Don’t call it life,
when it’s my life you’re taking,
my future you’re chaining
with laws you’ll never carry,
burdens you’ll never bear.
You preach freedom but give me a cage,
cutting deeper every time you say
I’m not strong enough to choose,
not wise enough to decide
what happens inside my own skin.
I am not your pawn.
Not a battleground for your beliefs,
not a vessel for your “values”
I am fire and fury and a voice unbound,
and I will not sit in silence
while you tear me down.
This choice is mine—
not yours to steal,
not yours to bind,
not yours to strip away in shadowed rooms,
where you sign away my rights
like they’re yours to own.
This body, this voice, this choice is mine,
I am whole, unapologetically, my own.

Don’t call it life,
when it’s my life you’re stripping,
my body, my rights, my voice you’re silencing
with hands that never held the weight
of this choice.
Tell me,
how is it your right to choose for me,
when you’ve never felt your own body betrayed?
When you’ve never felt the aftermath,
the ache, the anger,
when your life was taken, stolen,
and they asked what you were wearing,
Explained to you how it was your own fault.
How dare you call yourselves defenders of life
when you crush the life in us,
when you leave scars on our hearts
with your careless words,
your polished speeches,
your “righteous fists”.
Don’t you dare tell me what I can do
with this body, this breath, this heartbeat,
like it’s something you’ve earned,
like it’s something you know.
You legislate with hands that’ll never bleed,
never bear the weight, never know the fear—
you write laws with ink you’ll never feel burn,
ink that cuts us open, while you watch from afar.
Tell me,
how is it your right to decide,
how is it your right to choose,
when it’s my life, my body on the line,
when it’s my blood, my bones, my voice
you erase with a pencil?

You never see the hidden scars,
the marks left by hands uninvited,
by voices saying “boys will be boys” while my voice is silenced,
a whisper swallowed by the same mouths that judge me
for what they took.
Is that justice? Is that your idea of freedom?
No, you’ll never know.
You’ll never know because your world isn’t stained with fear,
your nights aren’t haunted by footsteps behind,
by eyes burning holes as you walk down the street
wondering if tonight’s the night someone decides
that your body is now theirs.
I am not your object, your pawn, your game.
Not your pet to control, to condemn, to tame.
I am not a vessel for your morals,
not a canvas for your shame.
This body, my body,
is mine.
Not yours to shackle in laws,
not yours to bind in blame,
not yours to drown in silence.

It’s said that the human body replaces itself
With entirely new cells every seven years.

In seven years, I will be free from your touch.

In seven years your fingerprints will
No longer be burned into my skin.
In seven years I will be able to
Wash my body and finally feel clean.

In seven years I will be able to kiss
Without getting sick in a cold toilet,
Sobbing sobbing sobbing,
Because my tongue tastes of you.

In seven years, maybe I won’t
Lock my bedroom doors,
Fearing a monster that lives
Not under the bed.

In seven years, one more woman
Will pretend to feel free.

i wasn't born hungry, i remember how it happened.
a bad man put a hole in me, one day when i was
very young
and i've been eating ever since:
i love gluttony, hate, ****, burning buildings, and you.

i'm sorry, it's not my fault. i was born hungry,
like strange flowers bloom:

both too old and too soon.

As I fall asleep
I hear the snakes hissing under my bed

I discovered them when I was a little girl
the first time one crawled up under my skirt

they left marks all over my body
scars I can't remove

I still find myself scrubbing so hard
trying to remove their mark

I still dream that they are all over me
I can't make them go away