By: Jordan Koehnke

I look at her, and I see freedom - confined freedom. Freedom that has no bounds yet is segmented into a category of what this freedom can entail. She exudes beauty, she exudes light, and she exudes a taste for understanding this world. The world is just beneath her fingertips yet has never felt so distant.

“***The world is just beneath her fingertips yet has never felt so distant.”***

Her independence is her power, and she rests easy knowing she always has herself to call amidst external chaos. She can feel every drop of rain that trickles down her skin, and she can move a mountain at the tip of a hat. Yet, she stands afraid. A fear of being truly alone.

Her independence is the only way for her to truly belong. She is deemed to be on her own wavelength simply because no one else can. She is desire, she is free, she is our muse. She is the embodiment of what you cannot be. Yet, you leave her to dwell in it alone with your inability to grasp the ethereal. This terrestrial being becomes celestial, not by the fault of her own.

*“Yet, she stands afraid. A fear of being truly alone.”*

Why is it that the women I view as a whole are the ones ultimately dismantling? Those who carry themselves independently from the constructs society has painted for them are the ones to bear the burden of such a decision. Why does our society encourage women to live as the version of ourselves that we see fit, yet once that version is fully grasped, it becomes something that is sought to consistently re-strive for? For it is those I hold to the highest regard of humility and self-awareness that find themselves punished - punished for the mere fact that they see so clearly.

***“She is desire, she is free, she is our muse***.”

These women see others with such clarity that the people upon which the lens is cast cannot bear its weight. For it is those who can see the cracks, see the imperfections - yet love otherwise - are the ones who find themselves broken. The ones who have clarity are the ones who possess the ability to love despite someone who may be broken. Regardless, the broken that we accept externally is the broken simultaneously settled on internally. Those who are broken will never reciprocate the love women yearn for them to return. For it is those who love despite the carnage who will ultimately create it for themselves.

I know what you may be asking yourself - how does one avoid the temptation of carnage? I don’t know about the rest of you, however, I can speak candidly on behalf of myself when I say that I, at times, do not even know when I am participating in this vicious cycle of trying to love what is broken. I notice that we as a society, or, rather, we as women, possess this innate desire to inflict some sort of change on someone we believe is the embodiment of “potential.” There is this looming desire, even amidst the most steadfast of individuals, to have the opportunity to fix someone for the better - at least we may think it is for the better.

“***Why is it that the women I view as a whole are the ones ultimately dismantling?***”

We attempt to fix what we deem broken, thereby creating an attachment to mending the broken. To fixate is to attach, and many of us as women attach to this idea of what can be fixed - on the contingency that it is, in fact, fixable. Speaking for myself, I yearn to fix what I deem to be broken around me - or rather, who to fix that is broken around me. Believe it or not, what is broken can not always be fixed, and what we aim to fix may not always be broken. We fixate on the fix, and all we want is to have the tools to streamline the altercation. Ultimately, this desire to fix can stem from the need for control or the delusional reality that an individual can be fixed. At the end of the day, how can one be fixed by another individual amidst the blatant disregard of one's loose bolts?

Not only is there a desire to participate in fixing another individual, but many of us, not specifically women, designate the desire to fix as a branch of seeing one's potential. After existing on this earth for a good bit of time now, I have realized that we, as women, as humans, as lovers, as independents - actively devote meaning to this potential that we see. Let me break it to you all - the potential is not real. I don’t approach this statement from a pessimistic perspective from years of built-up resentment but rather from the perspective of reality.

We yearn for potential- the premise as to why those who have so much clarity are stooped time and time again by this idea of what they “want” someone to be. The term potential has a clever way of skewing what is just broken. People will often tell you everything you need to know - whether it was explicitly vocalized or not. I cannot tell you how many times I have looked at a loved one and have known exactly what they are capable of achieving. At the end of the day, someone else’s potential is not about you. Sure, a third-party vantage point does not hurt in seeing what someone is capable of. However, the fulfillment of said potential is ultimately up to the individual in which it is geared towards.

***“At the end of the day, someone else’s potential is not about you.”***

To those great women who can see so clearly - I see you too. I only see you because I am one of you. Do not let the world diminish your steadfast, fierce independence, and surely do not let it dictate how you can love. On the other hand, regardless of the clarity, you claim to possess, I beg you to not allow the hope and potential you see in other individuals take away from your ethereal nature. These people need you, but it is also these people who will summon you to fix them into the potential they never even asked for.

After all, you are a muse - do not be afraid to stand alone. Let them follow after you for once.