A Woman’s Work

Written on the toilet at 5am while facing an onset of cramps. If only we could have the perspective of the future while we were in the present 

I can feel everything. 

Space. The air. The vibrations. 

the people. 

I can feel the gravity how heavy it is. 

The blood in my veins. 

I can feel my brain

And all its memories. 

I can feel the pain in my elbow from the time I fell off of a scooter. 

I can remember my mother sitting at the edge of my bed at night, softly caressing my forehead. 

I can remember more than 1000 kisses from her for an entire lifetime. 

And I can remember none.

I can  remember the first time I ever got my period

From the kitchen floor I groaned. 

That would be the first day I was a woman.

I was 9. 

Slowly my fruit ripened

Faster than the rest

I did detest.

It was then I realized jealousy came in the form of breasts.

It felt like betrayal from my body,

Like a doctor without credentials,

She kept signing off on the “essentials”

Plaguing me with curves I did not want.

Gazes I did not ask for.

I was 12.

I learned to use this skin stretched over bones 

Not like my ancestors who beat on drums,

but like an addict afraid of needles.

If I just kept using it, the pain may go away.

I was 15.

Chalked full of ideas that no one ever asked. 

I wrote them onto pages of paper.

I was pretty faced and a bit too fat,

Taken advantage of by my step-dads dad,

Good grades, didn’t make it out of undergrad.

Too too too too too too too too too too too much!

Not enough!

Never enough! 

So, when the ink bled through, I learned to not be so rough. 

I can remember the sound of seagulls at dawn sailing over golden sands. 

I can remember the mist and how I couldn’t capture it–in my hands.

I wish I could forget all I have been forced to learn,

By man who doesn’t know how womanhood is earned.