Her New Story

She is rising, she is rising up and out
of the stuckness of her yesterdays.
She will slip off the cloak
of smallness and drape, adorn, bless
and blanket herself in her own brand of bigness.
She will surrender the suffocating squeeze
of conformity, the dizzying race to nowhere -
she will stop waiting for someone else's hand
to show her the way only she - only she
can know. She will stop waiting. Period.
She will remember that all
she has been chasing
rests, rests here, here where feet
kiss fertile ground, here -
where body beats and breathes
and breathes
and breathes.
She will have the audacity to take up space,
to follow the trail of her own wild longings -
to be herself, all of herself. Only herself.
She will invite you to join her.
She is rising. She is rising up and out and through
the door that has always been hers
to open. She will remember and remember again
that she belongs. That she belongs to herself.
She will remember that she is necessary.
She will insist, she will persist -
she will not take no for an answer. She will be her own
savior, her own superhero, her own guide,
her own guru. With the help
of her sisters, of course.
She will follow her own rhythms,
her own reasons - she will slip into
the new, the never before. She will plant
herself firmly and decidedly
in her own certain skin.
She will bow to the crooked, winding ways
that led her from there to here. She will bow to each
of her sisters, to all women and girls - to all beings
everywhere. She will promise to hold
her own hand forever. She will promise
to hold yours too.
She will listen to the wisdom of rivers
and wildflowers, to the great, growling hunger
deep, deep in her belly. She will listen
to the silent places between - between
then and now, between there
and here, between this word
and the next. She will write
a new story, a story
that begins and ends
with love.
She is rising. She is rising up and out
of the stuckness of her yesterdays.
Dear Sisters, do you hear her? Come, she calls -
let us say each other's names,
let us reimagine, let us gather,
grow, build, become - let us become
the roaring wildfire
that burns, that burns the small away -
let us rise, let us rise
together. Together
let us rise.