Declare!

I stand here today on my path of present
and still feel the threads of past paths intertwining.
Ancestral paths
of mother, grandmother, mother of hers and mother of hers
and all sisters and aunts
still speaking their stories through tuggings at the back of my heart.
Their stories speak of worry for me,
that I am not partnered, not married, not a mother
and speak their known rule that these things come first.
I speak back, forcefully voice with feet planted in present
that it is now a new way.
My path comes first...

I thank my mother's anger and frustration (as I perceived)
at being tied to what felt to her as a small life
filled with too much to do - caring for children, home, family, is an infinite job.
She needed something else
and I felt her fire and resentment many days.
I thank this fire for it ignited the flame within my spirit
to burn through the trappings to find another way.
Another way to honor my own unique path,
to give space for all my gifts,
to honor my feminine and womanhood.
Another way to commit to partnership
without surrendering my passions, goals, freedoms, adventure, growth.
I have a fire inside that was fed by the fire of my mother...

And it burns against the fire of my ancestors
who tell me to follow their old way,
to accept the oppression that burned or buried their own fires.

I declare my path today
with roots outside myself into the earth
and allow the tears of fear from hearing the echoing of my grandmothers,
their stories worrying my heart
that I am cutting off from what they had - partner, family, child.
I console my weeping heart,
I embrace my righteous soul honoring path,
cradle my spirit in warrior arms and explain my truth,
that it is not an either or,
it is not path or family, sacrificing one for the other.
Rather these are one - simultaneously fed,
growing as one.

This is the new way,
though I do not know how this journey will unfold...
- a new path yet to tread.