I wish I grew up around all the women in my lineage
I know it’s not a possibility but indulge me in my fantasy
Imagine sitting with your great great great grandmother,
Think of all the things that she didn’t share that were lost forever
What if you could ask her about the lessons she learnt
Would it encourage you to always speak so that your story can be stored in the library of your ancestry
We look to history in awe, museums filled with nameless stories and we wonder at them with questions
So why don’t we value the lives we live as a piece of history
Why don’t we write each fleeting thought, every recipe,
What if we left each generation with the answers we found
Individually
Like what if my mums mum left her a book and then gave that book to me
What if with every generation we’d bind more pages to add to her story
What if it wasn’t just history remembered but herstory too
I wonder at the lessons I would learn from you
I dream of the library of our ancestry
Each generation leaving books
This is how we teach
We do not preach
We leave them to read
And we know the next books written
will be more insightful than those written by me
or even the lessons of my ancestry
Because we would keep learning from the lessons of her story
I would leave space inside my eyes
for them to teach me the lessons they’ve seen
Lessons I could never see but I only dream
I would learn from not his story but her story
I learn to stay careful to never preach history or her story
As my story is to be written by me
Lessons learnt are different from lessons you simply read and repeat
I learn a flower doesn’t bloom from the seed trying to save the dying tree
New life has to start separately
Learning from the lessons of our ancestry
But understanding eventually
We will need build our own trees
Learning from the lessons of those that nurtured their toxic leaves
But setting boundaries around the roots of our seeds to ensure their safety
Learning repressing the lessons won’t serve me
I can’t just avoid the old to start a new
There are some things you can’t get over cos you need to walk through.
Listen to the lessons they taught you
They’re not written
But they live deep in your roots
Listen closely enough
They will speak through you
