(This poem bears witness to the girl child—her body, her voice, her survival.)

Traditions are like antiques—

both suffer an identity crisis,

ugly in modern eyes,

yet sacred to cultural eyes.

Grandma bends over me.

Her shadow swallows my body.

I search my mother’s face—

she lowers it,

like a weeping willow.

Grandma’s hands—her tools—

work in my hidden place.

My cries wake the night.

They travel beyond that day,

etching themselves into stone—

Unforgotten.