A Woman

You're someone who has fought your whole life.

Fought against emptiness,

Steeled against the loneliness

That lives within your heart.

You have shouldered blow after blow.

Hardships that have

Staggered you

Buckled you

Dropped you to your knees.

But, even when drowning in your own despair,

Time after time you rise.

A phoenix in my eyes.

Coughing to clear the

Suffocating anguish that fills your lungs.

When I was little you held me up.

No matter what,

No matter when.

Even when you couldn't breath,

Pained by the very air

Around you.

You showed me hope

Though your own was bare.

And I never knew you as a woman.

A daughter

A sister

A lover

Or

A friend.

I saw only one thing.

A mother.

Now I see how tough you had to be

To dig in your heels and shelter me.

And I see you fight still

Against the sadness and the pain.

You suffer in thick silence,

But upon your face

A smile remains.

So now as you battle this new enemy,

Betrayed by your body,

I want you to lean on me.

Because I know now what you really are.

Complex, yet simply you

Hard as iron, but yielding too.

A Woman.

So let me be your anchor.

We will laugh.

We will cry.

We will weather the storm together

With fire in our eyes.