Women Aren't Allowed to Burn

I'm not supposed to be this angry

Photo by youssef naddam

Sometimes my anger catches me off guard—not in my writing, where it feels safe and acceptable—but in real life, where it spills out at my son, my partner, or in parking lots where no one is watching. I wrote this poem after one of those moments.

My Son and I Do Not Order 
Swedish Meatballs at IKEA

I am trying to be both—a good mother 
& citizen. Hold my hand. Look with your 
eyes. Use your inside voice. It’s okay to be 
overwhelmed. You sound excited. 
But there are too many sounds 
& colors & textures. We exit the store 
crying. My partner tells me he once 
heard every human eventually cracks 
under torture. I ask if a child’s vocal 
decibels qualify. The car is a refuge. 
Here it’s safe to erupt so I do. 
Red hot magma spills from my tongue 
before I am steeped in the sweet stink 
of shame. I could drive us home, 
send him to his room & bury 
my guilt in a pint of chocolate chip 
cookie dough. But I don’t. I unclasp 
his seatbelt & pull him into my arms. 
I apologize. Do my best to make amends. 
Remind myself not to be ashamed 
when he sees me trying. 

I learned early that angry girls are unattractive, unlikable—shrews. As a child and adolescent, I felt rage seeping from my pores. I was a tinderbox, always at risk of exploding and setting everything around me on fire. But I also learned that good girls, likable girls, attractive girls aren’t angry.

A few weeks after my IKEA breakdown, I met with my dietitian. She asked why I’m so quick to offer repair with my son or partner, but not with myself. I told her I’ve been trying to cut the angry girl out of me—to slice her away because I don’t like her. We talked about how I feel safer grieving than raging. That sadness makes me palatable. Anger makes me dangerous.

Intellectually, I know the archetypes of angry women are just as distorted as the valuing of thin over fat bodies. But knowing it doesn’t unlearn it. I grew up with this propaganda. Pop culture has long glorified the sad, quiet, self-sacrificing woman—the one who grieves but doesn’t rage, who breaks down but never burns through. When women do express fury, they are punished or pathologized.

Take Sinéad O’Connor—vilified for tearing up a photo of the Pope. Britney Spears: ridiculed and institutionalized for cracking under impossible pressure. Fleabag: a fictional woman punished by the narrative itself for her messiness and rage. Go further back and you find Medusa, who was punished for being violated. The “angry Black woman.” The witch. The suffragette. The woman who dared to demand more and was branded too much, too loud, too dangerous. These stories taught me that rage makes a woman monstrous—and I believed them, even as I felt the heat rising in my own throat.

Last week, I facilitated the first session in a four-part writing circle focused on emotion. We began with rage. The poems we read—and the ones the group wrote—made it clear that rage is rarely solitary. It almost always arrives braided with something else: grief, fear, overwhelm, powerlessness. I was struck by the irony of it all. I created space for others to explore and express their rage, but I still struggle to do it for myself.

I hold my own anger at arm’s length. I can be angry on behalf of others, but not for myself. In my personal life, I suppress my rage until it leaks sideways. For years, I relied on an eating disorder to numb it. Now that I’ve let go of that, it has nowhere to go.

My partner reminds me that I’m allowed to feel angry—that it’s okay to be angry with him, with our children, with the world. But I’m afraid of my anger. I’m afraid of the damage it might cause if I don’t contain it. I’ve been on the receiving end of that kind of unchecked anger—where someone explodes and apologizes and explodes again—I know how hollow those “I’m sorrys” can feel.

So I’m trying to find grace. I’m trying to learn how to hold red-hot anger without burning the people I love. On the page, I don’t flinch. Writing is a controlled burn. Here, I can rage without fear of harm, but sometimes, even that safe container isn’t enough.

Next weekend, I’m spending time with a group of women, and we’ve decided to go to a rage room—to smash old glasses and busted electronics. It feels silly and necessary. Sometimes anger needs to be physical, to live in the body, to be released in a place where no one can be hurt except a TV that no longer works.

In The Uses of Anger: Women Responding to Racism, Audre Lorde writes:

Every woman has a well-stocked arsenal of anger potentially useful against those oppressions, personal and institutional, which brought that anger into being.

Though Lorde was speaking specifically to the experience of Black women, her reflections on the transformative power of anger resonate across identities—especially in relation to gendered emotional suppression. Anger is not a failure. It is a signal. It is energy. It is information.

I’m still learning to see my anger as purposeful, not poisonous. I’m trying to channel it in ways that clarify, not destroy, and in the moments where I fall short, I’m committed to repair. I’m still learning how to be angry without apology.

Maybe I don’t need to be less angry. Maybe I need to stop pretending I’m not on fire.

I’d love to hear how you’ve navigated your own relationship to anger. Join me in the comments.

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Thank you for being here, for reading, for making space for these words. If this essay resonates, I’d be honored if you shared it with someone who might need it too.

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Additional Opportunities for Community & Connection For Paid Subscribers

Four-Part Generative Writing Series

This spring, I’m offering a new four-part generative writing series—a deeper dive into the emotions we’re often told to suppress. Each 90-minute session will focus on one theme—Rage, Fear, Grief, and Joy—and include poem readings, guided prompts, writing time, and the option to share in community. We’ll meet every other Wednesday at 7 PM CST: May 14, May 28, June 11, and June 25.

Poetry As Medicine Writing Circles

If you’re looking for a safe, communal writing space, our next writing circle is Tuesday, May 20th at 7 PM CST. Every month, our Poetry as Medicine generative writing sessions offer a tender, open space to read and discuss the work of a specific poet, to write what needs to be expressed, and to share (if desired). These sessions are unrecorded for a reason—they are meant to be experienced in real time, together. These monthly sessions are a balm, a place of connection and vulnerability. We would love to have you join us!

Below are the poets we’ll be exploring for the rest of this year:

Tuesday, May 20th at 7 PM CST – Diane Seuss

Sunday, June 8th at 10 AM CST – Ilya Kaminsky

Sunday, July 20th at 7 PM CST - Danusha Lameris

Thursday, August 21st at 7 PM CST - Pádraig Ó Tuama

Monday, September 22nd at 7 PM CST - Maggie Smith

Sunday, October 26th at 10 AM CST - Danez Smith

Wednesday, November 12th at 7 PM CST - Naomi Shihab Nye

Tuesday, December 16th at 7 PM CST - Marie Howe