The Things We Don’t Inherit
The Things We Don’t Inherit
We inherited warnings before we understood the danger,
rules whispered from one woman to another.
Hold your keys between your fingers.
Watch your drink. Don’t walk home alone.
We inherited apologies for taking up space,
and the instinct to make ourselves smaller.
We inherited stories told carefully,
as though the truth might break in our mouths.
I wonder how many women before us
wanted to leave something different.
Not the fear.
Not the shame someone else put in their hands.
Maybe what we leave behind can be a door
the next woman does not have to force open.
A boundary already given a name.
A voice that makes hers easier to find.
I cannot choose everything that was left in me.
Some things become scars before we can refuse them.
But I can choose what I leave in you.
And you can choose what you leave in her.
They left us a fight.
I want us to leave each other.
— Sofia Aronovsky
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