SHE Writing Competition

Winner - Open Category: Maryanne Graham

SHE who can.

I am she who can. Born to a stolen mother. Told who to be.

I am she.

A whisper barely heard. A shadow slipping by. A song with no sound and wings that won’t fly. Quiet. Small.

Broken. Oppressed. I have birthed the living and buried the dead.

I am love ill-timed. Compartmentalised. A burden. An ache. A beautiful mistake.

I exist.

I listen.

I love. I hate.

I dream. I hope. I scream. I shake. I am lost. I am found. I am here. I am not.

I am silence and sound.

I am void. I am quashed. I am everything I’ll never be.

I am all I can feel, and all I can see. All of this is all of me. From this place, I watch.

I feel, I breathe. On the ground, in the dirt, with memories.

Not of times gone past, but a life unknown.

My spirit is calling my sore heart home.

I recognise the place I stand. To face the fear, I understand, takes strength. A strength not of my own, but born from women long ago. Resilient and strong, the stories go. Resilient and strong, the bloodlines flow.

What fire destroys; time will heal. The storm will pass, the sun concealed, will shine.

And I will learn to smile again from deep within this pain. To know oneself is strength discerned. Innate possibilities. Love unlearned. The power of one, is the power of ‘we’.

I am she who can rise. I am she. She is me.