Sanitized Woman

Women have become sanitized in a culture that fears the wild and the natural.

How did it begin; the systematic refining of our nature?

Who first sought to bind our spirits by binding our bodies?

And why?

To what end the sale of the maiden,
the vilification of the mother,
the taming of the crone?

Was she slowly and methodically enticed from the forests;
the moist, rich home of her foremothers?
With sweet music, entrancing songs and vows of everlasting love,
was she seduced to follow the call
of those who would domesticate her?

Or was she hunted; ripped from her home,
her nails breaking as she was torn from the tree?
Did she scream at and curse her stalkers?
Then was she bound by chains until
her scream went silent and her rage was spent?

It is the howling wind or the eagles cry that stirs her memory within me.
She walks with smouldering strength within her wild domain,
she tends to the gardens and the fire,
and easily she takes up her charge.

I see through her eyes when I look upon the sunrise
and my body stirs,
my skin awakens and aches
for the heat to caress me.
She reminds me of a power that rests nestled in my hips
and I find myself swaying with the rhythm of desire.

I lament when I think upon her submission
and the cost of such an act.
I struggle with the insanity that such an act demands,
the relinquishing of her body and the shunning of her intuition;
the sources of all the wisdom in the world.

And I ask of all my sisters, as I ask of myself;
to what end this sanitization?

Through seduction or rape we surrendered our home;
when will we take it back?

Remember, we once were warriors
and sentries of our Mother.
We knew the feel of power in our hands
and the grit of earth on our feet.

What has submission cost you, my sister?

No matter the method of her abduction
they did not consider
all the times she sat on the earth
under the fullness of the moon,
her blood enriching the soil.
So that even when they placed her in the castle,
the bedroom, the kitchen,
she continued to cultivate under the tree.

I could not write these words if it was not so.
The sunrise and the eagle’s call would not stir a rich and bloody scent,
not cause my hairs to bristle.
I would not hear her footfalls,
twigs breaking under her sure step,
as I walk about the cultured hallways
and tread upon polished floors.