"Pièce de Résistance"

Layla Anwar, An Arab Woman Blues

...I will not succumb to you, I will not bow, I will not surrender to your might and force...I will not. It was a question of survival for me then, and it is now. Not just physical survival, but a moral and spiritual one too. You try to forcefully shape my identity with your slaps and I will resist you - no question about it. You will not make me into something am not supposed to be. And despite your best efforts, I will not let you steal, rob me of who I am or who I took great pains to construct... This is my "pièce de résistance." Whatever it takes, it does not matter... I shall not be broken. Because this is what you want deep down - break me. Break that spirit, dampen that fire so you can finally extinguish it. And you will try several ploys. Threats, torture, rape, money, exile, hunger, poverty, brutality, humiliation, rejection, abandonment...and death. None will work. I stand firm. Today, more so than ever. I owe it to Her and to myself... And so it shall be...

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