Category: Poetry

Decades ago when I started my personal foray into women’s studies, the field was still quite new. A feminist at heart, I was raised by a mother who also felt the tug of women’s rights strongly, as she came of age in the time of the early women’s rights movement in America. It is fear that causes men to still thwart women’s rights. It is fear that keeps some women from speaking up and claiming their own. Yet, we women are strong, powerful, “brilliant beings,” and many still long for the rights of simply be themselves.

Be Just Woman

In the brilliance
Of my madness,
Only then can I see
The sadness,
That walks,
And talks
In a million
Brilliant beings.
I see it on the corner,
In every face
Of every woman,
In the shops,
On the bus,
Every one,
They are all us.
We have long to speak
Our voice,
To tell our feelings,
Be just women.
We have long to walk
Our walk,
To talk
Our talk,
Be just women.
We are mothers
To our children,
Fierce and docile
Both by nature.
We are friends
To our sisters,
And lovers,
To our men.
We are feminists,
Who want to be
Feminine,
Honored and revered,
But instead
In our passing,
We are often not loved,
Only feared.
© Pamela Leavey
Temple of the Five by Lisa Marquis Bradbury ©

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