stately heads,
necks of steel,
dusty feet calloused
by rocks and ruts;
an illusion of romance
when reality is steeped
in bearing the burden
of water carried
back to villages, to men,
to eager thirsty children;
dresses of orange, red, yellow
burn brightly on the horizon,
bangles jingle on sinewy arms
as each woman stares ahead,
her golden-brown eyes shadowing
the pain this three-mile walk will bear;
she will do it out of duty, out of love,
out of necessity because that’s the way
it has always been done, by her mother,
by the mother before her and before her,
passing down wide hips and sturdy legs
and the expectation that a goddess born
enters the world with a pot upon her head.