serene, more accepting. My eyesight is still keen, my ears still sharp. I can see farther than I ever could before, even into myself. But my gaze is no longer wanting; no longer fearful, or even hopeful. My eyes are the eyes of the lounging observer, resting far above and not disheveled by the world. The eyes of a Jaguar. I love to watch the moon at night, for she speaks to me of calm, cool acceptance, swift decided action, and of the changing nature that is within me.