Ink runs over my hands, filling in the lines of my fate that are embroidered into my palm as it travels. It is white, unusual for its nature and its purpose, leaving marks like chalk yet moving as milk.
It is within the right of passage for any young lady to decide what archetype of the man she will serve.
The Madonna or the Whore?
Will she, at the ripe old age of 14, succumb to the male gaze and peacock her false feathers, unknowingly falling prey to the trap of growing up too fast?
Or, will she deny herself of her humanity, her desire, her unavoidable carnal nature, in the name of arbitrary and objectively ungrounded expectations, whilst she tuts nd hisses at her peers who choose the former?
I appreciate the rebellious nature of ink. The defiance towards autonomy. Every stroke is unexpected and births its own sentience. It paves the path for every dot of ink that will follow its parentange, eternally.
I question why Freud did not uncover a phenomenon in which women box each man into a category according to their function as he did for men.
A man is never limited to a tasteless sexual animal, nor a respectful, prudent partner but rather a sacred synthesis of both.
Man can do no wrong, because he is Man!
Woman can do no right, because she is Woman!
We trap Woman into a cage, as we trap ink into pens fated never to be held and we twirl her lucious locks between our chubby, idle fingers as she hopelessly rattles upon the bars and We say,
‘Dear! Do not complain of your supposed lack of autonomy for it is you who decides whether you will be the Madonna or the Whore. You author your own journey, Sweet Pea, as long as the lines you write are within the traditional bounds of either of the two! There is simply no other possibility.’ We assure her.
However, Woman almost always realises that the cage is not real! Neither is We.
She must simply walk past the metaphorical bars of stereotypes, because they are just that. Metaphors! Intangible! Not real!
Madonna does not exist. Neither does the Whore.
But Women exist.
And unless she is behind grids of literal iron, the only shackles that hug her ankles are the thoughts she thinks are being thunk.
So may every Woman press a pen, not just upon paper, but upon her very palm, and watch as the potential-charged ink ebbs and flows upon the banks of her all-powerful hands.
May she realise that her purpose is not to serve the Man, but to serve humanity, just as is the responsibility of Man himself.
May she realise how glittery, important and delectable her fate is, and enjoy observing herself becoming a Marbled Statue as the white ink, flowing as though nectar and leaving marks of concrete, decorates her
Hands.
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