Voices of Black PowHer (ePub)

Voices of Black PowHer was inspired by the realization that many Black women I've encountered throughout my life, from immediate family to friends and acquaintances, exhibited the characteristics of voicelessness. They either had experiences that left them feeling voiceless or were raised in an environment where they learned that their voices didn't matter or were not appreciated. It was too few and far in between that I met a Black woman with the confidence and courage to speak her truth as tough as it may have been, maybe this was a sole reflection of my life as a Black woman or maybe it was the overarching, dominant reality. Whatever it was, it was affecting me. Society's stigma of the "angry Black woman" has plagued Black women by unjustly summarizing and diminishing our identities into a box, and to be clear, NOT every Black woman is angry, BUT for the ones that are, have we ever took a moment to consider the root of that anger before casting judgments. Why are people less concerned with why we are angry, but are hellbent on labeling us when we are or appear to be, as if we have no right to be angry, as if our anger isn't justified. I don't believe anger is a state of mind that we should stay in, but I believe that we should also take time to understand why it may be that way or is assumed to be that way.

This book of poems is my ode to Black women who have felt or still feel voiceless, powerless and that their thoughts and feelings don't matter. Voices of Black PowHer is a declaration that they do.