No. 35 #ShePersisted Series
They said women are the weaker sex.
She kept giving birth to all humanity,
and with every child born unto man,
they witnessed the power of her strength.

I am woman.

I have borne the pains of birthing humankind so that we may all know life. I have forged my strength in the fires of the womb nurturing the unborn and tended to my compassion in the crucible of the pelvic bowl holding the sacred seeds of life.

I have climbed the manmade mountains designed to keep me in my place and risen above the fear of falling to my knees beneath the crushing weight of man’s desire to own me.

I have been forced to bow beneath the blows of patriarchy forcing me to kneel at its altars.

I have lived beneath the crushing death of believing I am not strong enough, good enough, do not do enough, and will never be enough because I am not a man. I am not his equal.

No more.

I have been forced to hide my feminine aspects and don the robes of conformity to not make those who feared my strength and my beauty feel ill at ease in my presence. I have been forced to witness the desecration of my sisterhood throughout the dark ages of our humanity where women’s voices were silenced and women’s work became the fodder for genocide, colonialization, subjugation and patriarchy.

No more.

I am woman.

I am the fertile womb conceiving life on this planet throughout time. I am the strength of all my grandmother’s grandmothers who bore life before me.

I am woman.

Midwife to the fires of creation, birthed from the womb of the Great Mother who bears us all, I have suckled at her breast and suckled others at mine.

I nurture life into being. I tend to the fires of our humanity.

I am woman.

I am a gatherer. I am a creator. I am the vessel through which all men are born. I am the milk that sustains us. The crucible that holds our humanity safe.

I wear my feminine aspects like a star-studded cloak shimmering in the light of a new moon rising.

I am woman.

I have risen. I am rising.

I shall always rise.

I am woman.