All my life
I have asked for permission
to move, to speak, to breathe.
All my life
I have been told how to exist in the world
by men with hair greying at their temples,
with reading glasses,
with the rounded bellies of middle age
and shelves full to overflowing with books
written by other men.
All my life I have taken up
only such a small space;
nice girls do not speak so loudly,
do not say such things,
do not wear tops cut down to there.
I told my husband I am one of three billion women
walking the earth filled with a quiet rage.
And some of us will spend all our lives –
will go to our graves –
still pushing it down.