Where the mind is without fear and
My heart doesn’t skip a beat while walking alone on the street
Where the head is held high
And doesn’t have to spin around to make sure I am safe
Where I don’t have to pretend to not hear comments with a poker face.
Where what I can wear,
What I can and cannot do
What I should or should not do,
Where my existence has not been defined by the narrow domestic walls of a patriarchal society.
Where my worth is not broken into fragments and viewed through the lens of my gender
Where I and my successors don’t have to strive endlessly to prove ourselves
Where I strive to improve but don’t have the burden to be ‘perfect’.
Where my emotion is not judged to cloud my clear stream of reason
And my mind, body, and soul truly feel free.
Where my own gender rises with and not at the cost of each other
And makes it easier not tougher for the next generation
And doesn’t just feel proud being the only woman in the room
But helps other women grow and bloom.
Where encroachment on my freedom
Is not passed off as dreary sand of dead habit
That I am expected to accept and live with.
Where my gender is not an additional battle I have to fight
Externally and internally.
Where I don’t just survive and live but thrive
Into that heaven of freedom, let the world not only awake
But commit to action.
For it is easy and there is a lot to say
But it takes consistent effort, not just wishing on a day.
Is it too much to ask?
The fact that I have to still ask is the real tragedy
This fantasy should be a reality.
( I say ‘I’ and not ‘we’ as I understand my privilege of being educated, of knowing my rights, of having a choice, of being able to question. Every female-identifying individual has their own stories, varying degrees of being subjected to sexism in different forms and I do not wish to generalize or trivialize)
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