plights of my modern woman, a poem of sorts

i have grown up and live in a time where the rights of women today are miles ahead of that of women, say, fifty years ago. I am lucky. I am lucky to live in time like this. because it was so much worse before. right?

i am at odds with it. there are moments still when i can feel gravity get a little heavier and i look back to see we aren’t miles ahead, but simply steps ahead.

there is a guilt plaguing the modern woman in me, that i should not complain about the trials i have faced because it was so much worse for women before. right? 

i feel robotic, almost, like i am programmed this way. that still, ethereal, world-bending beauty is the prerogative of my life. that there is something intrinsically and morally flawed within me, as a woman, if i am not beautiful. before anything, how i look is defined first, before i am defined.

gravity has a funny way of working. there’s always a little bit of it somewhere. even the moon.