i'd love to tell you that i don't mind sleeping alone,
that i have tough skin, that i don't sink into my pesky thoughts
and let them marinade me as raw meat to be devoured
down a ravenous cavern burnt to the point of
tasting only its own fiery scabs and blisters.
i'd love to tell you that i never whisper obscenities
to my chest about itself, that i am in love with the way
my hips bulge uneven and wavy, that i don't pinch at my
skin and curse it to dissolve, that i have explored each
inch of my earthly terrain and found it magical
and full of life and wonder, instead of finding
unfortunate mountains bubbling forth where they should not be
and unwelcome things i want to scour from its surface.
i'd love to tell you that i am full of humbled pride,
that i don't question every move i make,
that i am bursting with more of myself that i know
what to do with, but the more i live the more
i discover i am not my own, not an inspired
or unique soul, but i am piece-meal plastered,
shafted together from cherry picked muses
and i find my form unraveling as i wade through
these foreign seas.
trust me, i have long since
woken from the illusion of my permanence, but
i still long to feel true, honest, unmistakably myself,
and each morning i grow more and more and more
aware of my subtle shifting and morphing and reconfiguration
and i find that my environment is constantly reshaping me
with my hands helping.
and i don't know when i signed that permission slip,
but i find myself barreling forward out of my self-conception
my past, my roots, my image,
and it feels terrifying and terrific, trying to listen to
things i have ignored and shhhed for decades, but as i
attempt to reclaim my ground, my existence, i
find it disappears as soon as i think i have a grasp on it,
like chasing ghosts and playing with jello in zero gravity,
it keeps me reaching, fumbling forward,
and at night i wonder when i will be standing still again
and i wonder if i will even like it anymore.