Intern Spotlight: A Poem by Hannah Blair
What Women’s History Month Means to Me
As a child, I was told about the invention of woman; how we were plucked from man’s rib in response to man’s need for longing, or maybe man’s need to be longed for. The story means to solidify our function. It points out that we came second. It warns us what might happen if we step out of line. It also shows me that the rest of the world was born from her question, What if there could be more than this?
There isn’t a word that can define what it is to be a woman, but there is this body we all carry with all the souvenirs collected in time from all the struggles that made us who we are, all that seem like imperfections to the world - all of which only a woman can afford.
This month is Women’s History Month, and I honor the women who have come before me, whose shoulders I stand on, who have opened doors and broken ceilings and worked to get us out of the burning building. I celebrate the women who lived lives that make it possible for us to be who we want to be today.
Womanhood runs deeper than a set of societal guidelines and this month, we honor that. We celebrate the liberation from stringent binaries, alienation, inequality, and subverted discrimination. We choose not to be sidelined or belittled. We choose power, and this month we celebrate it.
The following poem is an homage to Women’s history month and the work that still lies ahead in achieving women’s equality.
The Woman Who Walks the Earth
She is an emotional creature, this woman who walks the earth.
Who is told that she has a mouth, but is asked to remain speechless.
Who is told that she has a body, but is asked to remain choice-less.
Who is told that she has a brain, but is asked to remain senseless.
Yet, she is tasked with the monumental responsibility of raising the bones of a people who have dismissed her value for everything else.
It is not a choice, but rather an obligation, for her to swallow her pride and to be seen as a woman who can only provide for others - she warms the home, puts food on the table, and bears the children.
She breaks her back trying to lift the foundations of a cracked society that reveres a man’s accomplishments as though they were his own.
That man does not stand on solid soil without the sacrifices of his mother.
That man does not get to stand on top of a mountain without deriving the strength from his mother’s womb.
She is an emotional creature, this woman who walks the earth.
Who has a backbone made of steel and a heart made of gold.
Who sacrifices herself for loved ones and still finds a way to be made whole again.
Who gives all that she is and asks nothing in return.
So please, don’t ask her to swallow her anger when she has had enough.
Don’t ask her to bend anymore than she already has.
For she has weathered every storm and said nothing; she has carried the weight of the world for all these years.
So listen to her,
Even as her words pour out like thunder.
Even as her shine starts to burn.
Because she is the foundation of her people.
When she crumbles, we all fall.
When she is fortified, we all rise.
About the author: Hannah Blair is a graduate intern at Free To Thrive. She has a BA in Sociology and is currently pursuing her MA in Social Justice and Human Rights.