A Softness Forged in Fire

They say steel is born in flame 

but never speak

of the silk that swaddles the burn.

Black women,

are the quiet storm,

the gentle breath between

war cries and lullabies.

For every door slammed

they opened another

with bare hands,

sometimes bleeding;

sometimes trembling,

but always holding.

A cradle in one arm,

a world on the other shoulder,

still they find a way to

hum joy into broken mornings,

wrap pain in poems,

and pour love into tea

for the tired.

Do you see her?

Not just the spine that never bends,

but the smile that softens a room

before she speaks.

The kind of grace

that dances through trauma,

carrying whole families

in the corners of her eyes.

Her strength is not the absence of tears

it’s the flood that dares to feel,

then builds anew.

She is the hymn in the hush,

the echo in the fight,

the silk and the sword, 

still exuding every bit of softness

for every ounce of her strength.

And maybe

that is the truest kind of power:

to bleed beauty into the world,

even as it forgets

who bled for it.

FYI: Thank you Black Women