My body is not beautiful -
it shows every row of dirt plowed,
every callous axe handle held
irreverently between the hands
that are swollen and cold;
my fingers, the puffy soldiers who smoked
one too many cigars in the
valleys of their webbed hills.

My body is not beautiful -
it is pitted with dirt entrenched in my pores
and craters of microorganisms
embedded in my flesh,
sending red fires into neutral skin,
a war beneath the surface
with smoothness being a casualty.

My body is not beautiful -
it has hair growing in places I hate,
thick layers of clinging calories
and expanded fat cells that
refuse to expire no matter how many
suicides I run or deaths I die
daily in an attempt to flatten them.

My body is not beautiful -
it is strong as hell.

My shoulders, firm and balanced,
tauntingly mock Atlas for complaining
of holding the world on his -
what he calls a tragedy, they call Monday.
My back has always carried whatever
burden I laid on it,
and though it's strained and torn
has yet to break beneath the weight
of the sorrow and the memories
living has given to me.

My legs, short and wide,
have lunged with mountains
by their sides,
moving forward through infernos
I can only describe as
"liquid fire as heavy as lead,"
traversing continents
and rushing rivers
knowing they were not going to give.

My arms are atlases,
traversed for countless miles
by vein-y highways
that lead to the ghost towns
I've gotten tattooed on my skin
to remind me that my
vagabond blood is pure
and my bones are made
of wanderlust.

No, my body is not beautiful,
but it is strong;
it has been places,
seen and done things.
It allows the universe
to make its home in my spinal
chord,
midnight to seep into my pores
and sing my heart to sleep
with starry melodies,
to leave behind the cement parking lot
I was born and raised in
and chase the horizon
no matter where it leads.

My body is not beautiful,
but it still deserves respect
for all it's done,
and all it holds,
regardless of my cellulite
or fat rolls.