the world taught me
how to carry burdens
that were never mine to begin with.
Others fail,
yet it is my shoulders
that are asked to endure;
as though womanhood itself
were an inheritance of blame.
And slowly,
day after day,
the world has made me afraid -
afraid to one day bring
a daughter into a life
that delights in breaking wings
before they ever learn the sky.
Not because I hate women.
No.
It is because I know too well
the weight they carry.
I am not asking for revolutions,
nor do I hunger for crowns of equality.
I only wish for a world
where men remember
the duties they were given,
and women are no longer taught
to shrink themselves
for the comfort of others.
Because a woman's place
was never merely in the kitchen,
nor hidden beneath voices
that tell her to be quite
to yield,
to understand,
to endure.
I know the beauty of gentleness.
I know the grace of patience,
But I despise the way
those virtues are turned into chains,
binding women
for the rest of their lives.
Perhaps my knowledge is still small.
Perhaps I know too little,
too little of religion
too little of the world.
Yet I know what it feels like
to live conquered-
by traditions,
by families,
by invisible hands deciding,
how woman should love,
how woman should breathe.
And every time I try to speak,
the world whispers softly:
"Be silent,
You are a woman"
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