Content warning, this post is speaking about gender identity, and has a brief mention of sexual harassment.
–
I wrote this poem on international women’s day
To highlight the experience that I’ve had.
This poem is not to diss women or any individuals.
It is just me sharing how I was feeling in the moment.
As a person who is non-binary, my connection to womanhood is a bit alienated. That does not mean that I lack womanhood, that does not mean that I did not experience girlhood. It just means that my experience is different. I could go on and on about the complexities of gender identity and how my own is complex and overwhelming at times. Regardless, no matter what words I’m using to identify myself, or my experience, I am whole, and I am human, I am me, and that is enough.
–
–
Womanhood; what the fuck is it:
–
Womanhood
What the fuck is it?
People tell me that womanhood is getting your period when you’re 13 or becoming a mother, or being socialized as a girl
People tell me that womanhood is the ability to carry your own children
Womanhood is a sacred delicate practice
Womanhood is throwing back glasses of wine while bitching to my friends at brunch
Womanhood is difficult
Womanhood is hard for me, because I do not feel like a woman
I am a woman I will always be seen and perceived as a woman
But I’m not just “some girl”
I’m a person
I am a human being that has been treated as less because of how I was born
Being a woman is not having gender equality
Being a woman is being paid less than a man
Being a woman is being sexually harassed on the street at 10
Being a woman is beautiful and fucking terrible sometimes
Being a woman is difficult when I’m not a woman
Being a woman is difficult when I am feeling dysphoric in my body
Being proud of my womanhood is hard when I don’t understand womanhood
Through your eyes, I am some bitch complaining
But in my eyes, I’m just a person who’s struggling
Getting called “girl” and “her” and “she” every single day when on the inside I don’t feel that way
But the world will always see me as a woman because I have a large chest
Because the way my body is structured and curves, the way that I bleed from the womb
The way that my voice is soft and sensitive and pretty
Being a woman is identifying as a woman
But to me, they’re all just words that we made up
I am proud of the women in my life
I’m proud of everybody in my life
I am inspired by women I love women
But that does not mean that I want to be like women
I will always share the struggles of a woman being born being perceived as one
But at the end of the day, I really am just someone