By Petra F. Bagnardi
PROMPT — The way I see it ...
What I'm wearing is not a dress –
it's an armor.
It's not make-up you glimpse upon my features –
it's war paint.
My independence is very expensive;
every other day, laws are written to protect me,
or to hinder my path.
For I am a woman –
and I travel on my own;
I work for my own dreams;
I give voice to my own ideas;
my words reverberate off walls –
strong, powerful, frightening.
What I am capable to achieve,
in spite of all the obstacles,
creates waves and makes the earth shake.
Petra F. Bagnardi is a TV screenwriter, a theater playwright and actress, and a poet. She was short-listed in the Enfield Poets' Twentieth Anniversary Poetry Competition and her work was featured in several literary journals including Masque & Spectacle Literary Journal, Punk Noir Magazine, Poetica Review, Drawn to the Light Press, Rabid Oak, and Pennsylvania Literary Journal. Petra writes from Rome, Italy.