I am woman
Hear me purr
Allow me to lure you in with the strength of my words
We are beautiful in every way
Complementary to the end and rise of every day
Every word I speak is literature
My eyes are the most priceless of books
When I stand, who can bear not to look?
Alone I am a mere woman
But together we are magnificent women
To belong to an entity so strong
To perform and inspire a generation so young
Inclined with our backs against an ever-so-great wall
Thoughtful words create sweet vines in urban neighborhoods
Succeeded in achievements we accomplished with ‘We can’ that no ‘one’ ever could
Butterflies we are
Wings different from one another
We do rest
But like stars shoot in the sky
With wings made of terrestrial dust
We flutter
Beautiful clusters of butterflies
Copper, ivory, ebony, fair
Perched on urban buildings
Painted to them like beautiful decorations
Speaking in a language we are trying to get the world to understand
PURR, FLUTTER
That’s the sound of us women
Claudia De la Cruz is the founder of a community group called Da Urban Butterflies. The purpose of this group is to gather a collective of women with differing ages and ethnicities to talk and write about the world around them. This group also discusses empowerment and feminism. At the mentee midyear event, we were given the opportunity to submerge ourselves in the idea of empowerment. Listening to our peers’ numerous encounters with the twilight zones of tradition, modernization and true power has given me ideas on how to exert my power toward myself and the people around me. We have learned that situations in which we feel powerless may not be so.
“As a collective we can change herstory!” Claudia stamps into our minds. And she is right. As a collective we are beautifully strong and powerful.
- Check out what Bre’Ann’s fellow mentee Angelica thought of the day, and what Community Partner Guest Speaker Tzahalla Kessari of Project Girl Performance Collective thought of her experience!