I used to think that I’d grow out of crying.
Perhaps a few more years of trying and failing and dreaming of flying
would make me a grown-up and not a little girl.
A little girl who dreamt and feared
and danced and steered her own little boat
through a big, wide sea of confusion.
I never saw the fusion reaction approaching.
The speed-increasing, exponentially disagreeable running race,
or noticed how time flew by on butterfly wings
that I can no longer see because the world tells me
I can’t be that dreamer anymore.
No. In your words, not mine, we must be women.
Powerful yet colourful.
Professional and emotional.
Both strong and weak.
wise and meek.
Fearless and endlessly stressed.
Homely superheroes or plugging away at ones and zeroes
and all the while fitting into the four walls
of our inspirational posters that tell us to follow our dreams.
Well, it seems to me like the world has a dream for us.
Our foremothers fought for what some of us now have,
but we can’t let the tables turn to a new direction.
A fourth dimension we couldn’t see coming
because I don’t know about you but I’m tired of running
to be something I’m told to be.
Beautiful or loud. Graceful or proud,
or the “wow she stands out from the crowd.”
Why can’t I just be me?
Why can’t you be you as we walk through all these words of expectation?
I don’t think there’s a single person here that could promise me,
or tell me with honesty that you haven’t felt tired
or stuck
or out of luck with your lot.
Because being us is a lot.
Go on. Raise your hands. Raise your hands if your little girl plans
fell under piles of makeup,
or a tea cup, or a harsh word,
or that absurd little voice in your head that used to put dreams there.
We girls, we women, or whoever we wish to be,
we’re dreamers.
We know our dreams mean something and we’ve seen others go before us
and find it, their place, their calling, but where do we fit?
How will our young selves stop climbing onto dusty shelves to wait for our turn?
I think I might know.
It may involve some falling, and I don’t mean like snow.
I mean tumbling and reeling and struggling, but we will find our calling!
Because we have to fall before we can fly.
A glowstick must crack before it can glow.
Sunlight changes and shifts before it reaches our eyes
so I implore you all,
don’t let the world send your dreams drifting by.
We women are born dreamers.
Now let’s find out why.
Ravenswood crowned for innovative education
Knox Ravenswood Cadet Unit
