I tried to write about yesterday’s prompt but with the news of Sarah Everard yesterday, everything I wrote came back to her. And this is what I ended up writing.
For Sarah
I too, have walked home
faster than normal,
with a raised heart beat
and the sound of my own footsteps
loud in my ears.
I too, have run back to the parked car,
and only felt safe when I sat in it
and pulled away.
I have been twitchy
and looked over my shoulder
when someone was coming up behind me
and jumped when I saw them so close.
I have wished myself invisible,
have wished also that this body
had been made a little stronger.
Two days after international women’s day,
where we said we could do anything,
we realise too
that she is all of us
and that any one of us could be her.
elisabeth pike 