Sylvia Plath was not a martyr.
Nina Simone could not speak her truth.
Simone de Beauvoir did not know our times.
There are no warriors now
but us.

Sylvia and her husband
(whose name is too common to even remember
next to the glory that was his wife's
furious articulation) Sylvia and
her husband did not find recourse in each other.

Nina, whose job it was to speak
(our songbird, our falcon, our peacock,
whose plumage barely hid the damage done)
found herself so unheard
that she uprooted herself, and evicted her voice.

Simone had the audacity
to couch womanhood in scientific terms
(the physiology of us becomes inglamorous,
our sociology too humane)
could only publish, and defend, and defend.

On the days when they draw
the noose a bit too close, let them tug
a little longer, let them cinch it in tight.
I heard the orgasm is better
for the men who like to watch.