You finally let your mask slip And with it crumbled the dam I built for you Made of guilt and grief and pity You tore it all down with four texts Relieved me of the strain of false responsibility By revealing your true and malignant self Through the dust and dirt I finally knew what freedom felt like As the stones tumbled away and the air cleared I could finally see you sharply I knew in that moment I had done the right things A rumble began to rise As the rage began to ascend Suppressed beneath my compassion for you Barricaded by empathy your didn't deserve
Now the pain and hurt and grief and rage I held back for this last year Ices my skin Darkens my eyes Eliminates my capacity for compassion And awakens the tactician's skills The quiet, calculated, dark, divine feminine Is finally assuming her throne within me
Welcome to my healing era No fucks are given here anymore
Women! Do not center your lives around men Pleasing Appeasing We are not the prey for their predator Though some argue nature made it so
We are Medusa's progeny Serving oleander sweet tea And Aqua Tofana cocktails We carry the legacies of Lilith Hecate and the Morrigan Skywoman and Diana of the Hunt In our bones
We are born with cunning woven into our shadows Placed there by the midwives and wise-women Kitchen witches and herbalists Shaman and priestesses Who came before us
We have our own form of politics Whispered around washing wells and sewing circles Book clubs and coffee tables We don our poison rings and hat pins Let them think our docility safe While we keenly observe and note and remember
It is time to end the war waged upon our bodies The raping of our spirit The subjugation of our gender We are the gateway of life We break ourselves open through blood and pain To do the Goddess's work of creation
Too long have we allowed the world to think us Weak Helpless Foolish Simple Incapable We must remind the world of our strength
Boudicca was beaten and her daughters raped And in her rage she waged war against Rome Joan d'Arc stood against the English and the Church A God-touched, heretic, peasant child whose heart would not burn Harriet Tubman survived the travesties of slavery Another God-touched woman who delivered 70 other souls to freedom And we know there are so many more like them
Though we may not find our names etched in history We are no less powerful than those who are Our lives are OUR CHOICE We are not chattel nor trophies We are creation gifted autonomy It is our divine right to wield our lives as we see fit
Let them vilify us as Succubi Mad women Uppity bitches And cunts
We know we are Goddesses Priestesses Witches And warriors
We are exhausted We are fed up We are wrathful The Divine Feminine rises The world is set ablaze around us But we are not tied to the pyre We choose to look the world dead in the eye And dance while it burns
Birthing a new world is painful Shifting a paradigm is tectonic
Daughters, We do not just choose The Bear We are The Bear We are the Wild Mother We are gifted with the power of creation We are skilled in navigating grief We are aligned with the cycles of life
Daughters, We are the builders of community We are the storytellers We are the lore keepers We are the heart and the hearth We are the fire keepers We are the fire
I have worn my tear stains like war paint The flush of agony, despair, and rage, too I have unleashed keening so potent The gods stopped to answer With a path to deliverance
How did it feel when I was finally arrested? Did it bring you glee to know I was handcuffed and taken away? Were you happy your long standing desire was finally fulfilled? Were you satisfied with yourself? Did you celebrate? Did you pat yourself on the back triumphantly? Did you rejoice knowing I was forced into the company of actual criminals? Did it make you giddy to know I experienced the humiliation of being strip searched? Were you finally satisfied to get the mother of your children arrested? Was it all you hoped for?
Who does that? Who plots plans premediates such things? Who bates and berates? Who starts a fire and fans the flames? Who then pretends that they didn't create the inferno? Who has no remorse? Who shows love like that? Who did I marry? How soon can I be free?
You gave me scars deep below my skin So I keyed this poem into your car A parting gift A reminder of the damage you've caused Easier to repair than what you did to me
Words Wishes and Wisdom 