They called me midwife, conjurer, crone—

in mud-caked skirts I walked alone,

bearing herbs for the fevered child,

roots for the weak, the frail, the damned.

They saw my hands, stained with earth,

they saw the wisdom deep in my eyes,

and claimed it black, claimed it sin,

claimed me blight and bane to their God.

At the gallows, they tied ropes rough around wrists,

hung women like lanterns, bound in shame,

our bodies swayed to the jeers of men,

who stood, heads bowed, calling it justice.

In ducking stools they plunged us deep,

to waters thick with mud and stones,

until our gasps were buried there

in pools cold as the Church’s creed.

In time, they raised their stakes still higher,

and I watched my sisters swallowed by flame,

their ashes swept in the street by dawn,

smoke curling high with the scent of flesh.

They burned not witches, but women strong,

who dared to heal, to know, to choose—

who bore the spark that dared to see

beyond the words of men.

Centuries turned, but the shadows clung,

haunting homes, hearts, and silent rooms.

In corsets laced to ribs and bone,

they called it virtue, praised our grace,

trained our tongues to soft restraint,

our hands to spin and stitch in silence,

binding us firm to husband’s law,

to the strict gaze of his God.

But I felt HER beneath the loam,

in the pulse of the moon on darkest nights,

HER hands reaching to lift me high

when they closed the doors and barred the ways.

In hidden corners, I whispered prayers,

hands outstretched to candle flames,

and worked my spells in secret guise,

the rites they could not find nor break.

In factories thick with iron and smoke,

I stitched, I spun, my wages thin,

while men in collars laughed aloud,

saying freedom was their gift to give.

In 1920 they let me vote—

another stone from the fortress wall,

but still they kept the gates secure,

and bound my body with their laws.

In 1963, they passed a pen,

allowed me wages for labor given,

but in hushed rooms, and courtrooms too,

they fought to keep my worth in check.

In ’73, a cry arose,

for women’s voices to claim the right

to body, blood, to will and womb,

to life ungoverned by men’s decree.

But still, I meet in shadowed rooms,

a hidden child of HER ancient power.

I light my candles, whisper low,

and speak the names of those who fell—

the midwives, healers, scholars, maids,

who dared to live, to know, to be,

their lives betrayed to ropes and flame

by hands that trembled at HER name.

Today, I walk through crowded streets,

where law and tongue would snare me still,

their words like walls to hold me down,

to shroud my mind, to stake my voice.

They call it choice, they call it life,

but silence echoes beneath their guise,

still bound by fear that women free

will rise as one, fierce and wise.

For we are the ones who hold HER grace,

our bloodline bound through centuries torn,

we live to claim what cannot break,

in honor of all who came before.

This world is theirs no more to take—

we are the keepers of all that burns,

we are the voices once silenced low,

and we will stand, for all who fell.