Wrote this 5 years ago while feeding my then infant daughter. Women will always inspire me 💕

I see her, dressed in all white like the sisters that walked before her, rise with grace and composure.  Her face, serene.  Never a crack in her veneer-made of steel-as she is booed and jeered by onlookers.  She is a pillar of strength-knowing she is won.  Riding out her undeserved humiliation with her head held up high.  Still getting under his skin because he feels the truth in his bones as clearly as we do.  She won.  She was better, smarter, wiser, more experienced, more beloved, more qualified.  Yet she lost. We all lost.  How befitting for her, for us-our punishment for living, for being women, for daring to strive towards greater unknowns.  Emails.  Benghazi. Propaganda, hate, lies.  The victim of her husband’s wrongdoings.  Damned if she did, damned if she didn’t.  Knowing it wasn’t her politics they brought her down, but her womanhood.  Anything to bring down the girl from Illinois who dared to think she was just as good-hell,even better- than the boys the next to her.  

She was never going to be ‘uncle Joe’.  How can she crack jokes and be one of the guys?   If she did, she’d be deemed a flirt who slept around to get ahead.  It would ruin her.  If she smiled tersely and continued to talk shop while the boys drank beer, she was a humorless bitch, a bore, the girl no one wanted to be around.  

Not ‘personable’ enough.  

Well, it’s time for a bunch of humorless bitches to rise.  

I am tired. 

Tired because I know that MLK’s ‘I have a dream’ speech still doesn’t fully apply to girls-yet.   Tired of waiting for the day in which I can stop smiling, and start shouting.  Tired because I know my own mask-the one that cracks so much more easily than hers-cannot bear the burdens of staying quiet any more.  

Sick of being the pliable plaything for men to mold, to shape their ideals of beauty, perfection and intelligence on me.  Years and years of operant conditioning threaten to break me.  I only smile because they want me to.  Wear a size 2 because that is all the space I am allowed to take up.  Avert my eyes so that I won’t invite their unwanted touches and stares.  Hide my ‘liberal’ agenda.  Who I am to have opinions?  It doesn’t please you.  The only offending agent is my my brown skin and unruly curls.  Deeming me ‘exotic’.  But as I age, even that fades.  Gray hairs come.  Double chins form. The weight and love of my babies form macroscopic dents that forever changed the topography of what once was beautiful.  Everything fades.  Just not my mind-sharper, angrier and more focused by the minute. 

I am tired. 

Of being friendless.  Though it is more exhausting to have friends.  

Fitting the mold again.  Pretending to be white because I don’t know who I am otherwise.  But I don’t share your blood.  Knowing many of your ancestors enslaved, looted, pillaged, and raped mine, and others, too. But it’s not your fault, how dare I make you uncomfortable with my rhetoric?  Even though you do nothing to acknowledge my pain and make it right.  To be fair, how could you?  You didn’t know.  Since I smile.  Always smile. Maybe then you won’t notice the bags under my eyes.  

I am tired. 

Tired of women being their own worst enemies. It is one thing to disagree on politics.  But what exactly makes you so angry at the thought of another girl shining?  Even one you don’t agree with?  Her path would only serve to light yours, not to mention your daughters.  Why do you hate your own?  Not only did you digest the lies of men, you added your own bile to it.  Nice girls never make history-you only have the rights you have because of other queens that fought for your continuous ingratitude.  Love them or hate them, if you don’t stand with women, you  are part of the problem.  You are the reason we make 77 cents for every man’s dollar. 

She is a queen, a goddess, something so much more than the leader of the free world.  Yet, like all queens, she is bound by her station.  Which is only to fight for a king.  She is the most powerful piece on the board.  But only if she stays in her lane.  Defending the king who may or may not be worthy. 

Queens, let us rise.  Let’s smash the chessboard. Make it our own. 

They haven’t seen nothing yet.  One day, someday, the world will yield-to us.  WE are actually the silent majority-that somehow lost.  Let us rise. Let us make HERstory. KEEP MARCHING. Don’t forget to use your voice and VOTE in EVERY election.