They all see it on the news,
They all turn the TV off
“Poor girl, poor thing
Too sad, too bleak.”
They ignore all the worries
And put on a smile
But when it happens to Them, it’s everything.
They shout on the rooftops and cry so people know
But the rest of Them don’t listen at all
“Poor girl, poor thing
Too sad, too bleak.”

I am a woman of the ocean,
You cannot break me,
But can drown in me.

-Nida Mahmoed

I write poetry
and paint sunsets with those words
I lie on rooftops
until the sky's adorned with birds
I dream with music in my mind
and in colours you haven't heard of
To you,
I am beautiful
I am something different
I will fill the hole in you
your emptiness brimming with laughter
I will lift your feet off the earth and plant them into my heart
but you will keep digging -
trying to unbind my roots
But I am not gentle, as that flower
You cannot like what you see, and pluck me out of the water
I am not what I seem on the surface
I am a flood
and I leave destruction in my wake
I will wash away all the paths you've ever walked on
and I will leave you astray
Wondering
if you'll ever find your way back

He pointed at the curve where my mass should be.
The skinny line wherein the whole of my being should fit--
based on what a man in a lab coat said once.
He dashed a tiny spec above it, where I was.
Out of line.
Not fitting in.
Against the rules.
I counted the tiny squares that separated me from my belonging...
… one... two... three...
Three squares from worthiness.
Three squares wrong.
Three squares from deserving love.
Three squares from good enough.
I stared at that dot a man drew for me and discovered brokenness.
I was five.

To whom do I belong?
To the cold morning
and the unrelenting pound of my feet,
to meet the waistband of my favorite pants.

To whom do I belong?
To the cries of the babe left momentarily alone
while I halt time in the motion of rushing water and clarifying peace
in being simply clean.

To whom do I belong?
To the man who comes home from a career
I gave up to care for others,
To the man who pours into me every need, secret, thought and dream without cease?
While I silently and forever support.

To whom do I belong?
To the child so afraid of the world after years of hurt
Best friend, Gilmore girl, dreamer with an uncertain expiry date.

To whom do I belong?
To the food raised,
The clothes mended,
The laundry flapping in the wind,
The music that surges through my thoughts and never ends
And is reluctantly reminded "later, later, later my friend".

To whom do I belong?
To the old man now dying, tended by many
Yet wanting wanting wanting the role of my beloved or child
While his wife and all push me to take what she has abandoned
To give of me the parts of her she won't share
Untangling from a blackberry bush full of webs.

To whom do I belong?

Men are dogs;
You can hardly call yourself a brother
With no respect for a father's daughter: me.

A man of God are you?
Plead to him for forgiveness, for your wandering eyes
And unfaithful hands.

It is men like you who lust for me,
As if I'm to fulfill a fantasy
Or be your one time secret

I will never be anyone's one time secret.

If your sons had been born daughters
Wouldn't you want them to do the same?

Hey dear women
Don’t you believe?
You’re not less than anyone
Because you bleed!
You are an epitome of abstract
With the universe in your body
And you’re the soul of the earth
Because you bring lives to feet
So never consider yourself any less
Than the men you see
You can also accomplish anything
That you desire to be
Keep your head high
And do what you need
Because we women are the entity
That this world will always need.

"I should have told you more often how gorgeous you are,"
he says while his lips cut deeper into my open wounds,
broken fragments of our memories littered throughout.

"I never wanted to be gorgeous", I say,
feeling his cold hands move through me.
Gorgeous women carry burdens I want no part of.
No, I wanted to be everything else.
I wanted to be loved.

But then you always say it - "baby you're so gorgeous",
and now I'm supposed to thank you for these bones,
for these eyes from my mother,
for a body you wouldn't love when the weight it carried wasn't
"gorgeous."

I lay awake holding love handles and cradling cheeks,
remembering every time a man called me "gorgeous"
and meant usable.

called me "gorgeous"
and meant agreeable.

called me "gorgeous"
and meant better if she's silent.

called me "gorgeous"
and meant too forgiving.

called me "gorgeous"
and meant less than whole.

called me "gorgeous"
and meant less than I am.

"Let me show you the parts of your body I like the most," he says
with a sly smile, constructing a mental roadmap.  
"No, let me show you the pieces of your soul that lured me", I reply.
I want to be introduced to the raw, untamed corners of your mind.
I want to compare the beauty of our understandings.
I want to be asked how it's possible that the entire universe can fit
inside of a kiss, a ring, and an outstretched hand.
I want to know why faces so admired fade from memory so quickly.

I never wanted to be gorgeous.