NO MORE PHD

YOU’VE REACHED THE WOMAN

You have reached the woman
whose words are not buried beneath her tongue,
who crafts metaphors and similes
like she tends to the tattered garments
of her inner untouched soul
that place she can call her own,
You have reached the woman
who has dared to stop and take stock,
realizes the images in the broken mirror are not hers
but mere distortions of what the world prescribes to her to be
All she is saying today is

Let me
rise not by stepping over
but by bending over
to pick another sister fallen
Let me be that woman on a chicken bus
to give the woman with a child on her back
my seat
because I know with no doubt
her mother like my own
taught her the same
that if she would find any other woman in her place
she would no doubt do the same for her

Let me rise
not by stepping over
by bending over to pick
another sister fallen
without pomp or fanfare
purely reaching out
to the woman inside of me

©Batsirai E Chigama