Score |
194
What the body kept
<p><img alt="" src="/media/inline_insight_image/23774.jpg"/></p><p style="text-align: center; ">Photo by <a class="external-link" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/woman-in-white-dress-pulled-through-doorway-by-hands-y_B7p0uO6eI" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Europeana</a> for Unsplash</p><p><br/></p><p><br/></p><p>Once, she hummed in the bathtub and believed the house was a jar of light.</p><p>Then the quiet men with soft hands came at the hour the generator coughs itself to sleep.</p><p>A door clicked and a radio turned up.</p><p>Nobody asked why the radio did that.</p><p>She learned the ceiling's every crack by heart.</p><p>She learned to leave. </p><p>She floated up and watched a small girl fold herself like a letter no one meant to read.</p><p><br/></p><p>Now a spoon drops in the kitchen and my whole body is a fist.</p><p>I wake with the sheets wrung wet, </p><p>my eyes two bruised plums,</p><p>old stitches itching under the skin like a rumour.</p><p>I scrub until the towel comes away pink.</p><p>I stand under the shower until the water turns cold</p><p>and still I smell what I cannot name.</p><p>Some mornings I pick at my forearm,</p><p>the way you hunt for the edge of a sticker.</p><p>If I could just find the corner,</p><p>I would peel it all off and step out lighter.</p><p>“You'll be fine”, they say, passing the rice.</p><p>Room by room, the house inside me falls in.</p><p>No one hears it. I keep the lights on.</p><p><br/></p><p>“She enjoyed it”, someone says. </p><p>“Look how her body…”</p><p>And the girl in the corner puts both hands over her own mouth,</p><p>as if the body were a witness that lied under oath.</p><p>Who teaches a body that a flinch is not a confession?</p><p>What soap? What river?</p><p>How do you undo the damage?</p><p>Somewhere a man sleeps soundly,</p><p>pays his tithe on Sunday and folds his blood stained hands.</p><p><br/></p><p>Hate has moved into the back room of my chest.</p><p>It does not shout. It hums, the way she used to.</p><p><br/></p><p><em>“Vengeance is mine”, saith the Lord,</em></p><p><em>and I, with my st</em><em style="background-color: transparent;">eady hands,</em></p><p><em>wonder if He is hiring.</em></p><p><br/></p><p><br/></p>
17
Other insights from Potato
Contributor Points
Points-to-Coupons
Referral Earning
Insights for you.
Can We Talk About Period Pain?
Yesterday I nearly died. And please, I’m not even exaggerating. Menstrual cramps are ac...
231 views
58 upvotes
60 comments
Disrespectfully, please leave
Dear Menstruation,We need to talk. Like right now.First of all, I’ll hand it to you— yo...
217 views
49 upvotes
47 comments
Papa wasn't mine...
My father died on a Tuesday.The man who raised me. The quiet one. The one who came home...
207 views
47 upvotes
49 comments
It Was Never About Pink
For years, I wore my hate for pink like a badge of honour. In family pictures, I’m the ...
536 views
38 upvotes
42 comments
Your Daughter Is Already Pretending
They grow up to be women who have turned pretense into an art form. And it starts early...
353 views
36 upvotes
38 comments
Hot Body?
Since I clocked thirteen, getting dressed has felt like walking through a minefield. It...
152 views
39 upvotes
44 comments
GOOD GIRLS DON’T WIN
I’m done being a good girl; let the streets judge me. They told us to cross our le...
811 views
40 upvotes
33 comments
We Are Watching You Watch Us
They buried her alive, and they did it in broad daylight. They did it with paperwork. W...
155 views
30 upvotes
32 comments
The Dangers of Ultra Feminism
I'm a strong feminist and a girl's girl, even if that sounds cheesy. But as much as I...
701 views
29 upvotes
30 comments
Are we punishing psychosis?: The Lind...
Are We Punishing Psychosis?A person commits a crime under the influence of psychosis. A...
177 views
31 upvotes
28 comments
