Baba Yaga The Wise

Come closer, little ember-girl,
and warm your hands by the stove awhile.
The night is full of women
trying to learn the difference
between kindness
and self-erasure.

They were taught young, you know.

Taught to fold themselves small as handkerchiefs.
Taught to soften every truth
until it could be swallowed by others without discomfort.
Taught to smile through hunger,
through humiliation,
through loneliness so deep
it echoed like winter inside their ribs.

And most dangerous of all—

they were taught
that civility requires access.

That if someone once held your heart in their hands,
you must forever offer them warmth
long after they dropped it.

Bah.

The old forest does not bloom
for every traveler who once carved initials into her bark.

Some paths are simply closed.

Not with cruelty.
Not with vengeance.

With wisdom.

There comes a strange hour in a woman’s life
when she realizes
she has spent decades performing peace
for people who never once offered her safety.

She learns how often she swallowed her instincts
to avoid appearing “difficult.”
How many times she betrayed her own nervous system
to keep the room comfortable for others.

How often she translated pain into politeness.

And then one day—

she grows tired.

Not bitter.

Not monstrous.

Just unwilling
to abandon herself anymore.

Listen carefully now, little bird:

You are allowed
to be civil without being intimate.

You are allowed
to acknowledge someone’s presence
without reopening the gates to your spirit.

You are allowed
to stop decorating silence
with unnecessary tenderness.

Sometimes a simple nod
is holier than false affection.

Sometimes “hello”
is enough.

Sometimes the most honest thing a woman can say
is nothing at all.

Because power is not always fire and fury.

Sometimes power
is the absence of performance.

The steady breath.
The unclenched jaw.
The calm spine.

The refusal
to make yourself smaller
so another person may remain comfortable
inside the story they told themselves about you.

Ahhh, and this is the part
they never teach women:

Closure does not always arrive
with apologies,
understanding,
or justice.

Sometimes closure arrives quietly—

like snow settling in the woods—

when the soul finally says:

“I will no longer carry this person
inside my body.”

That is the moment
the chains loosen.

That is the moment
the witch steps from the ashes of herself
and realizes

she was never hard to love.

Only taught
to love others
more than her own knowing.