I wish this verse was more wholesome and whimsical like Robert Frost’s “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”, but that it is not. This is about women determinedly forging on across streets, bazaars, workplaces, government offices, neighbourhoods and communities. This verse is also not so much about the woman hopeful of change (God knows that’s going to take its time in our blessed homeland), but the woman who is stoic and steadfast. It is the woman who goes about her day despite the odds that pull at her body, spirit and soul. It is the woman who dares to bare her true self despite and in fact because society expects otherwise. It is the woman who walks in her neighborhood afraid yet brave. May you find your grit and your grace for the rest of the days of your life.

A resolute, meaningful Women’s Day to all my friends and family 🌺

I wear my track pants 
And a pink shirt, long 
It says “Life is a song” 
I wonder if it’s too loud
Stoking thoughts like a gong 
A shout
To the world of men that teams about 
The streets 
Eyes peeled 
For glimpses of variously clad
Women that are mad 
Enough to sidle into the periphery of their sight 
And special leery gazes 
Trained like full-throttled tasers 
On women who dare 
To bare
More than the hand wrist down
Or a smidgeon of a toe around
Which sits an uncomfortable sandal 
A Soleful reminder
To walk cautiously 
To always look behind her 
To shrink as small as she is able
So she might pass 
With a warning glance 
From the men sitting around 
Jenetic Judges of right and wrong 

For the women who dare 
To bare
There’s a special gaze
For their fall from grace 
From the fraternity that mills about 
The corners of streets 
Superior, upright 
Pissing in plain sight 
Marking their territories 
For the women who dare to bare
More than the eyes
Downcast, demure 
Vacuous and pure 
For them there’s the death stare
Cutting them down to size 
I’m one of those
Who - Dares - To - Bare
The woman within 
The whole human being 
Self assured, aware 
She sits in my eyes
Unfaltering, dignified
Even as her heart drums inside 
As she traverses that den 
Of wolves, dressed as men.