YouMedia @ Chicago Public Library

Dont let the tears press against your cheekbones until they fracture

I will raise you to hold them in until your stomach rots from the salt 

resting at your sides

Like ulcers and bags on your hips

as they spread

Behavior is learned

You will learn that tears are not my friend 

But that doesnt mean that they cant stream down your face

they do not take diginity

They feel like you are drowning

dying in your weaknesses

but if you didnt cry when I gave birth to you

I wouldnt have even known you were alive

Sometimes we get caught up in our anatomy so much

we strive to be as strong as your father

but sometimes it is not in our blood

and sometimes in the shower I beg for them to blend with the 

faucets screams 

as they strip the nerves out of my body

I give myself third degree burns

and beg for my eyes to be honest with me

They can no longer deny what I have seen in my years

but they sink behind shadows

dry as desert

letting emotions desert my lungs

until I become weak WITHOUT tears

This is what women need to survive

I taught myself to be so concrete

that my offspring came out like stones 

passing through my organs 

I see you beating back tears

struggling to be strong

this is not strength

the strength in a woman is the expression of her feelings

we can not fill a man shoes until we FEEL what they are hiding

We are no different

no less stronger than what their back spreads 

into muscles to show

their are biceps in the wings of a gentle swan

I promise that finding a man to love me 

was harder than finding a way to love myself

And I cant watch you be shackled to the lack of vulnerability 

So I want you

to find

the rose that sits under your chest

let the vines wrap around your ribcage until your 

gentle ways choke the concrete out of you.

That will be your strength.