She’s seen for what she wears
for what's beneath the fabric,
Nothing more, nothing less.
She can’t stop what's going to happen next,
But that's her fault.

It’s just a regular day for you and everyone else like you.
Just something to do and forget about later.
You can act impulsively,
But it's her and everyone else like her who has to live in fear about that.
Not you,
Nor the ones who make the rules.
The ones without a care in their minds about this are the ones who are in control of her decisions.
The ones who don’t need to think about what they wear,
Where they are,
Or who they’re with,
Are the ones making her think about them.

She’s living in handcuffs and its as if this is a mockery of her.
Are you just testing her to see if the handcuffs are secure?
That they’re fully locked?
Don’t worry.
They can’t come undone.
You won’t let them come undone.

And that's just how it works.
We need to hold your hand.
We need to follow you, the leader.
We need to change ourselves because it's our problem.
We are the scapegoats to the polluted minds of the animals in control of us.

It's our skin, our body,
That we will have to live the rest of our lives with.
But since it's our body, it's our fault.

i.
i was 7 when my sister pointed at my chest
covered by a loose pajama t-shirt
and said “you really ARE getting ***** aren’t you?” and laughed
and i
ran back to my room and cried
and thought about how
i could saw them off
without
the blood attracting too much
attention
so until i could figure out a way i
kept my shoulders hunched over
to hide myself

ii.
i was 8 when my mother bought me a bra
she scrunched it up in a plastic shopping bag
into a ball she concealed in one tight fist
she came up to my room
quietly
carefully closed the door behind her
whispering as she knelt in front of me
unwrapped my new shameful secret

iii.
i was 10 when my father first
grabbed my shoulders and told me to
stand up straight
gave me a lecture about bad posture
told me stories about old women nobody ever wanted because they look like turtles- can’t pick up their heads to look at you
i could only tune him out because
i couldn’t tell him that id much rather sink
into the hardened concavity of my aching spine
than be seen

iv.
i was 13 when i got my period during a test in school
feeling the weight of another secret on my
already-bent spine
only made me cry again
only affirmed the stereotypes we were trying to shatter
in the minds we were trying to change
i begged the nurse not to call my mom
but she choked the phone number out of me
and that night my mother couldn’t
speak to me without that pitying, distanced
look in her eye that i hated so much
but it burned the confidence i might have had to say something

v.
i was 15 when i told my father i didn’t want to go swimming
that i just didn’t feel like it
let him conclude that i was self-conscious, embarrassed,
too much to even say so like
every other woman he had ever known in his life
and he told me i had to be more adventurous
that he was worried i was never going to have fun in my life
never going to be outgoing enough to get by
while i held back tears and the voice about to say “I’m on my period”

vi.
i looked
in the mirror
and allowed myself
for a moment
to notice the body i was trying so hard
to evaporate
i felt
so defeated
that it was still there

there was pain swelling
growing like a cyst
pushing against the backs of my retinas
pressing through my papery skin and cradling
my eyes in
tired
bruises

my pathetic reflection told me
i hated living in secret
flattening my chest so no one can accuse me of being a woman
shutting the door so i can pour hydrogen peroxide on stained bedsheets because i can’t put them in the family’s washing machine
stealing my mother’s razor and shaving everywhere to look like the other spotless girls at school

i hate the whispering
the hunching
the hiding
and pretending

vii.
there is not much
a few pretty strokes of ink can do
but
i am here now
to write about
shouting
about truth-telling
and openness
about rebuilding and restoring
and change

change for shattered girls who hate themselves like i did
much more than i did
whose hunched spines break under the pressure of the unseen
who set torches to their Power and burn themselves to ashes

no more ******* secrets.

I feel as if i’m cursed
As if it’s a misfortune to love her
In this lifetime at least

How brave we must be to love each other.
It’s like
We were both north poles
Only meant to connect with south instead of each other
Opposites attract...right?
That’s how everything was supposed to be laid out…

But there have to be some similarities
Whether that similarity is music
Friends, family, hobbies, sports...
Or gender.

Would you really rather see two men holding weapons
Than hands?
Do you want to see the slits on wrists
When you tell them who they can’t kiss?

Just so you know
I'm a girl
I love a girl
And I’m okay with that
You should be too.

Her poetry is also about me
even though it isn't entirely true
there ís a fire in my belly

maybe it can be put out
but as long as it burns, it desires
the best of you

that does not lust after my beauty
to penetrate my lips
but is longing

for the best of me
the heavy whole, holy
and safe, my home

that I formed myself
from the metal of my body
and the silk of my spirit

I am sick and tired of being sick and tired
I am tired of the fights,
The political wars,
And the real ones
Of the lies and deceit,
Of the blinding ignorance

You don’t care
You. Don’t. Care.
Because you don’t have to
Your brothers aren’t being shot,
Your mothers aren’t being locked up
Your aunts aren’t being deported,
And your cousins aren’t beating themselves up
You don’t care,
but I wish you did

What do I have to do?
Because all my talking and all my speeches aren’t helping
I am being called an angry child,
so you can sit comfortably on your throne of privilege

So please, enjoy
Enjoy as your world crumbles and falls around you
But know this
I may be tired,
I may be fed up,
And I may be frustrated,
But I am **** sure not done yet

Are you
the lonely wailing on the radio
or a smile for the screen

The strings do they pull
upward
or down
poor corners of your mouth
sore fleshy cheeks

leave the bone below for your own mind
Cream teeth molded to what the you believed
they want of you

Woman or man or he or she or him or they their
We admonish expectation.