The woman that I am

‘This is an elegy to all the things that we become before we’re done becoming women’ – Alysia Harris

I am not a girl of pretty words 

will not compliment her dress

despite what society expects 

I am not here to impress 

the fools that you still call your friends

and I am not sorry for the mess 

and I confess

Emotional intensity is still 

the greatest power I possess 

the reason I will not 

play part in foolish tests 

the reason I will not 

suck up 

to the emptiness 

that (some of) you confess to. 

I am not the girl in that pretty dress

someone that you can just compress 

into a pretty doll, with no stress,

pretty girl with pretty curves, no prowess 

too easy to possess 

with empty words, no stress, 

no reason to sweat, 

someone that you can just neglect 

squeeze between your palms, 

no distress, 

squeeze between your palms, no respect, 

I will not let you squeeze 

me dry.

I am not the girl who smiles best

and sometimes my tears run so deep

they carve my chest 

and I confess

I think I like my breasts 

but I also like chess

this meeting of minds that burns

skin, bones, wet chest

I will not offer you myself

if you are not bold yourself

bold enough to hold my mind, 

my waist, my chest, 

my mind

as you enter

the chaos in my head 

my mind 

as it diffuses in your head

my mind, doesn’t like silence 

my mind, doesn’t do silence, 

my mind likes to explodes instead

I am not that girl, not that girl 

with her heart well packed 

in boxes, come closer, come closer, 

I said, you’ll see, I said 

that I am not the one to fit into that boxy dress

not that girl

with her mouth well shut

her hair sleeked back, no stray strand,

no wild streak, passions held back

I am not that girl, 

not the one who could lie to you best 

who would tell you success stories 

but never the rest, never the worst 

never the sad endings, the bruised lungs

the bloody hands 

never the sad endings, 

in which men could bring peace but 

they bring mayhem instead, 

no rest, only stress, 

a bubble in which everything is blurry

I confess

I’ve been in the bubble myself. 

I know what it means 

to not feel good enough for him 

or her

or them

to not feel good enough 

to want to be that girl, 

someone else, calmer than you 

perhaps, younger than you, 

perhaps, quieter, collected, 

feminine enough, tame, 

enough. 

I got my spiky teeth back on 

this time and you cannot try to tame me, 

this time, this time, I love my rough edges enough

this time, I am edgy enough 

proud enough, this time, 

being the woman that I am,

I am enough.

.

Not you, not this, untitled

I tried to write about someone else tonight

Not you 

Not you, not about the way anxiety nibbles slowly

snatches my mind away

Not about the way I am scared I am not good enough

even though I feel pretty enough,

I feel pretty enough but I am not whole.

*****

I tried to write about someone else tonight

Not you 

Not you, not about the way fear is the castle

I hide into, not about how I built these impenetrable 

walls 

with frozen tears, frozen fears, 

the fear that I could never mould myself into

something 

people can hold onto.

I keep slipping, sliding sometimes

into in-existence

tell me how come I feel like a door 

despite these walls

tell me 

how come I feel like an open door

for people to walk into

*****

I tried not to write about you and the way

The way I tried to reverse the roles with you 

The way life reverses schemes and plots

The way it undoes our doings 

The way it implants feelings

in all the wrong places

The way I feel like I’d do all the wrong things

in all the wrong places

And still fall after the climax

the heights and depths 

of this intensity that’s haunted me 

all my life, I’ve been hiding intensity 

in the softness of my watery eyes

can’t you see

I have a thing about anything fluid 

and the way its force sweeps away 

everything that gets lost 

evaporates 

inevitably

I have my ways of burning, burning

until everything evaporates

until you can smell burning feelings in the atmosphere

until you can no longer smell the feelings

****

I tried not to tell you that I’ve been an open door

for people to walk in and 

people to walk out

just when I am trying to shut them in 

I tried not to tell you that I know 

where it hurts 

because I’ve been hurt before 

in a myriad different ways

because I feel pretty enough

yet I’m still full of holes

because I’ve been hurt before

I’ve been left before 

 with no alarm bells

ringing, no phones ringing

without a warning sign

a goodbye wave, short conversations

over coffee or art or sex

or the lack of it

or whatever it is that we’ve shared 

we, the ghosts and I,

We shared, we share

No more, tell me 

why does it all have to end

when the prize is won

when we’ve mastered the game 

when we’ve held the flesh

when we’ve consumed what was never ours

in the first place

*****