In all of my writings about my journey to the throne, I have neglected to speak about one of the most important characteristics of a queen. A queen must be a warrior. Yes, with the crown comes a sword. As Voltaire said, "With great power comes great responsibility." The necessity to don armor and hit the battlefield is not only to defend others, but to defend one's crown as well.
The "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune," as Shakespeare put it, are ever present as a queen ascends the throne. There are always obstacles and sometimes setbacks. But a queen must fight because the crown is her birthright.
The "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune," as Shakespeare put it, are ever present as a queen ascends the throne. There are always obstacles and sometimes setbacks. But a queen must fight because the crown is her birthright.
Women in this world are born into conflict. Our power is
either physically, mentally, emotionally, or spiritually (or all of these)
snuffed out or stifled from birth. As soon as we exit the womb, we are
bombarded with the beliefs and shackled with the restrictions of the world we
have entered. We are clad with pink, bows, ribbons, and lace to identify us as
delicate and fragile. 'Feminine' is given the connotation of 'weak.' But make
no mistake, females are born with the same warrior spirit, toughness, and fortitude
as males. The difference is that our feminine aspect provides us with different
tools with which to fight, and different reasons for which to fight.
Women must be the caretakers of the world. The children, the
planet, and all its creatures depend on the skills of the woman to both nurture
and protect them. We are the warriors for peace, equality, safety, wisdom,
knowledge and love. We also have personal battles to fight on a daily basis.
The daily battle in which we as women must engage is the battle
to live freely, securely and at peace in our own skin on this earth. We must
have Teflon skin when we are judged by our physical appearance rather than our
mental and spiritual content. We must brandish a sword against belittling
words, thoughts and actions that would sour our spirits. We often must
physically defend our bodies against violence.
Black women must double our efforts to protect our kingdom
(we are the kingdom) from the barrage of hate thrown at us not only because of
our gender but also because of our race. The belief system that was in place at
our births says that we are not beautiful, we are ignorant, aggressive,
materialistic, argumentative, oversexed, and less worthy of love and affection.
Many of us join in this belief and therefore denigrate ourselves even more in
the process. Some of us take arms against these beliefs often to no avail for
lack of support.
All women can relate to the struggle to be seen as worthy
and powerful allies to men, yet only the black woman can comprehend or even
recognize their battle. We are stereotyped, mimicked, overlooked, ostracized,
degraded and misunderstood. Embedded in the psyche of society are not only the
beliefs about women, but those of the black race. Unfortunately, they are also
embedded in the black woman's psyche as well, thus making the battle even more
arduous.
As queens, African, Native, Caucasian, Asian, Latina, and
Hispanic, we must be willing and ready for the battlefield. Whether we are
fighting for our children, our planet, our families or ourselves, we must
acknowledge that we are in the midst of war. Yes, there is a time to trade in
armor for silk and the sword for flowers. Part of our power is our femininity.
Most importantly, we must link arms and march together towards the enemies of
hate, greed, oppression and misogyny. These are our real enemies, not each
other, not ourselves. This, I have learned, is what a queen does.
