Beautiful as Pink

Book excerpt: Every year in October, we celebrate National Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Celebrities, athletes, and politicians don the tiny pink ribbon as a reminder and means of support. However, often, the disease becomes the focus of all that pink instead of the women suffering. Cancer is a very human condition, and we should not forget. Photographer and poet Wendy Deneise has fought sickle cell anemia her whole life, and she has known women who battled breast cancer. By channeling her own pain and the pain of cancer sufferers she has known, Wendy put together a collection of photographs and poems intended to life up and inspire, even in the direst of physical circumstance. Every woman has strength, no matter what diseases steal away. The words and images of Wendy's collection strive to act as a reminder of this strength and inspire women to keep fighting whatever ails them, whether physical or mental. Inner strength can bring light to the darkest days, if only we hold on to hope and the beauty of the world around us.