The Political Is Personal
Activists with sincerity on their tongues, burning eyes & tearful hearts. They set mine afire. I register the call of their wild cries, in the pounding in my ears. Eloquent speakers do the same. They tease out the primal me.
I’ve railed against patriarchy. At my loudest, I was screaming against my inner monsters, raging at my own wounds. I’ve decided not to, anymore. I won’t say I’ve forgiven because where I come from, that sounds like a clean reset. If it is, it can’t be a binary & I’m not all the way there. I may never be.
My beliefs aren’t binary either so I’m still a feminist. But I’m done screaming in pain (because what else is rage?). It meant letting wounds wither & pulling my sense of self out of that & planting it elsewhere. Never to go back again.
Activists I’ve met since, try to pin me back to that place. I know now they’re just digging for fuel in my fossils, to power their own raging wounds. Is that all activism is? It’s hard to refuse to add my voice to theirs but then, all they want is my screams.
And it is not that I’ve finished screaming. I miss the primal cry of my being. The full-bodied, unvarnished howl that I AM. I think that’s what I tap into with my passion for the articulate screamers. There are many things a scream can say & it’s always that I care.
Caring don’t gotta be angry. And it’s glorious even if it’s personal. Because after all, what’s more political than the personal? It’s radical to love, to treat loving another as an act of self-care. I do, I do, I DO.
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