Some days a poem doesn’t come from quiet reflection, it comes from a pulse under the skin. Today feels like that. After sitting inside the world of The Handmaid’s Tale (we watched all six seasons in a couple weeks!), after watching what happens when women’s bodies and voices are treated like territory instead of truth, I keep thinking about all the ways we learn to shrink: for safety, for approval, for survival.
And yet, there’s always a part of us that runs.
Running has taught me more about freedom than any mirror ever has. Legs that carry me forward. Breath that belongs only to me. A body that isn’t an ornament or a problem to solve, but a force in motion. This small poem grew out of that feeling, the tug between what the world calls us and what we decide to claim for ourselves.
Today I’m leaning into women’s power, women’s speed, women’s refusal to be folded small. Claire’s story may look like a child outrunning a nickname, but to me it’s about something older and louder: the moment a girl realizes she is not prey, she is momentum.
Claire the Hare
Alfie calls me Claire-the-Hare
like it’s a stone he gets to throw.
Grandma says,
“Probably those powerful legs,”
like she’s handing me a map
no one else can read.
I can outrun him
dust in my mouth,
laughter at my back
still, I tug my hat low,
hide the parts that listen.
“I know you hear me!”
he shouts.
Yeah.
I hear him.
But louder
Grandma’s voice:
Run wide.
Run wild.
Don’t fold yourself small.
My legs answer first.
Grass splits.
Air lifts.
He says hare
like it means weak.
I say it back
hare like thunder,
hare like flight,
hare like a girl
no one gets to slow.
I stop.
Turn.
Smile.
“Yeah,” I tell him.
“I’m the hare.”
