To be a woman

To coat the skin in body butter,
expensive cosmetics and fine silk,
and still feel unsatisfied

Gripping youthful pictures
with withered skin,
only then appreciating our beauty

To hide a frown through the guise
of a carefully constructed smile,
back straight, never causing a fuss

To be admired, seen but never heard,
praised for our compliance, submission, beauty, left invisible
to rot in middle age,
sinking into our incontinence

To become our mothers, the boldness, hope, indivudality of our youths erased,
To be a bird in a cage,
To be a woman