Woman
I am
A woman
Proud
Of her legs, her hips, her breasts, her swan neck
Flowing out of me
I bring blood and I bring life
I am
Unapologetic
My stigma
My taboo
Are worn proudly
My scars are a compass
They point north
Allowing me to avoid paths of past mistakes
My acne is a map
The backroads and highways of stress survived
Life pushing through the skin in swollen red bumps and tiny white sparks
My stretch marks
The battle my belly and breasts fought
Through too big and too little
Fat fluctuating like waves pulled by tide
And pushed back through seawall
My womb
Empty thus far
May overflow someday
Life coming in screams and gasps of air
My lungs starving as her’s take first breath
Or my womb
May remain empty
Life filled in to the brim in other ways
It will still come in screams
Of pain pleasure rage love
Either way
My body has served me
And I will worship at the alter of me.
Nostalgia
The taste and smell of honeysuckle
Of baked pears with cinnamon
The blue of chlorine that stings young nostrils and tongues
Even the sky has a taste here
Things that you shouldn’t be able to touch
Butterfly wings, flame, cloud, air
Are all within grasp of tiny hands
Scrubbing dirt off of scabbed knees under grass stained jeans
Fear had a taste
It was metallic and made you want to cry
And it smelled like contraction paper and a freshly opened box of crayons
It came on Sunday nights and Monday mornings
When school was an inevitability
And on Friday afternoons
Excitement tasted like freshly baked cookies
And smelled like Christmas tree needles and exploding magnolia blossoms
Joy came with dirty swamp water and loud splashes in mud puddles
Or skidding on patches of ice under a dazzling blue sky
With joy there is an intermingling of all five senses
And whatever brings you that feeling gives with it a
Taste, smell, sound, touch and sight
That cannot be put into words
But that you will remember as clear and distinct twenty, thirty, fifty years later
And you’ll call it nostalgia
Because when you’re an adult the senses are not enough
You have to put a word on it.
