Africa Journal October 15

Today, I’ll be a siren. I’ll sing all day with my sisters beside me, and our voices will be indescribable. To hear us sing is to see visions of the heart’s deepest desires. I would promise men nothing, but they would come to me anyway, drawn by my song. I would not have to hide from them or pretend to be anything less than what I am. They would see that I am a monster, but they would come to me anyway because desire drives away fear and logic.

Yes, the men would come to me. I would see in their faces all the oppression of countless generations of innocent women. I would see their painful climb to equality, but I would know “equality” was a lie. The men will always be stronger. They will never understand how it feels to be sen as property, like a pretty trinket to be worn. They do not know the fear women live with knowing that any man could turn on her and take whatever she held most dear simply because she had not the strength to stop him.

I’d hear the words of women, strong willed and defiant, crying out for change. They would be educated and trained. Many individual battles would be won. Even whole nations of women would rise up from the shadows of men; gut even these victories, I could see, would do little more than blind sisters from the plight of the less fortunate of their sex who remain in bondage all over the world. All their cries would echo on the black, slick rocks of my domain.

The men would come, drawn by my song, the song that showed them their own selfishness. My sisters and I, we would never forget the crimes of the men. We would be their jury representing our sisters all over the world. No man that came would be found innocent.
The verdict being passed; now, we are the hangman. Death, in the name of the abused girls! Death, in the name of women trapped in ignorance! Death, in the name of working mothers bending under the weight that should belong to men! And death! In the name of the women who cry alone.


***
Okay, I don’t really want to kill men, but this prose does express some of my feelings about the way it feels to be a woman. It’s dangerous to be a woman in this world. We are forced to live in fear while men are free to explore where they will. Of course, there are women like me who refuse to be ruled by that fear, but that doesn’t mean the danger isn’t out there.

Men, if you’re reading this, protect the women in your life by giving them freedom; freedom from fear, freedom from doubt, from loneliness, and from weakness of mind and body. Especially protect them from themselves.

As much as we hate it, men, you have the greatest power over women. You have the power to bring a girl’s worst nightmares into reality. You also have the power to make all her sweetest dreams come true. Do not abuse your power, or me and my sister sirens will be coming for you.
Jacob 2:31-33