Hooked nose, face of warts, high pitched cackles, and evil spells- they said to beware. They painted being alone with autonomy as evil, spell-binding, with a taste for unusual cruelty. We were told independence, femininity, defiance, softness, and soothing were synonymous with destruction and corruption. As the voices of power and fear slowly fell away, with razor sharp clarity, I saw that I had been surrounded my whole life not by fictional evil beings, but by women and gender non-conformers breathing, creating, and spinning magic.
What if we possessed magic within ourselves, that it is not just the women and folks of old? The ways in which we lend a hand, the ways in which we touch and hold and make love. Are we magic when we fall apart into millions of flecks of lights? When we tie ribbons of remembrance for our rainbow babies, when we hold ourselves with dignity and madness as our rights are stripped away, when we soothe our babies at 10pm on wooden floors with the unfolded laundry and cereal- these are the moments that prove this to me.
Are we conjuring spells when we bake warm bread on cold nights, say no to our harmful colleagues in board meetings- paving new ground, when we calm the broken hearted and find new life in our rejections? The moments that she floats around the room, tying hearts together, making every person feel seen, the ways that she pours out without ceasing, never needing eyes to see her, instead, she continues to create space for the bruised, the hurting, and those at the margins. She says, “you are welcome here.”
When he melted into her, lips loosened around hers, savoring the way they could make him feel, how was that not magic? The way she filled her mind with their posture and shoulders, feeling as if they were in her eyesight. How she stood, eyes focused in the crowded room, singing “Cry Me A River” for her past, present, and future, how she could make them laugh and hold their gaze captive until their fragile bones rattled. When they stared into each others’ faces over midnight candles, they would be fools to believe she did not possess power.
The way they hold each other close without touch, silently, looking across the space, knowing they hold each other’s secrets. The words “she” and “he” used as weapons to cut apart their core, dead names soaring through the air as arrows. Yet, they continue forward, silently healing themselves in the background, adjusting their voice, and shedding their characters of male and female. Though, it is not a magic we desire for them to invoke, is it not a protective spell they use to cloak themselves from those on the outside until it is safe for their phoenix self to rise again?
Have you seen what happens when a woman or femme person steps into the ring, blue gloves, hair tied back? To see her lose herself in the fight, no making pretty the ferocity in her soul, rather just tapping into her raw power….breathtaking. Have you seen the one she loves on the sideline, screaming out her name, heart pounding, and breath held? Her name on her lips, cheering her on towards victory. You cannot tell me that their love, their fight, and their fire are not what our foremothers dreamed of, slowly believing in a future where this would be possible with no need for darkened rooms in which to hide.
We was taught to fear witches, to believe they would entice and corrupt us. The men with the upper-hands said, “you’d be a good wife, because you follow directions,” the men who assumed we would take the balls of their fury and allow them deep into our throats. The women who said to cross our knees, tie a millstone ring around our fingers, and tamper the wild fire in our bellies. Yet, the witches in our life were behind the scenes. They were the ones who endured years of sexual abuse until the pearls strung around their necks strangled the secrets out of them. They were the ones that planted their feet in the ground and said, “upon this, we will prevail.”How did they survive?
The women and those who have never conformed to boxes of our past, the strength that came in the letting go, the bravery to fight for their voices and their needs when they were told to be quiet. Hell, even the patience they curated as yet another child would lick the frosting knife during cookie decorating and place it back in the communal bowl. The incantations abounding when those who have harmed fade to dimly lit spaces as they pour cheap liquor. The ones who extended warm, healing hands, saying, “I am with you to the end.” They are the legacy that we find in our bones.
When they burned for a world outside their four walls, their fire buried itself into our souls. My sisters and non-binary siblings, we are their legacy. I see the moments of our lives, the way that we love, the way that we heal the world, and I cannot help but see the magic that lives within our spirits. If the pointed shoe fits, maybe we are what the men and women of old say. we are the people with the ability to render you simultaneously weak and held; you will grow stronger in our embrace. We will feed you from the work of our hands, the love we will cover you in, and the words that come from our mouths. We are the strengths of our foremothers, non-flammable, unhinged, yearning, and untamed.
