Women before me. Where is your wisdom?
Woven in, carried through, on the wind of our daughters.
The stride of your steps, the sweep of your shoulders.
I see you in me, and in each her before us.
Lives lived unwitnessed but undeniably felt. Did you feel all this too?
The weight, no help.
Women before me, how did it work?
When things got too heavy, when your heart only hurt?
Did you cry all alone? Did you scream in your pillow?
Could you see through the dark? Was there even a window?
Did you dare life to meet you, or did you build yourself armor?
Where is your wisdom, where is the wind of your daughters?
Was it the first heart broken, the first tearing apart?
When your body became a spectacle and you learned to play its part?
Was it when you first lost your breath, then your desire to breathe?
When the hand of life pressed down on your head, ’til you fell to your knees?
The babies that stopped breathing, the daughters that strayed.
How did you do it? What made you so brave?
Did you know where home was? Did you ever really have one?
Or did you live every day happy that you finally found one?
You didn’t leave your words, but your life wrought the lessons.
Wisdom woven in our blood, each daughter in possession.
Every late night you cried, every ache that you felt, we all feel it too and like you, we know how to melt.
Melt until morning, melt until the end. Melt, harden, melt, and then do it again.
Preface to the Women’s Wisdom series. My Grandmother Had A Blue Couch
Read Next: Delusions of a Mother