B*tch

When I was a child,
I knew a woman,

A woman who was talked about in hushed tones,

A woman married women did not trust around their men,

A woman mothers did not want their daughters to play with,

I did not understand why society chose to ostracize her,

One of my playmates told us the reasons once,

In between playing house, carrying our dollies on our backs and mimicking our mothers,

My playmate, Dorica, said the woman was a bitch,

A word that was not supposed to come out of a child’s mouth,

She did not know what a bitch was,

But she had heard it being said in her household.

Image courtesy of Rappler.com

According to my dictionary, a bitch is a person is thoroughly disliked,

Yes she was thoroughly disliked,

And in those terms then, she was, a bitch.

Now as an adult, looking at the sexual connotations to the word,

I feel it was unfair for people to call her a bitch,

Considering that many, if not all of us, had never seen her engaging in what it is she was being accused of.

Whore!

 Slut!

Bitch!

Words men use for women who would have refused to entertain them.

Words society uses for women who refuse to conform.

I have been on countless times insulted in similar terms,

And other terms from men’s flowery vocabulary,

Sometimes for being passive and not responding to men’s taunting,

Sometimes for standing my ground and demanding my respect,

And sometimes for doing what you want with your body,

Where some Richard from Chitungwiza would feel so entitled to tell you on the street that you should not have done so.

But nigga I do not even know you, I would say in my head, walking fast,

Followed behind by the words that have grown so familiar.

So this woman I knew as a kid,

Her crimes were;

Laughing a little louder and more abundantly,

Perming her long hair and letting it down,

Having wide hips and a huge derriere,

Having long finger nails that were always painted red,

Wearing red lipstick and blush that became her,

Wearing huge earrings and many bangles that clinked as she moved,

Wearing ultra long stilettos with dresses that were brightly coloured,

Wearing pants,

Drinking beer,

Contesting to be a councillor once, debating politics and economics, delving into what was known as the men’s territory.

Society, led by men, wanted her to dim her light,

Cover her mouth when she laughed,

Speak less and then only about things women should be concerned about like cooking and raising children,

The way her heels made her walk, with the swinging of her hips,

Made some of these women feel threatened concerning their men who pretended to hate this woman yet secretly wanted her,

There were stories of a married man, who tried his luck with her,

And she had told him frankly that they were not each other’s types,

Then this man had gone on  to create a rumor that this woman was actually a whore.

Like bros?

How?

A man will call you a bitch.

A female dog.

Dehumanise you.

Because unless you conform to his standards and do things that make him happy,

You are not human.

He can go around telling people that you are now worthless because he slept with you,

It is funny though,

Because if my worth is depleted by me sleeping with you then it reflects poorly on you rather than on you,

He will go around talking about how many men’s’ members have been in you and how you are now loose,

Lol have you seen the size of a child’s head and the width of the shoulders?

If those can pass and still have me snap back,

What is a *bleep*?